2018 NatRally - Mackay - General Disscussion & Information

[Wild Rose]

Great photo's John & Kate 
Thanks for sharing
It's good to finally see the National Rally actually happened
 

[Biggles]

Awesome shots there.  Looks like everyone had fun.  I hate you all. 

Me too

It's all incentive advertising to get everyone gee'd up for Tassie 2019.   

[Bodø]

Don't worry.  I intend to be there.

[gone-cruising]

Hi Guys and Gals,
Thank you to Jon & Kate and everyone that was at the NatRally. It was great to meet like minded, down to earth, friendly people.
It was my first meet and I was made welcome and that made it so easy to feel part of the club.
It was great to be able to talk to people with the knowledge and prepared to share it with a new member, I learn't heaps and I thank you all for being YOU
Steve 

[Scarlett Thunderbolt]

Hi Guys and Gals,
Thank you to Jon & Kate and everyone that was at the NatRally. It was great to meet like minded, down to earth, friendly people.
It was my first meet and I was made welcome and that made it so easy to feel part of the club.
It was great to be able to talk to people with the knowledge and prepared to share it with a new member, I learn't heaps and I thank you all for being YOU
Steve 

... glad you enjoyed it... let's stay in touch and go for a ride when your knee permits... cheers, John & Kate.

[Scarlett Thunderbolt]

Just some quick numbers for you all... NatRally 2018 registered attendees : 52... number of bikes (STeeds & everything) at Saturday RTE: 25... Sunday RTE : 22

Cheers, John & Kate.

[Scarlett Thunderbolt]

One of the best...

Below is the email we wrote last night to thank Luke Burgess at Mackay Kawasaki for both the sponsorship and for giving up his Sunday afternoon to give the guys rides on his jetski at Kinchant Dam:

Dear Luke

I just wanted to express our great appreciation and huge thanks for taking the time on your day off to give our members such a memorable afternoon on Kinchant Dam yesterday. We all had an absolutely brilliant time and everyone appreciated your kindness and generosity in sponsoring our annual national rally despite the fact that we are not Kawasaki motorbike riders. We will take away amazing memories of this weekend, not least because of what you have done to help and entertain us. We were sorry that you weren’t able to join us at the dinner, and hope your racing was successful.

I’m attaching a photo of you on the jetski with Leonie, who, together with her husband Bill, had a jetski ride on her bucket list. On Sunday, you made it possible for both of them to tick that one off. Bill is one of our ‘legendary’ members, and I’m pretty sure he’ll be putting a good polish on your name on the OzSTOC forum :-)

Thank you again, so very much.

Kate Chiconi

Here's his amazing response:

Absolutely no worries at all, Kate! It was a awesome day yesterday and I loved seeing the smiles on all their faces! That made my day also, knowing that it was a highlight for some of them on the trip! 

Also thank you for sending in all your club members to our shop as we loved helping and looking after them for their tyres and servicing and appreciated the support you guys gave us. 

If the opportunity ever arises again Mackay Kawasaki or Townsville Kawasaki will be more then happy to sponsor it again as we saw so much merit out of it. 

What an awesome photo! I’m so glad that they enjoyed the day! ☺ Any more pics feel free to send them to us as we can put them up on our Facebook page ☺

Thanks again for coming to us.

Luke Burgess
Mackay Kawasaki
Dealer Principal/Business Manager
0448540549
(07) 49424300

What a great bloke... If any of you are likely to be passing through Mackay or Townsville and are in need of tyres or service, forget Honda – you know where to go! And in case any of you were wondering why he wasn't at the Rally Dinner on Saturday night, this is what he was up to on Saturday...

Cheers,
John & Kate

[Bodø]

I wasn't able to make it but am really enjoying reading all this stuff.  Ironically I do ride a Kawasaki.

[Scarlett Thunderbolt]

Luke Burgess has asked if anyone has any great photos of the jet-ski fun at Kinchant Dam on Sunday, could you please let him have them for the Mackay Kawasaki FB page... You can either email them to me at the address shown on my profile or MMS them to 0407913065... cheers, John & Kate.

[Skip]

Wow. What a great guy. That is impressive on many levels. 

[Cerebral Knievel]

Home at 3pm after dropping Tipsy off at  2:45.
Spotted a    40 k's north of Gin Gin taking off into the distance rounding up caravans.
Turned out to be Phil S when we caught up with him for breakfast in Childers an hour later.

A GIGANTIC thank you to John & Kate for organising a fantastic event that will be hard to top, and to everyone in the background doing all the unsung hard slog thankless stuff.

It was great to catch up with members new and old. I hope to see you in Tasmania.   

[Scarlett Thunderbolt]

Home at 3pm after dropping Tipsy off at  2:45.
Spotted a    40 k's north of Gin Gin taking off into the distance rounding up caravans.
Turned out to be Phil S when we caught up with him for breakfast in Childers an hour later.

A GIGANTIC thank you to John & Kate for organising a fantastic event that will be hard to top, and to everyone in the background doing all the unsung hard slog thankless stuff.

It was great to catch up with members new and old. I hope to see you in Tasmania.

We're so glad you enjoyed it!  People have come from such long distances that we wanted to ensure they had a really memorable visit – looks like the effort paid off

We've been doing the rounds of the venues and suppliers, thanking them for putting in the hard yards, and they've all said what a pleasure it was to deal with the OzSTOC crew, how friendly and appreciative everyone was, and how you'd all be welcome back any time. Go OzSTOC!

We won't be at Tassie ourselves, as we explained; it won't be possible to accrue the leave in time, but we hope to catch up with you at a SE QLD RTE some time soon.

Cheers,
John & Kate

[Gadget]

Home at 3:23 pm.

Shonee and I thoroughly enjoyed the weekend, thank you so much John and Kate and ably supported by Tony, Chris and Jean.

It was so great to catch up with everyone and to meet some me purple as well.

The venues and activities were superb.

I didn't expect to ride a Spyder and at best hoped to do a leg of one ride as a pillion. Still grinning.

The Jetski was a rocket!

Apart from the Torvil and Dean bed, my only other disappointment was not getting to say farewell to everyone.

The sooner we know the Tasmanian destination the better chance I/we might make it.

Again, many thanks to one and all.

Some of my photos from the weekend.



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[Gadget]

Oh, and this is on one tank of fuel in the Eos, last filled at the Caltex Sarina.


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[Biggles]

We didn't get home until 7:00 this evening, after planning on 3:00.  Just 5 kays south of Tiaro the front tyre blew.  We couldn't see a nail, so called RACQ who arrived 50 minutes later and took us into Maryborough.  The fault was one of those wretched angle valve stems.  But this wasn't an adapter- we know not to leave them on the stem.  It was a flexible rubber one.  They just plug in like a grommet, but fail due to flexing.  This one had done 28,000 kays.  The tyre bloke at the KTM agency said they only use them on ATVs, not on any bikes, Aggie or other because they've seen them fail.
So, guys and gals- if you get angled stems, get the metal ones that attach to the rim with a nut on a thread.  They don't flex or fail.
The PR4 wasn't damaged.  We were doing 100 kph on a straight and pulled it up in about 30 or 40 metres without any dramas.  Getting it onto the towie's trolley was a bit of a handful but would have been easier if it was lined up straight- the location could have been better (and also far worse- at least we had a flat 1.5 metre sealed shoulder!)

[Kev Murphy]

Just a quick note... I have been following Lindsays spot, he arrived safe in Port Augusta at around 8pm local SA time, and has settled in for a well earned nights rest after around 1400 Km travel today from Narrabri.

[Gadget]

We didn't get home until 7:00 this evening, after planning on 3:00.  Just 5 kays south of Tiaro the front tyre blew.  We couldn't see a nail, so called RACQ who arrived 50 minutes later and took us into Maryborough.  The fault was one of those wretched angle valve stems.  But this wasn't an adapter- we know not to leave them on the stem.  It was a flexible rubber one.  They just plug in like a grommet, but fail due to flexing.  This one had done 28,000 kays.  The tyre bloke at the KTM agency said they only use them on ATVs, not on any bikes, Aggie or other because they've seen them fail.
So, guys and gals- if you get angled stems, get the metal ones that attach to the rim with a nut on a thread.  They don't flex or fail.
The PR4 wasn't damaged.  We were doing 100 kph on a straight and pulled it up in about 30 or 40 metres without any dramas.  Getting it onto the towie's trolley was a bit of a handful but would have been easier if it was lined up straight- the location could have been better (and also far worse- at least we had a flat 1.5 metre sealed shoulder!)

That explains how we got in front of you going the short route through Biggenden and Woolooga. (It's now only 3 km of dirt) Glad you're both OK.

I had right angled metal valve stems for over 70,000 km and no problems.

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[Wild Rose]

I'm glad everything is OK Biggles, nothing worse then Bike problems on a trip
I have the metal angle one so never had a problem
But have had a few flat tyres. Always the rear tyre 

[Gadget]

Our total travels for the Rally.

On a disappointing note, we passed through Woolooga and the wonderful cafe was permanently closed. Shop for lease.
 

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[Jdbiker]

After saying farewell to the last remaining OzStoc’ers on Monday morning....we took the Peak Downs Hwy out of Mackay arriving Roma around 7.30pm..... then drove through the night arriving Bourke early parts of Tuesday morning ......after a lengthy breakfast just out of Bourke we drove straight through via Kidman Way arriving back home by 11.20pm last night.
In total 26 days & 9648 kms....was a great trip to the top of Australia & to the National Rally at Mackay ..
Thanks to all involved....... an amazing job  :  
Until Tassie ......

[Kev Murphy]

I am still following Lindsays travels by spot, he left Port Augusta at around 5.45 am this morning and is around 20 Km or so west of Penong which is about halfway between Port Augusta and the W.A. border. 600 Km covered so far today.

https://spotwalla.com/tripViewer.php?id=1a5bf5b62b8605494a&showInfo=yes&showHome=yes&hoursPast=0&fillFactor=20&zoomLevel=10&showAll=yes

[Scarlett Thunderbolt]

NR2018 Mackay Group Pic.

... we're on the road today... we'll repost this group pic as a much larger file, captioned with names (as much as our memory allows)... please let us know if we get some wrong (post rally brain fade)... J&K

[Scarlett Thunderbolt]

L to R, Front, Seated: DBfive, Carrol (Shiney), Chippy (jdbiker), johnnyYTED, Alison (Bloodman), Bloodman, mini-Dan (Sulkybear), Sulkybear, StinkyPete, Gordo (?), jdbiker.
L to R, Front, Kneeling: Nigel, Capt Thunderbolt, Kate (Scarlett Thunderbolt).
L to R, Middle Standing: Val (NandV), Leonie (Biggles), Ree (Capt Thunderbolt), Pockey, NavGirl20.
L to R, Back, Standing: Sicman, NandV, PC, Biggles, PhilS, Mitch, Shiney, West Aussie Glen, Theresa (WAG), gone-cruising, cravenhaven, JC, Joso, Roguedog, Tipsy, Chris (StinkyPete), Totgas, ?, Tding, ?, Wilko, Gadget, Rod, Lonerider1, Scarlett Thunderbolt, WendyL, Cerebral Knievel, Chris (ppopeye), ppopeye, ST2UP.

We’ve updated the original NR2018 Group Pic with a bigger one that you can zoom in on.
There’re some members we can’t identify or we’re not positive... Please help by identifying anyone we’ve missed or got wrong by leaving a comment… Cheers, John & Kate.

[Kev Murphy]

Lindsay is well on the way home, currently pulled in at a BP near Caiguna.
Has ridden 1300km so far today, should reach Perth tomorrow.

https://spotwalla.com/tripViewer.php?id=1a5bf5b62b8605494a&showInfo=yes&showHome=yes&hoursPast=0&fillFactor=20&zoomLevel=10&showAll=yes

[Joso]

Hi all arrived home at lunch time today took our time & took 3 days first stop miles then Narrabri then a nice little 312 klms home had a great time