Now the emotion of the day has subsided I can add some details of the ride.
It was always going to be emotional for me as Allan Macqueen and I were in High School together at Kyogle, a small country town in NSW.
This says a little bit of how senselessy we last him.
http://monumentaustralia.org.au/themes/people/crime/display/100949-constable-allan-wayne-mcqueenNow for how the day went.
We were up early and back at the bikes ready to ride down to The Domain for the morning service at NSW.
On arrival we saw the NSW MacLaren and the Austin Martin. And the bikes kept steaming in. It at that stage was the biggest gathering of bikes I'd ever seen.
Soon the Bagpipes started playing and the crowd moved up to the memorial.
As we waited I saw a RCMP uniform and went and asked the him if he minded if I got a photo. Someone he was taking to offered to take it for me. Afterwards I had a story chat as to what brit him to this event. He said his daughter lives in Sydney and he wasn't going to be home for their Peace Officees Memorial Day so he thought this a fantastic opportunity to participate and get to ride a motorcycle in Australia.
The service was brief but moving and the minutes silence soon passed.
Then it was back to the bikes to kit up and wait to depart in a fully escorted ride from The Domain, over the Harbour Bridge, along the M7 and onto the Hume with most major on ramps being closed to traffic.
At 2 separate places along the Hume Highway to Goulburn there were signs with the names of officers who had passed and the cavalcade slowed to 40 km per hour with serving officers standing to attention and some holding a salute the entire time.
At over bridges and on the sides of the highway there were people standing and waving with riders returning the wave.
At one point, I could see the leaf bikes and ask the Red and Blues on the crest ahead of us and it was over 2 km by the time I reached that point there was still fat more than 2 km of bikes behind us. In fact over the CB, when we were over 15 km past the junction of the Hume and M7 I heard they were just reopening the Hume.
There were some impatient drivers and some belligerent Truck Drivers, but in the most part everyone was well behaved.
We peeled off at Goulburn for lunch at the Police Academy and by the time Sean, his mate Terry and I had eaten, bikes were still dribbling in.
Worth only 80 or so km to go, and with Terry on a Harley, we decided to head off ahead of the pack, refuel Terry's bike and make or way to EPIC which was the final gathering place before the ride to the National Memorial.
There was a pavilion set up with Indians and Yamaha and a few other motorcycle related businesses.
We hung around there for a while and then the message went out that we had to be on the bike ready to go by 2:45 pm. So we sky followed the instructions and we're ready to go on a quote warm Canberra afternoon. Around 3:00 pm we departed and rode up around the square at Parliament House and then down to the National Memorial near The Carillon.
We were only 5 minutes from the front of the gr I uo and we're parked up by 3:20. The rest of the bikes continued to arrive up until after 4:20.
While we waited, I went and found Allan on the wall. Up until then it hadn't felt real, in all these years.
Then the ceremony began and each state came forward with the baton fire their state which is hollow and carries the names of officers worst names will be added to the wall on Police Memorial day 29th Sep. I am pleased to say all batons were empty this year.
After the service I thanked Sean for the invite, said my farewells to Terry and some others and went to Lionel's for the night.
We had a lovely dinner and shared a red and soon I was ready for bed.
