OzSTOC Ride Reports, Pictures & Videos > National Rally 2012 Ride Reports & Photos

Greencan's Gallivant...take two!

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Greencan:
Evenin' All...

Well for moi it was never a certainty to attend this Rally but getting the head down got all the I had to do out of the way by Wednesday evening  after Easter, so was relatively easy to plan a route on the Garmin to Blackheath then halve the distance and set the midpoint as overnight stop over, in this case it turned out to be The Rock on the Olympic Hwy. So having set The Rock as the first destination all I had to do was to turn on all the avoidances and pick out half a dozen towns in Vic and NSW I'd like to travel through, and viola!

So Day 1 began by heading north out of Sunbury  passing through Riddells Creek, up the Cherokee Rd to Romsey, Lancefield, Tooborac, Heathcote, and to Nagambie for a cuppa and a pee. from there 'Lee from Garmin' had me again just sticking to the 'C' roads by taking me over the bendy wooden Kirwan bridge to Murchison and turning due East to South Shepparton and across to Dookie for lunch and a pee in the park under the old Chateau Dookie clock were I thought I had the park to myself before I was joined by 2 elderly couples on their Beemers from Adelaide and tho we'd never meet before we had common friends in Adelaide.


Kirwan Bridge over Lake Nagambie

After lunch twas again eastward passing through the recently effected flooded towns of St James, Tungamah, Wilby, Peechelba, then up to Rutherglen then up another back road following the Murray where I crossed over into NSW at Howlong for fuel, cuppa and another pee. Beginning to see a pattern developing here. Then it was up to Brocklesby, and across to Burrumbuttock,  were the local farmers decided simultaneously to burn off all their stubble, talk about 'smoke me a kipper'; then onto  Culcairn and finally to The Rock were I found I was only 1 of 3 guests at the Motel section and after 20:00 was on me pat marlone as the 'cockies' all left the pub to go home, so one last Tooheys Old and twas beddy bobos for this little black duck as well. Now I know a lot of Guys avoid these old 60's style pubs/motels on major roads and railway lines, but if you have a way of dealing traffic noise I have found these places both very cheap and tidy.


Now I had considered a brown eye to accompany this pic, as I thought the iphone would have been perfect for this

Day 2 Saw me (unfortunately), travelling further on the Olympic Highway which I'd have to say has gone to shyte primarily due to the 10's of thousands of grain trucks on it, then up to Wagga, Junee, Cootamundra before again heading eastward at Wallendbeen, Harden, and Boorowa for morning tea which I shared in the sunshine with a bloke from Dubbo into model trains heading to Goulburn, and a bloke from Canberra on his Bandit heading for an over night's stay in a boutique brewery in Dubbo where the thought crossed my mind in asking him if I could tag along too. As it happen I am glad I didn't as from Boorowa it was north to Frogmore, Wyangala Dam, and onto Woodstock. This road though only about 110 clicks was just magic!


Ya know when ya in the bush when...


An ST next to something big and before it closes for good


Wyangala Village as seen through the windscreen of an 1100

This ride to Woodstock was so good it made the next dreary bit along the Western Hwy into Bathurst tolerable, so tolerable in fact that on the spare of the moment I decided to call into Mt Panorama via a back road and which 'lee from Garmin' wanted me to visit a winery or tearooms or such like, but I was having none of it. I was altogether very surprised to see a gaggle of ST's at the top of the mount all parked up, but with true tunnel vision I didn't stop as I was looking forward to the decent without any traffic up front. Dunno why I was keen to ride around the track as I have done many times before...must have been the after effects of that ride from Boorowa to Wood stock...before sighting a familiar 'truck' parked on rider's right out of Caltex chase, now I had to stop.


"I see a 'truck' and bloke with a camera aimed at me...buggered that line up"


Ozstocers of yesterday year 29, 8 and 15...and this is the last time you'll hear numbers!


The Return
Day 4. Well I reckon Laurie and I were about  the last ones to leave the caravan park at around 0900. Barry had seen to it that we were all up after he come back from ablutions and all set for an early start to get to Walcha. Laurie and John said "Nah, he'll be home in Brissy today" and something about "..cooking..." and "...lovely cupcakes". Lost on me. Anyway, having said our goodbyes we retraced our steps westward along the Western Hwy again stopping for a lap of the track before making our way to Carcoar for a bit of a look round but turned into a much longer stop when as we parked the bikes a couple of ladies across the street asked if they could make us a cuppa...a quick look around to  make sure the locals weren't in the process of making a 15 foot wicker man they...too easy! Carcoar is well worth a stop over as it's in a time warp. Apparently, it's not uncommon for blokes on bikes to made welcome and have a cuppa made for them...HarieG, ya reading this! It'd been at least 50 years since an elderly lady in her pinny popped out from behind her sweets counter and asked if I needed any help, it seems that this wee store holder has been behind the same counter every day for 47 of them.


"Cheers ol' boy!"

From Carcoar it was onto Cowra to refuel and visit to the POW camp and the site of the break out I'd read about in high school. Though I've been to the Japanese Gardens on a few occasions before, this visit to the ruins of the camp was a first and as the sun was beginning to descend over the yardarm of the replica guard tower at the site we departed Cowra for a welcomed 'fang' out to Wyangala village and it's Country Club to meet up with Laurie's Sister and a beer, or two, in that order. Wyangala is a tops little spot which I'd seen from on top of the dam wall on the trip up on day 2, never thinking I'd be returning there, was great but a little saddened the hear that it's simply a matter of time before riding across the dam wall will become a thing of the past as a bridge is to built a little downstream to allow soon be started dam works which will see the end of motoring across it. The evening of day 4 also saw the last of the Glayva to be consumed.


All that remains of the Cowra POW camp...gone also is the railway


Sunshine and shiny STeeds

Day 5. We left Wyangala around 08:00 having thoughtfully set up Laurie's Sister Duracel bunnies in just the position to make lots of batteries with Homer Simpson to pimp for them :eek; then it was off for Canowindra but not before passing through Cowra again and a visit to the Age of Fishes museum. This museum is well worth the visit if your into fossils or at an age of becoming a fossil, like we are. My personal interest is fishing and those suckers of yesterday year look more like they'd have eaten me than the other way round. Canowindra in parts was much like Carcoar insomuch it's architecture reminded me of all the places I'd stopped at in 1957 en-route from Rockhampton to Sydney along the coast in the Peugeot 203, especially when we had lunch at the 'Garden of Roses Cafe' and had a proper hamburger.


A fossil

From Canowindra we headed for some back roads to Eugowra and back down to Gooloogong for a an afternoon middy and a sit in sun an watch a few grain trucks pass by before setting out for last leg of the day to Laurie's Dad's place in Grenfell. After another fuse change in Laurie's quest of searching for the electrical gremlins it was time to just kick back outside for a beer or 2 and reflect over the past weekend and the great time we'd had before we trotted down to the Railway Hotel for the best pub meal I have ever had in a western NSW pub. Not only was it good, it was hot food actually served hot, and cheap, very cheap. So much so, if passing through Grenfell I would highly recommend it. Visiting Laurie's Dad was inspirational. At 92 he's not only agile physically, his mind and his knowledge of computers is extraordinary.  For some years I've been saying "I wanna grow up being like Mr Mutt",  an octogenarian I first met at the 99 Ulysses AGM, now I am not so sure.


2 more fossils in a shed that suits their age...collectively with 385,000clicks...and counting

Day 6 I decided to leave Laurie spend some time with his Dad and set off  for the last leg of my trip home by firstly going to Young and straight down to Gundagai and pick up on 'Sesame Street', the Hume Hwy. And while motoring along this boring piece of Commonwealth funded real estate I began to muse what it was that made NSW major roads so shyte. And as I gazed to my left and saw the remanent of a (yet) another abandoned and forgotten railway line it suddenly dawned on me that every day that I travelled in country NSW I had seen hundreds and hundreds of disused and abandoned railway line and rolling stock. Nowhere, was a functioning rail network to move grain
 
Ciao, the can :)

tj189:
Nice report there Greencan, thanks for sharing  :beer

Shaun:
Thanks for the write up Dick, and it was great to meet you too.

Cheers, Shaun

Biggles:
Nice piece of writing, mate.  And some social philosophy thrown in gratis!  :thumbs

Barry and Marissa:
Excellent ride report and pic's Dickie. So glad you came along. It was great to catch up again and Marissa and I looking forward to catching up again in June!

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