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This page is for stories about each ride we go on.   There might be a bit of a lag in stories as I find the time...

Chronological Order.

Big Desert, late September, 2003.

The Big Desert beckoned once more, and Richo and I made the 600 or so km trip from Melbourne to satisfy that need to take on the vast, uncompromising desert once more.

We stayed south this time, and explored the Lake Albercutya perimeter and the mighty Wimmera River, which leads south, eventually, to the dry nemesis expanse of Lake Hindmarsh.  The Wimmera River was dry, so we took it south to Hindmarsh, which was also the driest I've seen it yet.  Brimming with confidence on the asphalt - like surface, we zoomed south in the middle of the lake, doing about 12km due south, but then ... bugger me if we didn't get STUCK ON HINDMARSH AGAIN.  Yep, we got stuck in roughly the same spot as last time, but this time, we were about 2-3km from the shore.  Last time, we pushed it to shore, the 200m to the sandy stuff taking about 1.5 hours.  This time, I was a bit worried.  

Luckily, Richo got stuck pretty early, so I slowed down to go back and help - and got stuck even worse myself.  Without skipping over the mud at 50km/hr, it was hopeless, so Richo had the pleasure of watching me go arse over tit in a very ungraceful way in really soft and sticky mud.  About an hour of exhausting pushing and shoving later had us back to where we could get enough traction to ride out the way we came.  

An awesome trip, great fun exploring the region, and some pretty challenging riding here and there as well.  Photos soon.

Big Desert, late August, 2003.

The Big Desert beckoned, and I headed back on a solo mission to conquer the region which had the better of us last time.  The girl and I drove the 450 odd k's up there and I rode the bike on 4WD tracks about the same again over 3 days.  Rain cancelled riding on the final day, but that was OK as I was stuffed.

First day, did a lap of Albercutya in the dying light.  Good fun, able to take a short cut accross the middle of the lake, as unlike Hindmarsh, it's completely dry.  That was OK until I hit a fence in the middle.  Yep, over 4km from the nearest bank, a bloody fence!  I was cruising along, so I thought it was all over, but I managed to come to a stop with the front wheel pressing the wires a fair bit, cartoon style.  Later, I was riding out of the Wimmera River outlet when I hit a dead tree branch end on - it was sharp and straight, and jousted me off the bike, hitting me about over the heart, and stopping me dead!  Luckily, the body armour meant that the chest felt a bit lop sided for a few days, and that was about it, not even bruising. "lop sided" is the correct physio term.

Next day, did northern Wyperfeld, not bad, felt like a tourist as the riding wasnt really challenging, and actually read their information stations here and there. 

Next day, broke my own record for off road riding in one day (300km of beach riding) and did 322.  I went from central Wyperfeld to the Pink Lakes, then to Sunset-Murray national parks.  Then after fuelling up again at base camp, did another 120 or so K's in 2.5 hours to do all of the southern Wyperfeld section.  This was pretty awesome, very challenging riding through sandy wheel ruts.  Then I found that my freebie map was wrong, and that the only route to get back to camp during daylight and with the fuel supply was now rangers only!  I rode to the ranger station, and the cautiously friendly fella allowed me to use his track, and appreciated that I didnt just go ahead and use it anyway.  I zoomed home to arrive in the very last dying rays.  

For those huge number of readers (if any) who aren't familiar , its almost impossible to ride sand without daylight.  Also, pillion = dink.

Anyway, awesome trip.  The XR did a great job, power, reliability, handling, comfort, all things great.  A highlight was going pillion up a nearby hill on the mighty XR during a fantastic sunset, with storms on every horizon, but no rain on us.  Awesome stuff.  One down side was that it was the only pillion event as I forgot to chuck in the spare helmet.  Woops.  Photos soon.

Anglesea, 2-3 August 2003.

The two day ride was rain effected on the first day.  Tracks had been closed due to the downpour, leaving OK trials but no legendary hill climbs.  One section was just a series of massive 4WD bog holes, full of water.  The bikes were only just able to make it - they stalled a few times due to water on the plug, and we both got completely drenched from the section.  

Day two was at "Paddy's Swamp" area nearby, which was a good area, but still being a bit wet, it was a fair challenge in the greasy non-sandy areas.  I had a bit of stack in the photo below where I ended up leaning agaist a barb wire fence, adn pinned in place with the bike on my leg.  Luckily, the thick leather boots protected me from the exhaust.  Steve was along on the ride too, and is pictured thinking that the mud wasnt the best parking spot for his XR.

Anglesea / Enfield Ride, late July 2003

The day started off for me with a clutch rebuild from the previous trip.  Then after rooting around push starting the temperamental XR, Richo and I decided to give Anglesea a miss, and ride Enfield instead.  

The riding at Enfield was great - perfect weather and track conditions, a gift in the middle of winter.  Three main hill climbs there, one of which I'd never made it up, were there for the taking.  I did all three, including the very tough nemesis, very pumped after that.  Richo also ascended all the ones he attempted.  Staying upright was a bit of an issue, however, as Richo crashed three times.  The brand new speedo was destroyed on one of the crashes, pretty unlucky.  Some deep mud holes were a pretty good photo opportunity too.  (Photos coming)

Meanwhile, Wokka, Steve and Dave were having adventures of their own in Anglesea.  Dave broke his leg in a crash with some 2-stroker dickheads and Wokka went over the handlebars when he also hit the carnage.  Hopefully it doesnt place a dampener on the next Anglesea trip in a couple of weeks.

Big Desert, early July 2003

This trip was awesome.  Thursday, we drove up to a camp ground near Lake Albercutya, and started to work on starting Wokka's bike.  Friday we got it going then rode about 100km through the start of the Wimmera River where it is dry, as well as doing some handy jumps and climbs on the banks of Lake Albercutya. Then, to cut a long story short, we finally found Lake Hindmarsh.  It was great, the first time it's been dry for decades, we were doing massive power slides, crossing the puddle in the middle, took some nice photos etc.  Really good stuff.  

However, we were really running out of time and fuel, so we started the 20km dash across the lake to Japarit to refuel for the transport leg home.  We got about 2/3 the way there when conditions changed.  The gradual decent toward the mouth of Hindmarsh meant that it got gradually muddier, to an extent that our cruising speed went from a comfy 70km/h to about 20, then to a stop altogether -  the really sticky mud clogged up the rear wheel and chain to the extent that it no longer turned.  I burnt my clutch out trying to power my way out.  Wokka half burnt his, so we pushed his bike the 200m off the mud, which after 2 hours of heaving, took us through to night fall.  Wokka went off to provide assistance while I stayed with my bike and considered ways of surviving the freezing night if Wokka didnt make it back.  

We thought we were closer to Japarit than we actually were, so I was surprised when, at about 1am, Wokka turned up in the Police 4WD.  They had come out to rescue me!  They were pretty worried due to the sub-zero conditions etc.  I was pretty right however, as I'd lit a fire using dunny paper, and actually had managed some sleep here and there, while Wokka did the hard work in riding via Japarit to Albercutya again (see map on other page) and collected the car and trailer.  He realised that because of the time and cold, it was too risky to individually try to assist me, being about 7km off the nearest access road, and with Wokka on a buggered bike.  

We ended the night in Japarit Caravan Park, and then headed out the next day to collect the bike.  2 hours more of pushing got it off the mud and onto a 4WD track, where Bob the local mechanic met us with his 4WD and trailer, to bring the mighty XR400 back to Japarit and then on our trailer back to Ballarat. 

The area was great fun, we'll definitely be back.  Bloody cold at night though.

Wombat State Forrest June 2003

The coldest day in winter so far was also very wet, and the normally tame slopes of the Western Wombat were slippery as hell.  We only did 25km of tough riding on the greasy clay tracks, with a pretty big chunk of the time spent trying to get the bike past muddy sections every so often.  I crashed twice, Wokka and Steve at least once or twice each too.  

Grampians ride Feb 2003

Luckily the drought broke especially for Rich and myself to do about 120km on bikes that were due for some attention.  Highlights were the unreal track west of the Borean campsite which I forget the name of, jumping 3m erosion banks up a very steep slope in high revs third gear, where any bugger up meant a big drop onto rocks etc.  Great stuff.  The view from my favorite spot was unreal.  Richo's muffler fell off, so the focus shifted to alcohol and impressing some backpacking chicks with our tough enduro bikes, footy prowess, and campfire.  Pictures coming when Richo gets around to it.

South Aussie January 2003

We returned to the beaches at South Australia in January 2003.  Wokka, Deb1 and I headed over for some fun in the sun and some beach riding. 

10 km into the first ride, we pulled up on a scenic bit only to see that Wokka's bike was spewing out oil!  He had been riding bloody hard, which had exacerbated a latent minor problem with the seal.  This meant that we lost the following morning to the mechanics at Millicent, who were unreal, and fixed it no worries.

We rode 80km on a great stretch of beach near Southend.   It was bloody hard going, and the 400 and 350 were working bloody hard to shift the coarse wet sand underneath.  After 80km, still on the beach, we ran out of fuel.  Woops.  I had not allowed much for the extra fuel the sand would use up.  The new mileage was about 20 mile per gallon, or 8.5 km per litre.  That is a bit better than what my old car gets on the highway when towing a trailer.  Not bad considering the mass which the bike was shifting was about 1/10th of the car and trailer.

Anyway, we put the reserve fuel of Wokka's bike into mine, and I rode 25 k's to Millicent, half of which was sand riding, filled up, then rode back to Wokka, and put some into his, just enough to get back to the car, which we had to access via bitumen roads as it was by then dark.  We only just got off the beach in time, as you cant negotiate sand via a headlight.  The sun was decending as we sloppily rode off in the poor light.  We were literally jumping the bikes over the sand bumps without ever seeing the jump.  Anyway, we made it back to camp at midnight instead of 7pm, to meet Deb, who, understandably, was getting worried. 

I rode twice from Robe to Kingston, once with Wokka, and once with Deb pillion.  I was bloody exhausted after the pillion effort, over 100km of beach riding pillion is tough.  We were actually jumping the bike at 70km/hour, getting air over the gentle natural jumps on the beach.   That was pretty exciting.  Going solo with Wokka on the flatter setions of beach toward Kingston, I was doing powerslides consistently at 80km/hr to rear - wheel - steer around waves, then I gradually gained confidence to do one at 100km/hr!  Great stuff.

Also did some fishing, and caught two sting rays, each about 3 foot long.  Broke the rod on the second one.