The Wild GeeseCamerons Corner Bash Easter 2009
It was a fairly fast paced ride, a round trip of 3,000km or so out to Cameron's Corner and home again in four days, so not too many photo stops. Andy Powell organised the ride along with Keir Gillam. Steve went along for the ride. All were on KTM 950 Adventures.
| Day 1 |
I headed out from the "Sunshine Coast" early on Good Friday in the rain, arriving in Dalby at 07:30 in time for a Macca's coffee. Andy pulled in shortly after. As you can read on his page, he has my old KTM but we had not actually met until now. I was surprised to discover that he is a fellow Pom. If Andy is to have a Goose name it should probably be Gizmo, except that that one is already taken, so now he is Midlife Crisis Goose. He has kitted out the Adventure with every conceivable gadget, all built into the bike in very professional manner - being an aircraft engineer probably helps.
The rest of the day was a bum-numbing series of tar transports between fuel stops, finally arriving in Noccundra well after dark. here we met up with Keir and his girlfriend Kaz (who hails from Doonan like Steve - small world indeed). A few bundies and a meal, and Andy and I were off to our respective dongas while Keir and Kaz retired to their tent.
| Day 2 |
We were now well away from the coast and the day dawned dry and clear. Keir had been advised against tackling the track to Cameron's Corner two-up so he and Kaz left for Hungerford by easy trail and road. Andy and I headed out of Noccundra for the Corner and were soon on the dirt roads we had come all this way for. Plenty of soft sand on the surface to keep the KTM's lively and to keep us focussed on the job in hand. The bikes floated around quite a bit but handled the terrain easily and we made short work of this 250km stretch, arriving at the corner in time for lunch. My choice would have been to have lunch and then press on but Andy was keen to savour the ambience of an outback pub and swap yarns with other travellers, so we stopped here for the night. We ran a tab for the duration of our stay, but I would not necessarily advise others to do the same as we were both surprised by the size of the bill next day. To my mind it was rather more than it should have been, as was the fuel bill. Owner Bill still has the pump price set at $2.10 per litre, easily the most expensive of our trip. The half-day ride gave my untrained leg muscles a chance to recover for the next day's big ride.
A couple of lads from Brisbane rolled in during the afternoon in an old Ford Falcon, which rather put us kitted out adventure riders in our place.
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| There's also a short video of our trip in the vicinity of Cameron's Corner. It's about 12MB - download it here. |
| Day 3 |
This was to be a 1,000km day so we were up and away by 8am and onto easily the best section of the whole trip - the dunes and fast sweeping tracks to Tibooburra. The big KTM's are made for these roads and we both rode with grins on our faces; if KTM's could express themselves they would have been grinning too. I took the lead for a while and upped the pace a little too much, giving the Kato yet another dent in its rim and getting a punctured front tube in the process. A quick tube change and we were back on the ride, but not before the Falcon boys, who we had passed earlier in the ride, had caught up with us again. Real tortoise and hare stuff.
After Tibooburra the ride degenerated somewhat - lots of straight and unchallenging dirt, and then tarmac from Bourke on until we arrived at Lightning Ridge some time after sunset. Keir had arranged a communal motel room for the night, so there was just time for a meal in the nearby pub, a couple of drinks in the nearby RSL, and it was time to get some rest in preparation for the next big day.
| Day 4 |
The day began with drizzle, and this was pretty much to be the best weather we would have all day. It was another long day of tar transports, 800km in all. It started well enough with some very pleasant back roads to Goondiwindi, and the road to Toowoomba wasn't bad, but things went a bit sour from there. It started with me hitting a patch of diesel or some such in Toowoomba and dropping the bike quite hard. I banged my hip pretty badly and strained my back so the rest of the ride was guaranteed not to be too much fun. Andy had made a different fuel stop to Keir and I before Toowoomba and had to be home in a hurry, so we didn't see him for the rest of the trip. Toowoomba was wet and shrouded in mist (nothing new there), and the traffic was heavy, so the ride down to Esk in the dark was not much fun. The rain got steadily heavier as we approached the coast and by Kilcoy we were riding in filthy weather. The ongoing roadworks to the east of Kilcoy were chaotic, the rains having caused some damage.
Keir and Kaz headed for the highway through Woodford, I turned off to Peachester and Beerwah to join the highway near the Ettamoggah. I slogged home through driving torrential rain and eventually arrived around 8pm. By this time I was in real pain from my hip and couldn't get off the bike - Noi and Golf had to hold the bike for me so that I could climb off using the foot pegs. I was glad to be home again!
| Day 5 |
Unpacked the bike, threw everything in the wash and spent the day catching up on chores. The hip feels a lot better and the back pain has subsided somewhat, so it looks as though I will live to ride another day.
Thanks to Andy, Keir and Kaz for your company. Let's do a ride nearer home next time 
~ Steve
Category Rides ~ Category Dirt Rides ~ Category Long Distance
