Southeast Oz gathering

[SteveD]

Excellent picture.

[Airbear]

Pete and I arrived home yesterday arvo after a superb ride down the mountain. What a great few days.

I headed up on the Thursday to Geehi to claim the best of the 5 star accommodation ...



Met the neighbours (they are a bit obsessive about their lawn) ...



But there was romance in the air, too ...



Kangaroo penises are prehensile - something I didn't know before. Very reasonable, considering the path that must be negotiated around that big fat tail. Sadly, my camera batteries failed at a fairly crucial stage and by the time I had replaced them, Mr and Mrs Roo were sighing, smoking cigarettes and thinking about baby names.

The Swampy Plains River is popular with the fisherfolk, and I made the acquaintance of a bloke wearing some very expensive fly fishing gear. He returned after a while with a couple of fine fat rainbows, one of which he donated to the cause. He'd caught them on a tiny nymph fly. Thank you, Mr Fly-fisherman. My new 250mm ceramic coated frypan was barely up to the task.



Recipe: Throw a foil covered potato into the coals and forget about it while you drink some beer and watch the kangaroos shagging. Remember it some time later (an hour or so). Fry up some fatty bacon and shove it into the belly cavity of the trout. Butter the pan and cook the trout for 3 to 4 minutes per side. Slip the lot onto a dish, peel the skin off the top and liberally dose with lemon juice. Consume with beer and whisky chasers.



More to follow later. It's a gorgeous 30C day here, and Jane and I are going for a ride.

[ontic]

Looks great Charlie,
wish I could have been there.

Ahh, those whisky chasers, just the thing to wash that annoyingly watery taste of beer out ones mouth

See you when I get back mate, I'm flying out monday morning (Laos) and will be back early March. I'm going to try to hunt down a cheap Minsk while I've over there to play with (it is about the only old thing I'm likely to find). I'll be looking forward to trying to do a ride back here sometime in March or April... just in case you guys need to pencil something in

Cheers,
Happy krissy and new year everyone

[SteveD]

Happy krissy and new year everyone

You to Hans. Enjoy yourself and don't work tooo hard!

[Airbear]

Looks great Charlie,
wish I could have been there.

Ahh, those whisky chasers, just the thing to wash that annoyingly watery taste of beer out ones mouth

See you when I get back mate, I'm flying out monday morning (Laos) and will be back early March. I'm going to try to hunt down a cheap Minsk while I've over there to play with (it is about the only old thing I'm likely to find). I'll be looking forward to trying to do a ride back here sometime in March or April... just in case you guys need to pencil something in

Cheers,
Happy krissy and new year everyone

Thanks Hans. Have a great adventure in Laos. I hope the work and the co-workers work for you and you get time to explore. I trust there will be sufficient festive bullshit there in a couple of weeks to make you feel at home (y'know, silly paper hats and crackers to pull, etc.)

We'll be planning something for the autumn, probably of an elevated and twisty nature. Those roads up there are so nice.

[Sibbo]

Your usual excellent report Charlie !

Half your Luck Hans ...enjoy !

[Doug]

Blokes!
It was a delicious weekend riding around Lake Hume ( The Great Weir Road) and then a rip up the range to Geehi.
Swimming in the Swampy Plains River was a great refresher and then the camaraderie of a group of blokes sharing one curious passion...these beautifully idiosyncratic bits of engineering.
I'd post some pics to prove it, but the system seems to have beaten me. How the phuque do you post pics on this site???
The next ride cant come soon enough

[SteveD]

How the phuque do you post pics on this site???

Gotta store your photos online somewhere..eg, photobucket. They provide the url link, which you copy and paste into the message body. Lookin' forward to those pictures Doug.

[Airbear]

I'm looking forward to seeing them phuquing pictures too, Doug. I use PictureTrail as a hosting site, and resize the images to 800 pixels wide first. In the meantime, here are some more from my camera.

After two nights I needed supplies, so headed off up the mountain. Bloody spectacular twisty roads took me to Thredbo (shit-hole ski resort, best avoided). The only fuel supplier there had regular unleaded only, and a tankful cost $36.10. Then on to Jndabyne to re-supply the important things like coffee and grog. Another 70kms back on that wonderful road to be welcomed by a bunch of blokes and bikes. The weather was decidedly tropical, the company convivial and the beer, bullshit and wine flowed like beer, bullshit and wine.



Next morning it was pack-up time. Here's a gaggle of BMWs, and one Honda.



We headed off in our various directions. It was a much cooler day, and windy. Five of us decided to take the pretty way home, via Jindabyne, Adaminaby, Kiandra, Cabramurra. We certainly couldn't complain about the roads - wonderful narrow, twisty bits interleaved with wide sweepers. It's motorcycling heaven up there. DucatiPete and I were the only ones who didn't need to get back for work or family, so chose to stay on the mountain for another night. With the wind picking up even more and the temp dropping we needed a good place to stay. Jeff led us to this magnificent hut, between Cabramurra and Khancoban.





With an unlimited supply of firewood we were comfortable, and very glad to be out of the wind. It roared all night, whistling up through the floorboards. We woke to a clear sunny day and made the grin-making homeward run via Khancoban, Corryong and the Great Weir Road.

Thanks all for another fine gathering. Er, so where to next, and when?

[Sibbo]

Hi Charlie , it's great country down that way and I'd love to make it some time but it would be a major for me, maybe if I get to do my proposed but probably mythical Broken Hill , Adelaide Vic run.

Sometime .... thanks for the pics !