18th May 2008 - Robertson

The forecast for Sunday was supposed to be rain and very cold –basically not the best for our Sunday ride and this must have kept a few of the regulars away. However the day turned out to be beautiful sunshine but cold. On the escarpment and the mountain climb to Picton it was even colder. The planed rides was to Kiama for coffee/lunch and then on to Picton for another stop.

At the Newtown Hotel Mark Ducati 748 and I Honda VFR arrived fairly early and were greeted by new rider Peter who was on his “L” plates riding a Suzuki  GS 500 and Guy was also waiting on his black GSXR1000. As the morning progressed towards the 9am departure more riders arrived, Johannes on his BMW R1100S then Thierry-BMW RT1100 soon Luke arrived on is BMW K1200S. I got a text from Brad saying he was on is way. Then in quick order Stephan – Kawasaki 1400 then Peter and his BMW K1200r and Brett, possibly sick of being a pillion was on a Honda VTR 250 with his “L” plates. Just as I was about to start the briefing Brad arrived on his Yamaha R1. Immediately after telling all were we were going Jason on his Suzuki GSXR zoomed in to a stop and as we were all leaving Wayne on his BMW appeared. It was 13 bikes heading south for Loftus oval.

As normal the traffic lights split up the group on or way south. However we all managed to arrive at Loftus Oval about the same time. At Loftus Wayne told us he had only come along to say hi as he had some things on and set back to Sydney. Brett was having trouble with his review mirror and after the BMW technical wizards had tried to fix it the Honda specialty came in to play. The problem was the tread and tightening the mirror stalk – just use the bit of rope as a washer –seemed to work. There was some comment that Peter was at the back of the group and must have been a first for him.

Setting off at 10am for the ride to Albion park on the old highway was great as it was very free of traffic and we had a great ride down but cold and extra clothing was brought out by some at the Panorama Restaurant stop. On this section of the ride Brett’s right hand mirror had decided to become loose required fixing. This was done at our the regroup point and more comments how strange it was that Peter was at the back of the group but he was encouraging Brett on his on his L’s and I think the other Peter liked having someone else on their L’s as well. 

It was then off to Albion Park to meet Johan who had been picked by Thierry at Wollongong.  Again tariff was not too bad and we made up some time on our way to the Albion Park round-about. Due to the minor delays and the time, I decided we would stop of coffee at Jamberoo instead of Kiama.  The sun was out and a pleasant morning discussion followed over coffee and food. Just as we were about to leave Troy from Canberra arrived. He had emailed saying he would try and join us and I had given him various times of were we would be but forgot all about this when changing pre- published plans and so Troy had been at Kiama waiting for us but had decided to ride back along our planed trip to see if he could find us and so we spent some more time at the coffee house while Troy had some food and dink.

After coffee we said goodbye to Johannes, Peter and Brett who headed back to Sydney. For Brett's first major ride on his bike he did very well and we hope he enjoyed the ride. Jason had left us at the Panorama stop having to had back to Sydney for something that would tie him up for the afternoon. The rest of the group set off up Jamberoo Mountain Road. It was all most a traffic free run up this nice mountain road. There was slight miscommunication on were to wait at the top and some stopped at the Robertson pie shop while others went ahead. But it did not take long for all to re group in Robertson at the fuel stop. It was there that we said good by to Troy who headed back to Canberra and Guy who stopped at a place he had to visit near by.

The rest of us then headed along the Illawarra Highway for the right turn to Mittagong. I waited for Peter who was obeying the law on his L’s, he was not far behind the group and then it was on to the Old south road to Picton. Thierry and Johan had been asked to mark the corner for us. Apparently on this stretch of the road the regular Air France pilot had decided to take a back seat and let the stand in KLM- BMW trainee pilot the course. We did not learn over coffee how the trainee went. The old south road has had some changes including a massive round-about to east –who knows except Mark thought that was the heading and a few of us were surprised to see him behind us when he had started in front and we had not overtaken him.

It was a very pleasant ride to Picton in the sun and surprisingly not that cold. Some of the towns on the old road looked very dead. In Picton we stopped at a coffee house only to be told that in Picton lunch stops being served at 2pm and they only served drinks. No wonder they are country. While we had our drinks –predominantly hot chocolate there were lots of bikes riding along the main street. Another interesting conversation was had over drinks.

After our stop Mark, Brad, Stehpan, Peter and I headed back along the freeway to Sydney Thierry and Luke went to Wollongong to drop of Johan. For the freeway gang it was a relative quick ride and even though the a wide load was doing its best to slow traffic it was not a bad run. 

Overall a great day, 300ks, no rain a nice day to ride around the country side and great company.

See you if you can make it for the Sydney Leather pride Ride Saturday 31st May– in two weekends or for our June 15th ride

Cheers, Rowan