Holiday girl goes riding

Cantuckee n JJ just went riding!! 5 days of heaven on wheels round Norhtern NSW and SE Queensland...

This is the first installment, on request to tell my tale.

Ist day - had no plans for our 5 days. decided to just see where our front tyres took us. i got to be navigator as JJ conceded that I can actually read maps and he can't Decided to go to tenterfield from Bris - went through Killarny - there is no good coffee there!! Drank powdered dirt at the little shop but the service is great and the view to die for!! watch all the riders going by and rolling hills to pine for. great stop (try the pub next time and have a beer. skip the coffee) to plan ur next leg.

From killarny through the Lions road - no cars or roadworks (although much needed!!). The Lion's road is private so it relies on donations for repairs but what a hoot!!

decided to do a little jaunt through our old rockclimbing grounds (TonyBro - been there?) at Urbanville (still no expresso!!) - haven't ever ridden that road before as far as I know....oh no, here comes a walk down memory lane....in 1980 me n a bunch of boys and one girl pillion went for an overnight ride somewhere around this area - the roads were dreadful and we ended up rding on this dirt road for miles before we stopped to camp. Great night - drinking round the fire, stars out, etc. All fell asleep under the stars in the open - Bliss... In the middle of the night the torrent of rain started and continued til mid morning. had to try and ride out through deep mud on big bikes like a BMW and a Laverda (i was on a lightweight spanish racer) so after clogging up the from fenders til the wheels stopped spinning completely, we had to take off the front fenders. one guy had a trail bike (and a hoot) who took the girl pillion and I out and dropped us in a haystack which we crawled into as we were wet and cold. several hours later the boys got all the bikes out. Did I mention that the Laverda could only start with a push? Imagine no front fender, 18 inches of fresh mud and trying to push start a 1000cc of Jota?

see where my mind goes when I am riding? so back to the future - I'm rding in the same area almost 30 years later, wondering where exactly we were all those years ago. I also remember (going back 30 years for a mo...) there were no mobile phones and I was due at work on the Sunday at 2pm. Got there at 6 and couldn't hold a cup of coffee and my coworkers put a cuppa in front of me with one of the kids hospital cups (the ones with the built in straw - great for long trips) those little 2 strokes vibrated like nothing else on earth and after a long cold day of riding you're numb from the fingertips up. I actually eventually bought my first kidney belt. Why don't we ride like that anymore? maybe we actually can't...

Anyhoo, back to now. the weather was cool and perfect - road from Urbanville to the highway was fantastic - different to the road from Casino up to Lion's that we did a few weeks ago. No dirt either. Stayed at the Royal Hotel again but gave the bar a miss because the food was so crap last time. Found a small, new pizza place that had the best COFFEE and the pizza was pretty excellent too. tenterfield was way too freezing so we decided to head back north into sunny Queensland - why did we leave in the first place i'll never know...

is this the sort of story you are after? if so I'll do day 2 installment soon.

Janee Baby