Day One: Greg foils a terrorist attack
I’m up early jumping up and down with excitement for today is the first day of the winter Bathurst ride of the hard men of the Highlands Classic and Enthusiasts Motorcycle Club. I fling open the curtains and it’s wet. I’m feeling downcast but when I look up again there is a rainbow, surely this is a sign. I leave the wet weather gear packed up and head out to Sutton Forest, our starting point.
Assembled are the cream of the hard men, Trumpy Dave, Ton Up Andrew, Beemer Greg, who will come all the way, as well as Tenmil Lance and DadJoke Richard with his paramour Alison who are out for a morning ride. Chatty Mick and his neighbour BusDriver Sven turn up soon after and we’re off.
Mick outlines our first leg and is at pains to explain that we must turn left at the first roundabout in Goulburn, or face eternal damnation. We roll into Goulburn and Mick goes straight through the roundabout with half the ride, Andrew turns left. I’m at the tail of the ride and just follow the bike in front of me to the left. Never mind, we regroup and roll into Crookwell and morning tea at Paul’s Cafe, renowned throughout the western world for the quality of their chiko rolls.
The next leg sees us head towards Boorowa along a road that follows a ridge exposed to the strong south westerly winds that blow our bikes across the road but don’t dampen our enthusiasm. Mick and I are proceeding at a rapid pace when Trumpy Dave storms past, we are hard pressed to keep up. A right turn takes us to Wyangala Dam, where we stop and marvel at man’s dominance over nature. The road out of the dam towards lunch at Woodstock is a delight, the wind has dropped, the temperature has risen and the road climbs and dips and twists through a pastoral wonderland of impossibly green paddocks and impossibly yellow canola fields. We lunch at Woodstock where the barmaid looks at us funny coz we’re not drinking beer, our request for lemon lime and bitters confusing her, she needs to seek the recipe from the kitchen staff and still needs direction from us. The locals look at us as if we’re from outer space and shuffle away in case they catch temperance from us.
After lunch we drop onto the Great Western Highway and drone into Blayney for fuel, we decide to take the back way to Bathurst and we follow signs to the Blayney Sealink. I’m expecting a marina but instead it is a complex of warehouses and railway lines to deliver the bounty of the central west to overseas markets. The road is something else, it is a series of straights and right angle turns ducking under and over the railway line and really quite challenging. We turn left towards Newbridge and another challenging road with the added joy of gravel from the freshly graded verge on the road. Newbridge is a quaint little town built around a now abandoned railway station. Outside the general store and art gallery is an old retired greyhound dog. It’s muzzle is grey and it’s once hard muscles have turned soft, it’s athletic feats and finely tuned body a distant memory in it’s now foggy mind. The hard men ride past.
We penetrate the soft underbelly of Bathurst and after the obligatory lap of Mount Panorama retire to the Vegas of The Central West, the Kelso Hotel. Greg is delighted that the Hotel retains the familiar aroma of stale beer and desperation. Greg has me check his hotel room as well for odours but it smells only of cheap disinfectant and toilet cleaner. After Mick has an altercation over allotted parking spaces with a local we shower and retire to the lounge, we drink up and carouse and proceed to terrorise the bar staff and generally raise hell till at last we have had enough and stagger off to bed at almost eight thirty. Rebels. As is traditional we agree to be stands up at first light, or nine o’clock in the morning, whichever comes later.
But the night is not over, in the dark hours around midnight I hear a foreign voice outside in the car park. “Dukkadukkadukka” the voice goes. Another voice replies “Dukkadukka Jihad!”. The first voice “Dukka Jihad Bin Laden dukkadukka”. Clearly it is a terrorist on the phone to his terrorist cell leader, planning to bomb us all in the night. I hear a door open and Greg’s voice “Knock it off, have some consideration”. The terrorist cries out “Allah akbah” and runs off crying into the night, his dreams of vanquishing the infidel hard men and getting his reward of virgins dashed.
Day 2: No chiko rolls left
The next morning is drizzling, we are all up early and rearing to go despite the weather, we’re ready by eight thirty except for Sven, as a newcomer he thinks nine o’clock means nine o’clock not eight thirty. Amateur. We trundle down town, the roads are wet but it is no longer raining, and have a cooked breakfast, the greasy bacon and coffee chasing away our mild hangovers.
We roll out of town along wet roads, the uncertain traction limiting our shenanigans to a fast cruise rather than a breakneck sprint till we roll into Crookwell and morning tea in the cafe. The same chiko rolls are safe in their bain marie, no chiko rolls left since yesterday.
The locals warn us of an unmarked highway patrol between Crookwell and Laggan so we behave ourselves on that run and head to Goulburn via Taralga. We stop before the turn to take us to the freeway and say our goodbye’s. The weather has played havoc with the trip, wind on Saturday, the wet on Sunday but truly, none of us would miss it for the world.
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