Sydney to Brisbane
Seeing the right amount of time between my bookings, I decided to ride to Brisbane and see two friends I haven't seen in far too long - Simon and Penny. Day 1 took me along the Old Pacific Highway which was an unexpectedly magnificent road - twisty, overgrown with beautiful old forest and practically empty while I rode beautiful bends sweeping next to and under the flat straight Pacific Motorway packed full of cars. It was beautiful and a great start. I made it to Terrigal. Day 2 and I traveled along the Central Coast Highway and rode into Munmorah State Reserve after a very emotional few days. I sat and looked at the beach for ages thinking about the significance of a companion journeying through life with you knowing you and being with you and when the rain started coming down, I hit the thin road through the pack back to the highway - a small kangaroo jumped across the road in front of me, but far enough ahead that it wasn't an issue.
Beach at Munmorah State Reserve
I rode on but battled traffic and towns finally stopping at Raymond Terrace feeling tired and defeated. Checked into a crappy caravan park to recharge for a fresh start the next day. Day 3 I rode off after a chat with an old clarinet playing man in the caravan park heading up to Gloucester then a beautiful road down to Krambach before a rough road to Nahiac which broke one of the baggage straps on my luggage bag. Tied a few knots to get me to the next town then rigged up a temporary system to get me to Brisbane. I struggled pushing up the coast and wondered why it was so much harder than riding to Melbourne before realising that all the Syd-Bris traffic goes this way, so it's busy and the towns are large - as opposed to my Syd-Mel ride which was a very long distance from the Syd-Mel Motorway and therefore the roads were empty and the towns tiny, much easier to ride through. Heavy clouds threatened to rain so I pushed hard on the highway in light rain watching massive bolts of lightning crack across the sky ahead of me. Made it to Coffs Harbour so exhausted I could barely lift the bike.
Watch out for giant banana peels Day 4 and I rode off after a chat with an old cigar-smoking man in the motel heading inland and feeling refreshed along the beautiful Gwydir Highway travelling through the Washpool National Park. Stopped off at the top of a mountain looking at a beautiful view over cascades of mountains feeling like there is nobody for hundreds of miles.
Outview at Washpool National Park, sat here for a while
After a half hour, some holiday makers arrived and I chatted before riding off down a kilometer of dirt road and heading up to Stanthorpe to see my mate Simon who I haven't seen in a decade. Beautiful place, great guy. Day 5 I awoke to a beautiful farm and had a long chill with Simon and Dennis over a perculated coffee.
Beautiful farm, great to see Simon and meet Dennis
I then rode on to Warwick, turning down towards Tooloom National park enduring 50km of by far the most rough and dangerous road I've ever seen - no centre line, narrow, so rough that it was unbelievable it was allowed to exist (a piece of my handlebars fell off) and in all this, corners so blind on a road 1.5 cars wide that I could only ride slow and hug the inside and hope for the best. There was at least 20 unbelievably perfect postcard photos that could have been taken - beautiful fields with rusty-roofed sheds with old wooden gates, just amazing, but I'll never ride that road again, terrifying. In contrast, an astonishing beautiful and great motorcycling road through Mount Barney National Park followed with Mount Lindesay present in sight for much of it which I could only gawk at for short seconds due to the strong-turn-after-strong-turn with no railings at the cliff-side roads. Stunning. Then a push through country roads into Brisbane and into the welcoming friend-forever arms of the amazing Penny who showed me another incredible view only a few km from her place.
Amazing view from nearby Pen's place
The bike is performing so well, but the tappets need to be done. Not sure if I'll wait 'till Canberra or not... thinking. Also incredible to realise I've done nearly 10,000km in the 6 months since I've bought the bike and nearly worn through a complete back tyre. There are many more tyres to be worn through..! In a few days I will begin the ride down to Sydney. Thanks for reading!