It was booked in for it's 1000km service this coming Friday so the plan was to get it up close to that over the weekend. Harder than it sounds, my routes were all either too short or too long! LOL. Eventually I settled on a plan that saw me snag the FarChallenge pics at Jindabyne and Adelong and head out west for some countryside cruising. Also because the Khancoban Motorcycle Festival was on and I had no intention of sharing my favourite roads with others.
And then I changed my mind.
Mostly because it was to be around 18 in the snowies and about 30 out west.
So instead I planned to go to Jindabyne via Dalgety (for spelling), then back through Adaminaby (for spelling) and onto Adelong, down to Tintaldra or Corryong then back up through Cabramurra and home.
So Saturday morning I fronted up at CMC to drop off the rego sticker for the 6
and bored my way down to Cooma where I topped up the fuel and stopped for second breakfast as I was freezing. So glad for heated grips! I stopped at the Cooma Cafe and have to say I don't rate it. I parked intending to go to the hippy cafe across the road but turned out I had parked right outside this one so thought to give it a go. Only drank about half my coffee, way too strong for me even with heaps of sugar in it.
Rolled out on the Maffra Road with the clouds so low I swear I could have stood up on my pegs and dragged my fingers through it. It was raining in patches here and there and I thought about turning left instead of right and trying my luck at the coast but I really wanted to get that Jindabyne pic. So I manned up and went to Jindabyne.
Photo taken, managed to stall trying to leave here (and not for the last time, CBR wants more revs than the 6 did!). It rained some more, enough that the road was a bit wet but didn't unsettle the bike at all. Over to Adaminaby where I topped up the fuel again and then down the road to the Big Trout, to match Pat's picture from a few hours earlier.
Then onto the Awesome Road. It was nice but my chicken strips would tell you that I didn't enjoy it much (I did though). Somewhere along there the clouds all disappeared revealing a sunny, but cool and windy day. Stopped at the Sign for a traditional picture
and was *very* tempted to keep going but the bike was still very new and I was a bit worried about other bikes so instead I turned back and kept going to Tumut. The sun stayed out and I stopped at some lookout I never noticed before. Pretty.
Just before the drop down to Talbingo there were roadworks and I was stopped at the red light for quite a while so turned the bike off. Just as the light went green a group of bikes arrived behind me so I waved them past while I restarted the bike. Mistake. It wasn't so bad going down the hill, apart from the noise (there was a very awful sounding m109 I was right behind) but once we got out past Talbingo OMG they were annoying. Anyway. I stopped a couple of times to let them all get away as I didn't want to be caught up in the middle of their group (the leader was faster than me, the rear few doing about 80 on a slight bend grrrr). Anyway was behind them all the way into Tumut where they stopped and I kept going onto Adelong. Hurrah for empty roads again! Stopped right out the front of the Hotel Adelong but there was a tree blocking the sign! haha so a distance one from the side, by this time it was HOT and I gladly stripped off the layers and settled out the front for a coke and a packet of chicken chippies.
I drank my coke too fast and ended up hiccuping my way to Corryong. Oops.
Just out of Adelong I hit roadworks OH NO but they were really good just a bit dusty, not horrible at all. Rolled through back to the Batlow Road and had to pull up in Laurel Hill in an attempt to try and get my hiccups to stop. It was a temporary measure only! ggrrr.
Into Tumbarumba for fuel and I was wondering if my fuel gauge was dodgy - I had done about 210km and it only just dropped to one bar below half as I was pulling into the servo. Only put in 9.4 litres so I guess it is just really good on fuel! Yay! I was debating whether to stay in Tumbarumba or push on for Tintaldra or Corryong as it was now about 5pm. I decided to push on, with warnings about excessive amounts of roos on the road, so I just took it very steady :) It was lovely and warm!
Decided Corryong over Tintaldra and got a room at the pub. Overall it was very disappointing, the room was pretty ordinary, though the bed was comfy, and my dinner was pretty average. Ended up going to bed heaps early and even had a nice sleep in on Sunday morning.
I had intended to go to Legends for breakfast so waited until almost 9am to leave, only to find that Legends is for sale and there didn't appear to be any signs of it opening. Oh well.
The weather forecast told me that overnight Cabramurra had recorded wind speeds of 70km/h and gust of over 90km/h with a strong wind warning still in place - I decided to forgo the Cabramurra Road as I didn't want to have a tree fall on my head. So back to Tumbarumba where I stopped at Bears Cafe for breakfast which was MASSIVE and then back into Adelong for a spelling photo as I had forgotten to get one yesterday LOL
and into Tumut for fuel. It was warming up again now and I gladly lost the jumper and neck sock here.
I consulted my map - years ago I had a conversation with someone who had lived in Tumut about another way to Gundagai which was not the Gocup Road (I would have loved to go back via Snowy Mountains Highway but that would have taken me well over the 1000km). I found the road through Brungle and thought to give it a go. It was really nice! Some twisties but no signs and lots of inconveniently placed bumps but I just took it nice and slow and took in the scenery - it was pretty special.
My map showed me that after Brungle I could go through Darabalga (sp?) and then onto Coolac which would cut off a bit more freeway - awesome.
Where the turnoff for Gundagai was it was on a river and *very* beautiful. I had to pass through a herd of cows and tried to take a photo but it didn't quite work as planned.
The road narrowed down to about one lane of tar but the scenery was quite pleasant and the road quite empty. Before long the road came to another river and followed that for a while. Another T intersection and another photo opportunity. These ones I was happy with :)
From here it was over a bridge and into Coolac where the road joined the freeway. I stopped for a drink as it was really quite warm now and consulted my map. Unfortunately taking the road out through Cootamundra would also put me too far over my 1000km :( so no choice but the freeway. I really didn't want to do it! Oh well. It was sooooooo windy it was crazy. An uneventful run back into Canberra and home with 964km on the clock and lots of bug guts on my shiny new bike!
Now a service on Friday then we are off again next weekend - YAY!
