Monthly Archives: March 2013

I Went for another ride with the OFMG from Goolwa again. (I may have to start a page for these Wednesday rides 🙂 )

We left Goolwa at the usual time of 10am. It was quite overcast and was threatening to rain. It was a lot more comfortable to ride in then last week when it was 37c. Today was around 25c and I don’t mind the rain. In the end we only got a small sprinkle of rain. Must be frustrating for the farmers. Everything is dried right off from the unusually high temperatures and the wind.

We rode from Goolwa to Nairne via Ashborne, Strathalbyn and Callington. We stopped at Nairne for Coffee and out of 11 starters 9 decided to ride on for lunch. The other 2 had other commitments and had to return to Goolwa.

So we left Nairne and headed up through the Adelaide hills to Palmer where we were to have lunch. It was a nice ride up there and the traffic was unusually quiet, in fact we met no trucks in this section at all. We arrived at the pub at Palmer at about 12:30.

I Noticed a rock that had been white washed while we were riding down into Palmer about 5 km short. It now made sense as the rock did resemble a bears head. Hence the Bear Rock Cafe.

We went into the pub to order our meals and the poor lady behind the bar was running the pub on her own until her husband returned from town which she thought would be about an hours time. So after getting our meal orders and drinks she left us to our selves while she went to cook our meals. She was grateful when her husband turned up within about 10 minutes to lend a hand. The meals were good value. I had a half serve of steak, salad and chips for $10.50. I was glad I had ordered the half serve as it was still a big meal.

The group themselves are maybe an average age of 65-70. I’m the youngest at 51. So my best guess at the combined years of experience around the table for lunch was more then 500 years. Well you could tell this by the amount of story telling around the table. It was quite entertaining listening to them.

We enjoyed our meals and left to return to Goolwa.

The 2 riders closest are Ian (84yrs young) and Don (81yrs young) Listening to these 2 and their yarns is great.

They had decided to go to the Local Brewery at Goolwa to have a quenching ale. They also serve a nice Coffee which I opted for.

The Brewery is quite the tourist attraction also. While I believe it is called a Micro Brewery I think their production out of here is quite high for that title.

I didn’t hang around to long as these gent tend to get settled in.

Another great day out.

Went for another ride with the OFMG from Goolwa. They go out regularly every Wednesday for a coffee in the morning and then stop somewhere for lunch and then head back to Goolwa for another coffee others will have a beer or 2. Personally I don’t drink at all while driving or riding. To easy to make a mistake.

Everyone meets at the Caltex service station before 10am for 10am departure. 17 bike started the day.

We left Goolwa to the north and headed for Meadow. Meadow is a nice little town that services the local community and some tourism that passes through.

I have tried something a bit different with this ride. Rather then taking photo’s as I normally would I fitted my Gopro to the front of my bike and to my helmet and from the footage taken I done screen dumps of a few sections.

We stopped at a small cafe and enjoyed coffee. The people working in the cafe’s must dread it when they have large groups turn up to order coffee and cake all at once. But they done a great job. Even got a coffee for John. Who John was nobody knew. So they took the extra coffee away.

This is not what I normally do when I go for a ride. I tend to leave at 6am and I wear a Camelback to quench my thirst on the road and only stop to refuel. So spending time in the one spot and chatting is a little foreign to me.

We then left Meadow and headed west to ride around Myponga reservoir. I had only recently ridden around here but I didn’t mind doing it again. There are some great bike rides around this area.

We then headed towards Yankalilla to the hotel for a counter lunch. I had prawn skewers and salad. At $12.90 it was great value. The waitress came back after we had eaten with some vouches. Buy 1 meal and get the second at ½ price. Has to be used by the end of April though. May take my wife through sometime. A couple of the chaps shared a bottle of Red. I stuck with my glass of lemonade.

I was warned that these 2 chaps ride a lot more aggressively after lunch but I didn’t see it. One of them is 84 (and ½ he informed me) so I was hoping he wasn’t going to ride to aggressive. I wouldn’t be able to keep up.

After lunch we headed south and then turned east back towards Victor Harbor. We went out the back of Victor to bypass the town traffic. Then headed for Signal point in Goolwa. There we went to Cafelicious for another Coffee. (I was about full up with coffee by now) Oh yeah and the 2 red wine drinks, opt for Beer.

Day is at an end for me so I head home. I’m not real happy with the photo’s and think while I may still fit the Gopro to my bike I will still take normal photo’s with my camera.

Well It has been a while since I have been for a ride. I guess having just relocated from NSW back to SA has made my time at home busy and this could be why. Although there may be another reason.

On November 25^th last year I received a call from my son, Sam. It was 07:30am. It is not an unusual time as he is a shift worker and had in fact just got home from night shift.

However the conversation started with “Dad I have some terrible news” Our neighbour from Cobar and good friend John lost his life while riding home after work the previous night. He had been passing 2 cars when the leading car turned right in front of him.  I have not bothered to find out who was in the wrong. A man and good friend had lost his life.

He left behind his wife and 4 children.

I had just relocated my family the week before and was to leave for work in a few days. I was unable to return to Cobar for his funeral.

I returned in January and found his wife had not been coping well but was getting good support from friends and family. I guess no-one knows what to say to the spouse of some who had recently been killed on the road. I seen Angela (Johns wife now widow) out the back lane of our cobar houses. I passed on my condolences and then said “I’m sorry Angela I don’t know what to say” I was at a loss for words. Angela’s response was simply “That’s okay Cliff, I don’t either”.

My wife has since been busy finding excuses for me not to go for a ride. I accepted this and new it would just take time before she would realise that I needed to fill the gap that not riding left. I went for a short ride 3 weeks ago of about 150km. So I guess that will be my plan for the next few months. Just to get the confidence of my wife so she isn’t panicking to much while I am away riding.

I guess we all have tales of mate who have lost their lives on the road.

In the end we just have our memories of the good/great times we had together.

Angela, John (top) and a rare photo of myself without whiskers.
The good times

Ride on John, you were a good man taken to soon.