Author Archives: Cliff

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About Cliff

Live in South Australia and enjoy Prospecting, Jewelry making and fishing.

First day of winter riding

It has been a couple of months since I have been out for a ride. So today I managed to steal a couple of hours for a ride into the hills.

It has been raining for the last couple of weeks and is very much welcomed as it has been a long hot summer. Only a month ago a bush fire just a little further North of where today’s ride took me had claimed a couple of houses.

The day was overcast and threatened rain but I managed to dodge it for most of the ride apart from the last couple of kilometres as i returned to Goolwa.

I left just after Midday and the roads were mostly dry.

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I headed north out of Goolwa and headed for Mount Compass. If it was likely to rain anywhere it was here.

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The plan was to head a little further north and turn east towards Meadows.

It is surprising the amount of properties that have bags of manure for sale out on the roadside. Horse Poo, Chock Poo, Alpaca Poo, Pigeon Poo is just a few of the varieties. But this was a first, “Hornless Unicorn Poo”! I tell ya, you can get anything in South Australia 😉 .

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After this discovery I continued to Meadows and from there I turned north again to Mylor where I intended to stop for a coffee and warm up for a bit.

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The temperature was not to bad at about 15c so I shouldn’t complain. It was still warm enough that I was wearing my fingerless gloves and open faced helmet.

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Well autumn is over and winter has arrived. The leaves have mostly fallen and the contrasting colours make for a pleasant ride. The coffee is great at this cafe. I have stopped here before and will again.

After checking the time I realised that I had been taking my time getting there and it was time to return home as we had intended to go visit a friend in the afternoon.

I left Mylor and headed back to meadow via Echunga. I spied a war Memorial there and stopped to take a photo.

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Then to Meadow.

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From Meadow I simply rode back to Goolwa and called into the Supermarket as requested by SWMBO.

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Not much of a ride but it served as a fix until the next one.

Categories: Motorcycling | Tags: , , | 4 Comments

OPM Stickers have arrived

A fellow Blogger has a Web site Called “OBSERVATIONS OF A PERPETUAL MOTORCYCLIST” OPM for short. Click here to go to the site.

A few weeks ago he posted that he had received some sticker with his LOGO and was willing to send a few out to the first few replies/emails he received requesting them.

I was glad to hear that I had made the cut and the sticker was on the way, however was not to be used as I had originally thought.

I arrived home from after 2 weeks at work to find that sure enough I had an envelope awaiting me with not one but 2 stickers inside. this made my next decision easy. I’ll put one on each bike.

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I think they look pretty cool. Along with the stickers he sent a Business card with his website address, email address and facebook address. Also very cool.

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In fact I am so impressed and inspired by them that I am now considering a design for my own site,

Thanks David (OPM). When I am asked about the sticker I will be sure to point them to your web address.

Cheers 🙂

Categories: Motorcycling | 2 Comments

OFMG Wednesday Ride. April 10th.

I was late getting to the start for the regular Wednesday ride and all had gone. I was in 2 mined as I thought they must have only just left. No, turn around and just ask at the servo we start from and see if maybe they know where they were headed to. Walked in to the the counter and luckily someone had said they were going to Mylor. Great I know the road up there well.

I headed out of town and sat on the speed limit and thought I would most likely catch them before they arrived as it was a good 60km to get there. well Murphy is still healthy and I wound up behind several cars and truck on my way. I arrived at the local cafe where I thought I would find them and parked up. I strolled over to find some riders were still inside ordering.

I joined the other riders outside at some sheltered tables. what a fantastic day for a ride. No wind and about 20c – 22c. We sat in the shade of a large tree while our drinks were brought to us. we sat and chatted for a while. it seems that muffins were the flavor of the day as almost everyone but me had one. Even though I had seen them when I ordered my coffee I wasn’t hungry and resisted the urge ;).

As usual a couple of the riders had to return home and the were also a couple who needed to get to Adelaide to get to specialist appointments. The remainder of the riders who were planning lunch took an alternate route to get to Ashbourne for lunch.

One thing about riding with locals is you get to find all the best bike roads. All I can say about the roads is “Fantastic”, No, No, I tell a lie, here’s another “WOW”. It was a great ride. Of all the times to leave my Gopro behind. I am definitely going back over it again to get some footage. Up and down and twisty. I was so out it today that I didn’t even think to get some photo’s until the best parts have gone.

We done the circuit and ended up at the Greenman inn for lunch. We wondered in and put in our lunch orders. We arrived at 1pm and it was not until 1.50pm that we  started to receive our orders. mind you some locals who had shown up about 5 minutes after us receive their meals about  15 minutes before us.

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Oh well the meal hit the spot.

Strolling out to the bikes after lunch. Bit of Aussie bush out back.

Strolling out to the bikes after lunch. Bit of Aussie bush out back.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sorry I didn’t get any other photo’s. I do this one again on the bike on my own to get some better photo’s.

Cheers

Route taken for a great bike ride.

Route taken for a great bike ride.

Categories: Motorcycling | Tags: , | 7 Comments

OFMG Wednesday March 13th

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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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

Another great day out.

Categories: Motorcycling | 4 Comments

OFMG Wednesday ride

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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

OFMG 6-3-13

Categories: Motorcycling | 2 Comments

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