pacific coasting roller coaster roads

so i made it up to brisbane 3 days later, a few muscles sorer, and a couple extra pounds of dirt on the bike, which i cant stop calling goldy even though i'm trying to come up with a more original name.

anyway got out of sydney finally at about noon after getting kind of lost on the way out. remind you this was my first real day driving in sydney and on the left hand side, kinda confusing at first but i think i got the hang of it now. i get as far as wyong about 3 hours into my trip and stop at a cafe for lunch and realize when i look the other way down the road it says "sydney 77". i've only gone 77kms and i'm 3/4 the way through a tank of gas... me thinks this is going to be one expensive trip especially since brisbane is only about 1000kms away.

once i hit some open road though, which isn't stop and start city travel, i can get about 200km on a tank. better. still think the bike needs a good tune up.

1st generation of luggage. have you ever seen a more ridiculous set up on a bike , oh.... well, if you've never seen my other touring set ups that is.

so to fill you in on the way i bike travel it's : wake up when the birds wake you up, drive as far as you can in a day(and obviously insert other stuff/activites etc. here) , then about an hour before sunset find where to lay your head for the night, preferably for free or close to free. the problem/advantage with this system is you never know what area/city/town/farm/ho(s)tel/rest-stop you'll end up in so it's impossible to book ahead. and i love it that way. benni had a great quote which i think i might steal: person A "where are you going to sleep tonight?" person B "i don't know?... where ever i wake up."

so anyway first night i only get as far as forster (pronounced foster like the beer, no aussie says the r sound). i'm in "the great lakes" region. and of course i laugh because we canadians know what great lakes are. suns coming down fast and there's okanagan sized mountains around so that'll cut a good 1/2 of light out of my time. so i took the first gravel road with the camping sign on it, soon to realize it's 10km of windy gravel roads with potholes everywhere. but suns setting fast and i got to set up before nightfall. first day riding a new-to-me bike down an unfamiliar road at dusk. great. it was the long weekend too so it was quite likely to be full. luckly i made it up and down and all around the shaky road & i got the last spot just in time, really, a car was looking for a spot right behind me. set up, and an aussie couple came over to chat and give me my first vegemite sandwich in oz. delicious, seemed i forgot to take any food or drinks even water with me. whoops.
i got to start rushing through this now it's costing me $5 an hour



2nd night i made it to the queensland border and what a sight! the road leading up to it was 25kms of wonderland. but i have very few pics to prove it, because while i'm trying to enjoy the beauty of the land again night is falling within the hour and i know i got about an hour left of riding through these windy hilly roads. worst of all my oil indicator light is flickering, bad news. i later find out it was just low but it was making me pretty nervous. anyway, i've never driven any road like it. majestic i guess would decribe it best. i had no time for photos except at the very beginning when i crossed the first of many single wooden bridges and... oh yeah! at the very end the road acctually turned into a roller coaster steep steep hills straight up and down about 6 times. i'll go back on my way down south again and set the camera up to movie capture to show u what i mean.
that's some of it anyway. this has cost me about $8 so far, and if i was making money at the time too it wouldn't bother me so much. you'll have to buy the book to get the rest of the story....

top of the (bottom) world!

it felt so great getting my last piece of mail today that enabled me to get my registration and plates. and yes i did finally get my business papers from rich a week and a half later(fyi if you're sending me a valentine card).

but what felt even better was riding away on my new bike! it handles so easily for that size of bike. i think i'm going to keep the fairing too, it's starting to grow on me and it would be a huge hassle to get and re-wire the signals and like the seca, the headlight is mounted in the fairing. too much trouble; i just need to enjoy the ride.

so as scheduled i leave tomorrow morning north up the pacific highway. expecting to meet up with manny in a couple days in brisbane. it's about a ten hour drive but i'm going to split it in two or three days ... hopefully. it's also labor? day weekend here so getting proper camping might prove difficult.
got all my camping gear today. tent, inflatable mat, cooking supplies. i'm going to have to downsize my stuff as i go since every nook is filled on the bike including both tank bags. so much for travelling light.

i'll put some pics up later on this post i just dont really have much time now, just wanted to let you know everything worked out so far and i get to start exploring the real australia and get out of this lost:city.

d.y.k.,the little blvds in the middle of the roads are called refuge islands?

beach song # 2

so yes, i ended up buying that guitar and aside from figuring out how to bring it along i think it has been my most favorite purchase in oz so far. below is a picture of someone else playing (cant remember his name).

went to bondi beach yesterday with a brazilian girl i met named luara, and met about 20 of her friends. the guitar i bought about an hour earlier was a hit as many there knew how to play so they just passed the guitar around and played between brazilian and north american songs singing loudly into the ocean.

it got really cold near the end of the day so went home changed and found out our hostel group was doing quiz night at a near by pub. so i made a team with 2 girls from holland named "the botanic gardeners" and we did fairly well. did you know australia was originally to be named new holland? well now we know.