Dusty Butt - The Knocked the bugger off Reports

[NordieBoy]

The linear slope orange line between the 900ish and 1000ish kms indicates to me that the GPSr stopped recording somewhere around dovedale and it was turned back on again at another location - my guess is around St Arnaud and that Nordie was with Zukin when he redid the St Arnaud to Nelson section of the route on the Sunday Arvo. The lack of time stamp in the GPX file means I cant be sure though.

The 2-dayers didn't finish until Sunday evening.

Nordie - how were you recording the track? If seems you have a heap of track points that were recoded manually at key locations (intersections etc). Would have been better (if your GPSr has the memory for it) to automatically record a point every 2 to 5 seconds. Much bigger file but get a much more accurate idea of the "shape" of the route. You understand the difference between GPS tracks and GPS routes i.e. routes are prepared on a computer uploaded and followed and tracks are points automatically recorded at a set interval or manually when out riding the route. Tracks obviously have much better data.

Cheers R

Tracks were being recorded on auto.

Try THIS ONE.

[cooneyr]

The 2-dayers didn't finish until Sunday evening.......

make that Monday. Email sent about the data.

Cheers R

[NordieBoy]

Profile of the ride...

[Zukin]

You missed Island Saddle (on the Rainbow road) that will be the 2nd highest points
And Jacks and/or Jollies, what about Wards pass

[NordieBoy]

You missed Island Saddle (on the Rainbow road) that will be the 2nd highest points
And Jacks and/or Jollies, what about Wards pass

The catch is, I don't know which ones they are
I labled the ones I knew

[cooneyr]

Common ya all can do better than that

Cheers R

[Zukin]

Hmm maybe I could have a go

[NordieBoy]

Hmm maybe I could have a go

Can I borrow your glasses?

[warewolf]

I shoulda kept reading; here's my update. There's more labels to add but I reckon that's enough to make it easily understandable.

[cooneyr]

Me being a smart arse. Some of the high points don't actually have names and yes there is two Tadmore saddles!

Cheers R

[marks]

my pics are finally up on teh interweb.

Cool pics

Thanks for posting them.

cheers


Mark

[NordieBoy]

We had a nice mix of bikes (KLR650, KLE400, XF650, DR650, F650, XLV600) and blokes including Christian, a visiting Frenchman on the KLE400 and a lone Toyota Smurf with my brothers doing chase duties (and I mean chase).

The Rear guard/subframe bolts came out of the KLR on Fridays practice run over the Maungatapu with a loaded Givi hanging off it, but better that it happened then and not on the ride - some bolts, grinding, hacksawing, super stud-lock and zip-ties and all was well. At the BBQ on Friday when we checked the KLR tyre pressures we found out it'd just done the Maungatapu with 18psi in the Kings knobbly rear and 34psi in the TrailWing front. That would explain a few things.

We headed off about 5:45am after offloading all our gear into the Smurf and rode only carrying water and food.


Maungatapu in daylight this time...
The rough sections were the worst they've been for years but presented no problems to the hardened KiwiBiker Adventure Riders.


We'd only just got our helmets off at the summit and were talking in deep manly voices about how rough it was but how little problem it presented to us manly men when the Smurf appeared. How the hell did he get it up there that quick?


Not to self: If you're going to get water splash shots...


Make sure you're far enough back to stay dry when a mad bugger in a 4WD comes through.


On the other side the sun was rising...




And milking had just finished and we slowly rode through a couple of million cows.


The Onamalutu gravel was a lot better than when TransAlper and I went through last where it was 10cm thick all over the road.


The Kaituna-Tuamarina Road sealed section is just magic with those cambered twisties even if you do have to dodge small goats.

[NordieBoy]

The Taylors Pass washboard sections were annoying.


Black Birch Track was great as ever.






It got hotter and hotter coming down Black Birch Track instead of like last time TransAlper and I were up there in the snow where we got warmer and warmer and were back to normal temp by the bottom.

Some great scenes along the Awatere.






Lunch in the shade at the Molesworth was a welcome relief from the heat, dust and bad drivers.


I got a shot of Christian at the same ford TransAlper got me last time.


Another shade stop at the Acheron was also welcomed and a bit of shouting at 4WD'ers who seemed incapable of shutting gates ensued.

Coming down Jollies Pass near Hamner we got stuck behind a truck carting a horse for a few km.

[NordieBoy]

Looking at the photos of the Molesworth and Rainbow the first thing I note is the total blue sky in the Molesworth contrasting with the clouds that were over the Rainbow.


It paid to stay a distance in front of the Smurf...


I had a small slide into the watertable on the outside of the corner on the Rainbow and had a quick glance about to see if it had been spotted. Only to find out later it had.
Also crested the brow of a small rise at about 70kph to find out it was a gravel wash and went through it at about 60kph. If I wasn't standing up already I would have had to have the seat surgically removed from my arse crack.
Christian was following me back out of my dust and I managed to get him slowed down so as not to repeat the performance. We thought about waiting to see what the Smurf would make of it but headed on.

We stayed the night at Speargrass Station beside the shearing shed courtesy of Ian Thorneycroft where we cooked up a barbie and settled down to a dinner of steaks, sossies, venison bacon, venison patties, beer, wine (How much were those paper cups again?), cheese, trifle and sandflies.


The standard BS session ensued with Shane being full of it (stories that is).
Some of the guys put their tents up over the fence in the longer (softer) grass whereas the locals just roughed it putting their tents up on the hard ground around the shed - we're tough.
We dropped off to sleep to the sound of bulls snorting a couple of paddocks over.

A hearty breakfast of bacon and coffee and we were on our way...

My camera batteries had died so I had to be content with just riding until I could replace them at Springs.

Off through the Porika! Nice riding on the way up, lulling you into a false sense of security for that nasty little bit.
Deep dust/dirt with large loose rocks for 100m or so. We had one binner here and the chase crew finally got to fix a bike (well a plastic handguard).

Nice cruise down through the Braeburn where the Smurf crew was forced to have several goes at a water splash, to Murch where I forgot to get batteries and off to the Maruia Saddle.
The Smurf crew stopped by Horse (Whores?) Flat Bridge for some fishing while we went over the Saddle.
Some nice sandy corners up there.

Back out onto the main road for a while and we got tailgated by an arsehole towing a V-Rod on a trailer.
He would sit meters off the back of the bikes waiting for us to get the fcuk out of his way or if there was a slight gap in the traffic he'd overtake a single bike, rinse and repeat.

West Bank Road was a revelation. Long long long gravel straights and then sweet twisties.


Got some batteries in Springs where we also grabbed some lunch.

Palmers Road is something else again! Just brilliant! Sneaky fords, open paddocks, native stands and it just kept going on and on.








Back along West Bank Road and the highway, over the Maruia again and past a couple of MG's out for a bumpy cruise and met up with the Smurf crew who had been waiting for over 3 hours but had forgotten we were going right through to Palmers Road and not just going over the Maruia and back.

Aaron had caught a large fishy and I got 1 more photo before the camera gasped it's last and was no more. It is an ex-camera. It's no longer just pining for the fiord's.


Back through the Braeburn and up the Porika with a couple taking the BusaJim approach and not risking the more road biased bikes up that top section. You had to keep the revs up and the momentum going but it was fun.

From the Porika we headed on the seal to Kawateri Junction where Shane was talked in to showing what something with more than 2 wheels could do. From Kawateri around the best right hander in the South Island and off to Glenhope and the Dry Weather Road.

A nice cruise through here apart from some anxious moments with a little girl riding her bike on the wrong side of the road towards us and as I passed her she was heading up a rise that would have hidden her from those following. Seems she stopped and watched us pass.

We stopped at the Tui Road corner and waited for the rest.
XF650 arrived with the news that Christian on the KLE400 had dropped his sump bung in the middle of the Dry Weather Road.
The bike hadn't seized but they were scratching their heads about how to fix it.
I went back and found bro#1 and Christian had gone off to try and find the bung and bro#2 sent me off to a mates farm to make something up that would do the job.
The others went off through the Sherry River Road and we set a meeting place at the corrugated iron chook back on the Tap road.
20km back toward Tapawera at Kinzett Creek I found Shane's mate was away at the supercross (of course) so his dad and I fossicked around the old motorbike bits in the shed(s) for something that would do the job.
Half an hour later we ended up at the wreck of an old jap car and after 10 mins of looking we noticed the wheel studs were the right thread.
Jack the car up, nick the brake drum assembly, back to the shed, press out a stud, cut the wheel nut in half, put some o-rings in the end and we had an adjusable sump-bung. No #8 wire involved at all.
I met Christian and the Smurf crew about 3km along the road as they had got the bike going with a sump-bung made of wood.
Shane wanted to swap the bungs over so I headed to the chook and we headed off to do the Mt Arthur section and they would catch up at the Pokororo Hall at the base of the Graeme Valley.

The ride up had more washboards but was still cool and even cooler at the top.
A German dad was playing with his kids minds by driving off as they reached the car to go home.
I found you can get almost all of the way down with the engine off before you cook your DR's rear brakes.

About 5 mins after we got to the Hall at the bottom the stragglers appeared having fitted the new bung and Christian said he was going to get the wooden one made into a necklace.

Off we headed to Jacobs Ladder where it started raining...
I pointed the roadie bikes up the road and the dirtier ones along the clay to the left along the wet clay severely cambered whoops.

We stopped at the "Olde Dovedale Shoppe" and got into various bits of wet weather gear and rubbish bags for the last legs over the Dovedale Hill and the home stretch on the seal back through Wakefield, Brightwater, Richmond and Nelson.
The Dove hill is much better wet than dry and it's great dry.
Luckily my brakes had come back somewhere between Jacobs Ladder and here so I could enjoy the downhill side even more.

Once back on the seal we cruised back to town.
I was watching as my speedo clicked over 1000km at the 70kph sign heading out of Wakefield.

Back at the start point we chatted a bit and slowly dispursed to various lodgings, homes and in one case rode back to Blenheim.

Christian had missed out on the 1000km by only 20km or so.

I had a great time with some great blokes, birds, bikes and scenery.

Thanks to the Smurf crew for the repairs and storage space. It was great riding only having to carry some water.

We only fell off a total of 2.5 times between the 6 of us on the whole trip.
The guilty can come forward if they want.



All I can say now is... Next!

[JATZ]

Great report N.B. I like to think of my .5 of a fall as taking a power nap