2024 UNB Moonan Flat Weekender - 16 & 17 March

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The 2024 Moonan Flat weekender was a pleasant and fairly quiet affair with seven UNB riders attending. Five of us left St Ives at 8am Saturday and met Al Scott at Wollombi then went on to Singleton Bakery for an early lunch stop. From Singleton we separated and four of us enjoyed a short dirt ride of about 20k’s over the Albano Road to Rouchel and past Glenbawn Dam while Alan B and Terry went round via Aberdeen on the tar, and we met John Hutchison at Moonan Flat. I had booked both bunk rooms at the Victoria Hotel at Moonan Flat and we filled all seven of the beds. Arriving variously from around 2pm, we sat and yarned through the afternoon and enjoyed a few drinks and an excellent dinner at the restaurant.

Yes our weekender clashed with the Ulysses AGM week. What a terrible decision – to ride or fly to Perth and trek down the scenic west coast of WA to Mandurah, a 5000km journey from here at least – or to sit and enjoy the afternoon at a quiet country pub in the glorious foothills of our own Barrington Tops. Cheers!

I’ve been visiting the Victoria Hotel at Moonan Flat for around fifty years, and UNB has been visiting for the past fifteen years, and it hasn’t changed much. It’s been successfully maintaining its one-star rating all along. Some recent improvements may move it up to one-and-a-half stars but lots more money will need to be poured in to go much higher. However, our bunk rooms had new flooring and new windows that opened, new beds and clean linen, and lights and a ceiling fan that worked, so they were pretty much OK. Outside new lawns and more paths and outside tables and chairs, plus a big new dining pavilion where the old pine tree had been, plus for a couple of hours we had a local balladeer singing some quite reasonable country music. All very nice.  Oh, and we shared the pub with about 20 Harley riders from Cessnock. Nice folks, really!

 Usually we include some dirt riding in the Barrington Tops on our Moonan weekenders, but this year there was some serious rain on the Gloucester side on the  Friday and on the Saturday morning, so we opted out. Next time. It did rain overnight and Sunday morning wasn’t looking promising, but by the time we were ready to head off around 8.30am the skies were beginning to clear. Apart from a few light showers on the high ground the roads were mostly dry for our trip home via Gundy, Muswellbrook, Jerrys Plains and Wollombi. 300kms each way, home by 2pm.

My thanks to the attendees Keith B, Terry T, Bonny, Al Bateman, Al Scott, and John Hutchison.

Moonan Flat next year?  We’ll see….   Cheers Geoff W.

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