Gloucester Dirt Ride 28th Aug 2025

 Hello Thursday Riders

 

Chapter 1 – 21st August, 2025.

 

The 21st August ride had been cancelled due to inclement weather. A decision was taken to transfer the ride to the Kyushu Japanese Restaurant, Neutral Bay, famous for its bento box, and hold a formal meeting to discuss important matters of policy. These notes represent Minutes of that meeting. Membership was drawn from a cross section of constitutional interests, to ensure a diversity of views.

 

Present: Chairman Rod (Roquet) May, representing the Bega Valley Cheese Eaters; Peter Walshaw (North Korean Hoteliers Resistance Movement); Wayne Rees (Aotearoa Advancement Society, Fielding Branch); Tony James (Teals) and Yours Truly Truly, a person known to be incapable of lying.

 

Welcome to Country: Sato-san visited the table and did his Welcome to Country. Tony James, as a devout Teal, was shocked by this and moved a call to order whilst he phoned Zali (MP Stegall) to determine whether a Japanese Welcome to Country was politically correct. Whist that was going on we all bowed a ceremoniously appropriate 30 degrees in honour of Sato-san  and his kitchen. Sato-san, with great flourish, bowed back. We ordered beers.  Tony finished his call with Zali and was pleased to report on the first round of discussions. It had been decided to hold a Senate Inquiry into the practice of a Japanese Welcome to Country but that the Greens had got wind of it, and they insisted on a Royal Commission. We ordered more beer. 

 

Fund Raising: extensive discussion of fund-raising efforts followed. The meeting endorsed the Wangi Wangi sausage sizzle planned for 23rd October, in aid of rheumatoid arthritis research. This is the official Ulysses charity. It was resolved to fine anyone that didn’t turn up $100 and to talk meanly about them. On a motion from Tony James, it was agreed that vegetarian sausages will be served, and an extra tree will be planted as our carbon offset. A sub-committee of Tony and Wayne Rees has been set up to decide what sort of tree would be most suitable.

 

The Gloucester Ride: The Chair asked Tony to report on the forthcoming ride to Gloucester. Tony did that but said he was worried about pot-holes, which happens when global warming causes more rain. He had called the Council and asked that any pot-holes be filled by the time we arrived in the district, or there would be an adverse report in The Guardian Newspaper. He also gave the good news that the publican at the Roundabout Hotel had offered a schooner of Old and a choice of a 250g Scotch Fillet steak or a 400g T-Bone for $10 per head, with a free bottle of wine on every table. Tony advised he had ‘phoned Zali on the matter and, after due consideration of methane emissions caused by the cattle industry and as a matter of conscience, the Roundabout Hotel offer would have to be refused. Consuming steak may aggravate the pot-hole crisis.

 

Peter gave a brief overview of his planning for the dirt option of the Gloucester ride. It became clear that only an idiot would take that option, so Peter was thanked for his inane commentary, and we ordered another beer. The Bento Box lunches arrived.

 

Wayne Rees then spoke of the need for the meeting to acknowledge the traditional owners of Aotearoa. We ordered another beer to salute the traditional owners of Aotearoa. Wayne followed up with a four-hour ramble through the difficulties of Strata Home Units. Having finished another beer and our Bento Boxes, the remainder of us nodded off for our afternoon nap whilst Wayne continued his speech.

 

The meeting closed when we all woke up. The rain and wind outside made any suggestion of going home ridiculous, so we ordered another beer.

 

Chapter 2 – The Gloucester Ride – Dirt Option – 27th August, 2025:

 

There were five idiots; Peter W (ride leader), Roquet, Frank, yet another Peter and yours Truly Truly. Peter W provided a briefing, for an 8.30amdeparture. It was a waste of time, since no-one, even Frank with his indigenous background and local knowledge, knew where we were going or what we would encounter. Clearly, this ride was a prep for the North Korean Hoteliers Resistance Movement, when it enters its partisan fighters’ stage.

 

We rocked up Thunderbolts, to Rockhurst and turned on to a dirt road. The sign said, “Road Closed”, but somehow that didn’t seem to be a sincere comment. Frank, with his indigenous background and local knowledge, and as a former Plant Operator himself, went up to a bloke that was operating plant and scooping bits of road into a truck to gain some idea of road conditions. It’s a bit difficult to know the whole conversation but I think it went something like this:

 

Frank: “Is the road really closed, can we get through on the bikes?”

Plant Operator: “If yer an idiot”.

Frank: “Ah, ok, she’ll be right then”.

 

We threw dirt over ourselves and the bikes, just in case there wasn’t enough on the track and we looked unimpressively clean when we got back. We gathered in a little circle and mumbled at each other, like the Wallabies do just before they get whacked by the All Blacks. And off we went. We were following the course of the Manning River. I guess we were in the country that you can see from the lookout atop Thunderbolts Way, after all the twisty bits. It was beautiful, a paradise lost and serene. We were heading to Curricabark. After half an hour or so of blissful riding, we reached a causeway. I shit myself. It had all the hallmarks of Iguazu Falls. The water crashed over; dinky little rainbows danced above the mist from the tumbling torrent. “Ahhhh…” I told myself happily. Released. “We’ll be able to go back, because not even an idiot would try to cross this”.

 

Unfortunately, local government had provided for idiots, and there was a detour sign pointing up a hill. We took the detour to a slightly technical climb which, at the top of a rise, dumped you into a bucket of mud. There is no way back and only fear as you go forward. To be fair (truly, truly) the road did settle down as we crossed the hill and it was beautiful valley country again. We reached a river crossing. I think I must explain at this point, I am bringing up the rear. This is because I was frightened. I looked over the river crossing, and the other blokes had made it across. Bravely, I entered the water. Halfway across, my front wheel struck the Rock of Gibralter, heaving me to the left. I planted my right foot in the bottom of the river. The bike was tilted at a 45 degree angle. My left foot was akimbo, and the bottom of my riding pants somehow tangled up in the gear lever. I was an immoveable object, stuck in an irresistible current.

 

The other blokes were smiling insidiously, voices full falsetto calling “ the boy fell in the water”, in direct imitation of Neddy Seagoon (of the Goon show, for those that never owned a radio when they were a boy). I stood there, one legged – the same side as my artificial hip - for a full seven minutes as the others laughed and cackled and jumped for joy on the opposite side of the bank. Eventually Roquet, having decided this couldn’t go on forever, stripped down to his Superman outfit, did 20 push-ups to warm up and show his rippling muscles, and leaped into the water and lifted me, bike and all, out of the water. He complained about the water in his boots, saying it was almost as bad as kryptonite.

 

What might have been termed a road, turns more to a track and up we rise. At this point we are somewhere along the edge of Barrington Tops, perhaps parallel and some way north of the road that runs between Gloucester and Scone. There is the odd gate, and then a pile of bush pulled across the track as an artificial fence. No-one is up here. We get to the top of the range and are now looking north-west. The views are spectacular, the wind tears over the top of you with temperatures now down to 13 degrees (warm for up there) and the sky is immense. We head down the hill, me in the rear, less scared than I was but of a competence where I can’t catch the other guys anyway. Peter W patiently waits, from time to time.

 

We jiggle down the hill and find ourselves in the middle of nowhere. We know it was the middle of nowhere, because a sign said 70km to Scone, and (the other way) 70km to Nundle. We drop in on the Packers at Ellerston and have tea and scones, and play 9 holes of golf (one club each; a five iron - and race on the bikes rather than walk) on the private golf course. They’re nice people, those Packers, once you get to know them. Off we head toward Nundle, the Packers, waving and teary eyed because it was so nice to see us.

 

Our track goes up Isaacs Creek road, crossing lots of causeways, little rivers and creeks running over them then up Crawney Pass and into Nundle. This is all beautiful dirt bike riding, and anyone with an adventure bike would find it a pleasure. I can report I ran over a black snake. I feel bad about it but couldn’t avoid it. This tells you the snake season has started. 

 

At Nundle, at the little general store and fuel stop, we have possibly the best hamburger in the World. Superbly prepared with a good mix of veggies (including lashings of onion and beetroot) and prime local steak. The CIA has provided Donald Trump with report on these hamburgers, and not only has he promised to lift all tariffs from Australia, but has suggested NSW as the 51st State of the USA, prioritising Nundle over Greenland. In the meantime, the Kremlin is watching.

 

Sated with the World’s best ‘burgers, our route takes us up Forest Way, past Hanging Rock. This is a neat little climb on tar, with lots of tight bends. You arrive at the top, relaxed and feeling as though you are on the last, pleasant leg. However, the weather has taken a turn. It has become dark and cold. Logging trucks, behemoths, appear from the left, then the right. The council, in an effort to drive up the road toll and to scare people witless have gravelled the road. This isn’t simple gravel. It is composed of marbles laid thick. The bike must glide across the top of it and keeping straight is not easy. Braking is impossible, and if you lose momentum you are sure to crash. Get up into a high gear and think of Buddha. This goes on for perhaps 40km, and you marvel at your own competence – or is it luck - in staying upright as your sphincter tightens to 100 psi. Then it ends, and soon you make your way back to Thunderbolts Way, and to Gloucester. By this time my mind has gone back to the $10 schooner of Old and 250g Scotch Fillet, and I curse Global Warming and Tony James for denying me the pleasure.

 

I have to say a loop ride up and down the nice, but same, old tar roads has little on the fear, loathing, joy, thrills and adventure of getting dirty. Thanks for Peter W, for being such a cunning and ruthless trip planner. Thanks to the other guys, including Roquet and his donuts, just for doing it. Mad as ever!

 

Stephen