Sunday, October 24, 2010

Gold Coast

Hanging out with friends on the Gold Coast now. Been very surprised about the cycle paths about Brisbane. They have much better facilaties than Sydney. Good paths that go everywhere I wanted to go. Clear signage. Maps. So awesome.
Ditching the GoGetters for panniers. About 7kg weight there. Wow. Also loosing the wide loader bar. Caught my foot on it a couple of times on rough roads. The panniers hang higher, which is a bonus:better ground clearance.

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

Jondaryan

Wet and cool is how things are now. Decided to escape the 36C temps out west and get closer to the coast. Funny how now a bit of that sun would be nice to dry everything out.

Thursday, October 7, 2010

Stonehenge, Isisford, Blackall

Last day doing things in Stonehenge. Was helping cut the law on the ride on. Never used one before. I managed to:
Find the bottomless pit (in fairness it wasn't marked, and was hidden in the knee high grass)
Cut the water pipe (plastic also hidden)
Am now in Blackall. Was a long hot ride from Stonehenge to Isisford. Rolled in on 7pm after leaving at 4am. There was stops during the hot part of the day, and lots of rest stops after that. Slept several times.
Isisford the river was over the bridge. Walked that pushing the bike. Lots of mossies and sandflies about right now.
Still having lots of hassles with bags. My blue waterproof bags are that, but getting them on the bike hasn't been as successful as i'd thought it would be. Thinking now that panniers, the tried and tested touring gear carriers are the go. My gear at the moment is held on with lots of straps and ocky straps. Looks big and messy, and is a pain to get on and off the bike and to find anything. Am sitting the blue bags in the yellow Go Getters. It the blue bags are upright, they tend to fall outwards. Lie them down and opening them without unpacking is hard. Tried putting different amounts of gear in them, and in the Go Getters. Haven't found a combination that works for me.
The fatter tires are way better. They provide some suspension, and track better on the dirt roads.