Today was about riding to Queensland, a transport leg that would see me ready to start the Top Rider Adventure Riding Course first thing tomorrow morning. While the weather didn’t look promising there was no reason for the ride to be boring so keeping off the highway and it’s ever changing speed limit signs and never ending roadworks was a must.
I left in light drizzle and took the very familiar route out through Raymond Terrace, up Thunderbolts Way to the Walcha Royal Cafe for my first stop. The ride up was wet to about 30k’s south of Walcha and the wind had risen but I enjoy that road under any conditions. Particularly the Barrington end. At the Royal I had a nice chat with Toni, a bonus added to the great coffee and toasted ham and cheese sanga. Food luxuries I don’t have time for on Iron Butt rides.
From there I rode up to Uralla then Armidale for fuel and the start of Waterfall Way. Shortly after Armidale the rain came back and persisted through Ebor and down to the Armidale Road to Grafton. This road is getting higher and higher on my list of favourites every time I ride it. Photo ops were rare today but I had to take at least one and it shows the conditions at the time.
On to Grafton and up Summerland Way to Casino for the final fuel stop for the day. I continued north to Kyogle, a new road for me, and then took a righty on Kyogle Road towards Murwillumbah. What a fantastic piece of Road this was, a bit slippery in the wet on the Heidenau K60’s but lots of fun around lots of corners. I passed the Nimbin turnoff and was back on familiar territory. I was last on this patch of tar on my first Iron Butt Ride on a small bike (TTR-250).
Just before Murwillumbah a bit of a short cut got me heading north on the Nerang-Murwillumbah Road through Chillingham. Another fantastic piece of motorcycling Road, to the Queensland Border in a non rainy patch.
I continued north to near Nerang arriving just before 5pm. A good number of hours for the 783k’s for the day until you add back in the hour that Queensland is behind NSW for a few months of the year.
So there it is, transport leg done choosing some decent riding roads that only added about 50k’s to the the total a trip up the Pacific Hwy would have been. You’d never ride the highway with these roads on offer!