Xmas Trail Ride

 Yesterday was the Bush Riders Xmas Trail ride.  Today I am sore...

Totally worth it!

The ride was just 40mins ute drive from my place and by the time I got there, there were plenty of vehicles parked up and bikes being unloaded.  I parked between two very flash utes towing even flasher trailers, one of them had led lighting and a fridge was keeping the drinks cool.  I had ice in my camel-bak...

After the rider briefing (where we were warned of wet slippery grass), we were led out on the opening 15km+ lap and I can confirm that the grass was slippery - for those that don't know, a 450 goes sideways on this stuff when you think of touching the throttle or changing gear.  Yes, it is still fun.

After a pretty quiet first lap, I didn't stop back at the pits but carried on into my second lap with the grass just the a little bit less slippery - a couple of hundred bikes had kinda fixed that.  As I made my way around I kept an eye out for a decent spot to take some photos, have a breather and kill some gorse.

BTW: the chap in the first two pics below must have been in his sixties and he's riding a TS185 that was probably over 40 years old too!

Ending lap two, I pulled into the pits for a more decent breather.  It was definitely hot work out there and I needed to get my breath back a bit.  This stop turned into an early lunch where I was more interested in getting water in than the tucker.

Back out onto lap three and I was riding a lot better and was pretty quick on the quick bits and not making too many mistakes elsewhere but I was already starting to feel it a bit.  There was one really bumpy hill climb that you really felt through the arms and of course my legs were tiring too.  But I was still having fun.

After that lap I had a quick stop again in the pits, using fuel as an excuse.  I only put about 4L in the bike so it was a pretty flimsy excuse as the bike carries just under 10L with it's upgraded tank.

Anyway, I made it a quick stop as I found that the longer you stayed stopped, the more things start hurting.  Lap 4 was a cracker with some good pace but by the time I had dealt with that hill climb and some of steep descents I figured that was enough for me.  Probably just under two hours riding all up.

Back at the ute, I quickly loaded up so I could then get out of my hot, sweaty gear and start rehydrating in earnest.  It was hot.  And it was a hot drive home to a hot house and an afternoon consisting of not much...

Still, awesome fun.  Love these trail rides and getting out on the yella terra!

Glen Orua Trail Ride

Well, this is the ride I've been waiting for ever since I bought the RMX.  

The Glen Orua trail ride was the first trail ride that Colin and I did on our WR's and it was a bit of a mission due to the boggy conditions.  But, we both had really enjoyed it and it was well organised with heaps of riders on it.  For a variety of reasons I'd missed everyone of these until this past weekend - and a cold earlier in the week had may worried for a while...

As it turned out, I was nearly back to 90% so I wasn't going to miss it...

Another difference this time around (besides the better bike for it) was that it was being hosted in Tangimoana on a farm that I believe they have used for it before.  No change to the millions that attended it - it's definitely a popular ride and the organisers reckoned they had to send out for more sausages...

I got there around 9:20, unloaded the bike and then wandered around while waiting for the 9:45 briefing.  Unfortunately the wait was a bit longer and they needed to wait for the ambulance to get there (stuck in a queue of utes and trailers) and also wanted to get everyone signed in so they didn't miss the briefing.

Cleanish (ok, it hadn't been washed) and only a few of the riders vehicles - that grass in front soon filled up completely!

In the end, we were probably off about half an hour late and I was one of the first few (hundred) to get out on the first led lap.  I took it fairly quietly and quickly discovered that there was going to be quite a few whoops, sand, some neat riding across what are probably grass covered sand dunes, sand, some mud, sand, some more technical slow stuff in a pine plantation, sand and a couple of quicker bits on the way around an approximately 15km course.  Fun stuff!

After lap 1, I had a quick water stop before heading out again for a much quicker (for this kid) lap two.  Here's the complete lap - make sure you watch it all 😜

Another quick stop for water and after tossing up the idea of an early lunch, I decided to get in another lap.  This time around I was a little slower in places as I was already starting to get a wee bit tired.  Tired enough to make a silly mistake in one of the muddy bits:

Well, at least I didn't get stuck in the mud hole...

Back at the carpark it was finally time for a lunch break.  A sausage (in bread with onions and sauce please), sandwich, drink and a slice of chocolate banana cake along with more water all went down very nicely.

While scoffing it down I was joined by Steve who was there on his two-smoke but also had a brand new DRZ-400 to try out.  So on lap four I followed (or tried to follow) him around while getting just that little bit more sore and tired.  One rest stop and a little drop later and that was the end of the lap and enough for me.

Another great day out on the yellow bike and even though I'm still sore now (as usual) I really enjoy it and the exercise you get riding offroad.  Next one in a few weeks  - fingers crossed!

A dirty dirt bike is a happy dirt bike!

Not the TT2000 Part One

Carrying on from the sad intro: https://banditrider.blogspot.com/2023/03/not-tt2000-intro.html

After a night spent in Geraldine, we had a easy drive over to Wanaka on Friday.  Once there we found our home base with Kelly and Tim just out of town and then spent the rest of the day cruising around Wanaka before going out to dinner with our hosts.  We also discovered that there was a Trail ride on near Te Anau and Tim reckoned that we should join him on it.

After some quite tricky trail rides on the 450 back home, I was a bit concerned about taking the WR's with their road legal rubber on it but Tim reckoned we'd be fine and that the trail rides down South were always mapped out for all skill levels.  Our arms did not withstand the twisting...

The next morning started with a fairly decent drive across the Crown Range Road and through to Mossburn before turning off onto the Mavora Lakes road to get to the ride.  We were not the only ones there...

There was no riders briefing (cool) and so as soon as we were ready we could go out and attack one of two "family" loops or tackle some A loops...we decided to stick to the family loops.

And it was great!  The tracks were pretty easy with good drip everywhere and nothing to technical or snotty.  Add in some spectacular scenery and it was a real blast!

BTW: we weren't the only ones on road legal bikes wearing stinking hot riding gear, there was another guy there on a DR650 - also having a ball.

I ended up doing 3 laps of one of the loops and 2 of the other before it was time for us to head off into Mossburn for a cold drink before the long drive back to Wanaka.  Spectacular day out pushing the wee 250's pretty hard around a really amazing trail ride!

Herbertville Trail ride

It's been forever since I rode the yellow bike and with the Herbertville Trail ride allowing quads too I managed to persuade Colin to come up for the ride.

We had an early start as we had to haul the bikes a fair way on the pretty average Weber-Wimbledon section of Route 52.  In the end we could have taken it a bit easier as we got there with just over an hour to spare - plenty of time to get sunburned while we were forced to smell the bacon and sausages the guys next to us were cooking up...

With no rider briefing (just a piece of paper with a map) we had to keep an eye out on when the ride started.  We managed to be in the first 20-30 bikes to tear into the first of many hill climbs.

The route was a little different than last time out but still took in plenty of challenging hill climbs and descents and of course the odd bit of mud - one particular bog hole taking a bit of an effort to get through on Lap 1 but there was a better route around/through it the next time around.  One thing that was familiar from last time was the wind - I didn't get blown off the hill this time but it was interesting...

A new section of the ride was probably about 2km or so of beach.  I hated the entry to the beach through seriously soft sand and even on the harder stuff I wasn't crazy about the wiggly/waggling through the front end at speed.  Beach at about 21:30 in the below video:

During the first lap Colin and I got separated when he took an easy route while I clambered another hill and I ended up waiting for him for about 20 mins with no sign of him.  Meanwhile he got back to the ute and waited for me for a while before tearing off to go looking for me.

When I gave up waiting and made for the ute I stopped a number of times to ask people if they'd seen him but apparently he was an invisible man.  When I got back to the ute the guys next door said he'd left about ten minutes before I got there.

A quick drink for me and the bike (450's use a it of fuel on hilly 35km loops) and I tore off after him.  I eventually caught him probably a third of his way into his second lap and we had a quick catch up before getting back into the brapping.

Another hoon back down the beach got us back to the ute again where at around 2pm it was definitely time for lunch!

With 2 laps and 70km under our belts we were reasonably knackered so after lunch the bikes were loaded back up for the trip home after a heap of fun!

I really enjoyed getting back on the Suzy and am definitely looking forward to the next trail ride in December.

Here's what some of the ride looked like from 4 wheels (shame the Garmin doesn't have the image stabilisation that the GoPro has).