Menindee to Ivanhoe...an adventure.

After leaving Tikalina Station we stopped for lunch in Broken Hill, then we rode on to Menindee, from there the plan was to push on to Ivanhoe where we would stay for the night. Now if you look at any GPS, or Google Maps, for the best way to get from Menindee to Ivanhoe, they will tell you to go back to Broken Hill, through Wilcannia, then down the Cobb Highway to Ivanhoe.

That's about 490 kms, so we said screw that, let's take this "Ivanhoe Menindee Road", 206kms, how hard can it be right? It turns out there is a reason the GPS tells you to go via Wilcannia my fellow travelers.....

Ivanhoe Menindee Road is actually a pretty good road, the problem is the sand, especially the first 70kms out of Menindee. We hit the track travelling at about 90kph, which felt perfectly safe on the firm road surface. About 2kms down the road we hit the first section of deep sand, and that was a very sobering experience. Now I've done a bit of sand riding on my dirt bike, and it was a ton of fun, but on a 210kg bike, carrying around 30kgs of tent, sleeping gear, tools and extra fuel, it become something else entirely. Yes yes I know, weight over the back of the bike, keep the power on, stay on the pegs, all very easy on a 120kg dirt bike, but on the GS800, this was damn hard work.

Chris took a rather nasty spill after about 30kms, it really knocked the wind out of him and gave us both a bit of a scare. Thankfully there were no serious injuries to Chris but the bike took a fair pounding, and I am VERY glad I decided to travel together.

After that, the pace slowed right down. According to the GPS logs it took us about 4 hours to travel just over 200 kilometers from Menindee to Ivanhoe, including a 40 minute stop after the little fender bender. Even though we had a bit of a mishap, I still LOVED that track, it's everything I expected the outback to be, and taught me a lot about how to prepare for my next trip.

After that ride the accomodation in Ivanhoe looked fantastic!

Goodnight Ivanhoe, see you in the morning!

A change of plans....

Well I've had a rather drastic change of plans. Originally I planned on parting ways with Chris at Radium Hill. Chris was going to head back to Melbourne via his folk place in Kyabram, and I was going to head up to Lyndhurst, then on through Oodnadatta.

The first thing that got me thinking was the heat, the last 2 days have been 40 degrees plus, and riding was at time very uncomfortable. It was only going to get hotter as I traveled further North in to Central Australia.

The second thing hit me while we were out at Radium Hill, and I looked around at the complete isolation surrounding me. The thought of being out in that sort of area, alone, was quite frankly unnerving. If anything serious were to happen, well, it's a long wait for someone to come along, then another long wait to get to help.

The third thing was probably the most serious....hard panniers are a REALLY bad idea for offroad riding! I dropped my bike pulling up at a rest stop between Mildura and Broken Hill. I was probably moving at 1kph and turned the bars too quickly on the gravel carpark, the front washed out and I dropped the bike. Pretty much a nothing incident, but the weight of the bike falling on the panniers broke the rear bracket, meaning the pannier was now only supported from the top, no rear support. This was OK on the bitumen, but any serious off-road work would be putting a hell of a lot of load on the single top mounting point. And if that pannier were to fail, I'd be screwed. There was no room to move all the contents out of that box should the need arise.

So I have a new plan, I'm going to head back towards Melbourne with Chris, then part ways around Deniliquin. From there Chris will continue South to Kyabram, and I will head East in to the Victorian High Country. Sounds like a plan!

Visit to Radium Hill

Good morning Tikalina station. 

It's been around 49 degrees for the last couple of days, making the ride up pretty uncomfortable at times. Last night a cool change came through so we got a great night sleep in the shearers quarters. 

After a great breakfast (thanks Andy!) Chris and I set off from the homestead out to Radium Hill. It's about 20kms on nice flowing tracks. 

Eventually we came to the old mining site. Almost everything above ground is now gone, but there are concrete footings everywhere, this place was HUGE!

Next we headed up to the old town. Again, pretty much everything above ground is now gone, but there are plaques everywhere explaining what used to be located where, usually accompanied by a photo showing how things used to look. 

Above is the site of the old drive in theatre. It's pretty incredible that there was ever a drive in here, 55 years ago this would have been like living on the moon. I still find it hard to believe 1200 people used to live all the way out here!!

There was even an Olympic size swimming pool. It was SUPER deep, this was necessary to ensure it didn't get to hot during the long hot summer.

Arrived at Radium Hill.

I The ride from Mildura to Broken Hill wasn't the most exciting stretch of road, but we made it in about 3 hours. Had to slow down a few times for emu's, which was a first for me.

Lunch in BH then it was an hour ride west to Tikalina Station. 

Tikalina is a sheep station, 70000 acres with around 8700 sheep. The had just started shearing the week before we arrived. I was amazed to hear they get through about 1000 sheep a day!

The station has its own airstrip, but the current plane is out of action and a new one on the way. 

We arrived about 5pm so it was a quick shower, then dinner with our very gracious hosts Andy and Helen. An early night, then tomorrow is off to explore the old mining site and town. 

Good morning Mildura.

First stop - Mildura.

Mildura.

39 degrees upon arrival, temperatures in excess of 40 degrees on the way up. Leaving Melbourne at 10am was a mistake, should have headed off at 6am to avoid the worst of the heat. About 8 hours to reach here including lunch and a couple of fuel stops. This is about the longest I'd like to ride in a single day, you start to get tired around the 6 hour mark and the last couple of hours seem to take forever!

Heading off!

Got both the bikes loaded up and we are ready to hit the road!

We're leaving at 10am to beat the city traffic, hopefully it's not too busy. Looking at my bike I really feel like I'm taking too much stuff, but as this is my first ever trip I don't really know.....only one way to find out!

My co-pilot Chris is on a shiny new Triumph Tiger XCA, very nice bike! It's so new in fact that it's scheduled for the 1000 km service tomorrow morning in Mildura.