You'll be sorry... it's an Essay!!!
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Ducati Turismo 2006. Noosa to Port Macquarie
The 6th annual Australian Turismo for 2006 started this year on Queenslands Sunshine Coast in the idyllic setting of Noosa. 307 bikes converged over the weekend of 21-22 October for an 8am Monday start. The event is put on by NF Motorcycles, the Australian importer of Ducati. This was the first time I could make the time available to participate.
You will notice a few ‘other bikes’ in our photos; any Ducati owner may invite one other rider & bike to attend. As the years have progressed there have been fewer and fewer ‘other’ makes coming. This year there were about 10 non-Ducati involved. I said 307 bikes but there were about 360 participants including pillions.
One of our special guests was Federico himself, what a nice bloke he is and really enjoys being involved with the base owners. Another notable was Warren Fraser, the owner of NF Imports.
With so many bikes spread over the car park I can only get a few of them in. Need I tell you about the ROAR when we all started our bikes to head off? We were given a police escort for the first 12 km out of town and into the hills of the hinterland to begin our first day of travel.
The event was broken into 3 days of riding; the 4th day was a concours, with the gala dinner on the Thursday night.
Mondays ride took us from Noosa down to Ballina on the North cast of New South Wales via Boonah and Murwillumbah. There are some really great roads in this area with a lot of open plains and sweeping corners. The official speed limit in OZ is 100 kmh. I think a few people might have exceeded that once or twice. The ride distance was about 580 km.
Tuesday Morning had us leave Ballina in our own time and head up into the hills once again. We passed through the ‘alternative’ town of Nimbin, a ‘hippy’ type commune where if you know what’s good for you, you don’t buy stuff from anyone on the street OR buy the ‘special’ cookies.
The road out of Nimbin to Kyogle would be close to the worst we have in Australia, lots of tight corners where you tuck the bike in glance through the corner and find the apex is a combination of bitumen patches and fresh loose blue chip throw downs. So many times I had to brake, stand up and re-assess the line I wanted. Lucky I was on my own; I hate head shaking bumps when leant over trying to get the power down.
Kyogle had an organised ‘Lions Club’ breakfast. A small side street was closed off where we could park and enjoy a hearty breakfast while donating to a small community that has been doing it tough of late.
Because of the size of the group and the distance we were travelling you don’t really get the full image of what is going on.
From Kyogle we blast to Casino, out to Tenterfield along the flowing Bruxner highway. A fuel stop was all I took because I had stopped for so long I was way down to the back of the group. This doesn’t mean much really but I just like to catch up to people. I joined the tour without knowing anyone so spent the first 2 days riding on my own. Each time I found a group with a comfortable pace along the straights, they had a slower pace in the curves or twisties. The really fast people in the twisties just scared me. I wasn’t going to crash and ruin MY trip. There were a few places in Tenterfield with large groups of bikes outside. I must admit there are few things ‘cooler’ that riding down a street and seeing Ducati bikes on both sides in clumps of 6 or 7, the waves of acknowledgement as you pass all knowing you are having the same experience. Out of Tenterfield we headed south to Glen Innes and the Gwydir Highway, destination for Tuesday night, Yamba. These highway names are not what you are thinking. All the way down the Australian east coast is a mountain range called The Great Dividing Range. For the most part the range is about 60 km inland from the coast and about 800 metres of climbing. Each day we would ride from the coast over the range then south to the next highway to ride over the range again back to the coast.
Day 2 left Ballina and finished at Yamba, a distance of 100 km as the crow flies. Our trip was about 540 km. I’d like to say the day was uneventful but some people struggle with their own abilities along with everyone else’s. We had 2 Multistrada’s riding way above the safe level, overtaking on blind corners and even on the wrong side of people. While a lot of the quicker bikes would stomp on up to us so we’d signal them past, these Multi’s were on stock exhausts so one second your setting up for a nice left hander and the next there is a bike stuffing itself up beside you.. If that doesn’t sound exciting remember we right on the LEFT side of the road!! We had an ST4 with 2 up and a 996 go down today. The ST4 rounded up some friends then right in front of them he touched down the right hand exhaust, skipped the bike across the road, caught it and took of again, it was short lived. About 6 corners later they were down, the chick on pillion had a broken finger I heard. My friends picked them up and heard some noises over the edge. About 15 feet down there was a 996 with both people still sitting on it, bike on its side. They were hauled up and my friends left.
Yamba was the Tuesday night stop as I said. Dinner was organised at the local Lawn Bowling club. I didn’t mention dinner even night one. Each person paid an entry for the event of $95 plus another $55 for the final night Gala dinner. This covers event organization, t-shirt and welcome packs. It also turned out to include DINNER on Monday and Tuesday nights. Monday we had a complete pub booked out, that was awesome with the 370 people all attending, band included and special awards for good or bad things on each day. Tuesday Dinner was the same with more awards. Wednesday night we were left to ourselves but a lot of us all ended up at the same pub in Port Macquarie.
Wednesday Morning I finally hooked up with a couple of guys at a similar pace. We headed out toward Grafton then out through Nymboida toward Armidale. A lot of that road was unfenced meaning there were stray cattle in a few places. Nothing is more sphincter-tightening that rounding a blind corner to have a couple of calves wandering across the road. That all said remember this is Australia were there are kangaroos and other stuff EVERYWHERE in the bush. These are all narrow roads like your backcountry stuff I imagine. We decided to just have a quick coffee in Armidale then hit the road again. Armidale to Uralla and down the start of Thunderbolts way to Walcha is pretty straightforward major road riding, heavily policed so we kept our speeds down and relaxed.
Walcha saw our start of the mighty Oxley Highway. This road holds the reputation of being about the BEST bike road in OZ. It also has a reputation of being one of the most ‘character building’. There is about 60 – 70km of tight mountain road. The down side is we had about 6 bikes go down on this piece of road, only one looked written off when if slid into a tree. We fairly hammered down the range trying to keep ahead of the rain that was threatening us most of the day. We made it to the bottom still dry but the road on the flats was soaked. We buttoned off and cruised but did see a couple of people who might not have been so prudent. One spot was particularly ‘skatey’ and two bikes had crashed there when their rears must have spun up. I saw the bikes on Thursday and they would have been rideable if it weren’t for levers and other ‘niceties’.
We ended up being caught by the rain so we quickly pulled over and threw the rain gear over our luggage. Did I mention we all carried our luggage for the trip?? I had a tank bag and oxford tail bag. I think it spread the load on the bike nicely and added to the stability in cornering.
As I said Wednesday night was a quiet one for most, 220 km direct distance but we covered about 520 km.
Thursday morning was an organised Concours De Eleganza. This was well attended but most people felt they wouldn’t enter because everything was filthy after the wet ride. A few people had trailered bikes to Port Macquarie just for the show. Personally I think this kind of sucks really, especially when others ride the event, clean up the bike and present it but are beaten by the showroom trailered bike. That’s just my opinion. There was a confusing thing about the classes for the show with 6 classes. Superbike, Multistrada, Sport Touring, Sport Classic, Monster and Vintage. Please notice NO Supersport class. I’m sorry I don’t have more photos, I was sure I had some of a little immaculate 250cc scrambler. The lady rode it ALL the way, Very impressive! We looked at this bike at the start and were in immediate awe of her tenacious spirit.
Thursday’s Gala Dinner was held at the Panthers Leagues Football Club. This place was huge. We had a “ Viva Las Vegas” theme to the night and everyone was encouraged to dress up for the night. We had the usual dozen or so Elvis people, which worked in well with the Elvis impersonator entertainment during the evening.
In all the trip was a terrific time, the days were long and hard riding along great roads. Maybe the condition let them down in a few spots but welcome to Australia. The 2007 Turismo was announced as being held in Southern New South Wales and Northern Victoria at the same time of year. I think wild horses will struggle to keep me away next year. It’s about 1300 km for me to the start of next year’s event and over 2200 home. I might need a few more weeks.
If you wanted to visit Australia and experience our interesting roads start saving your pennies. If you live here, make the jump and attend, you won’t be disappointed.
On the first morning in the car park while getting geared up to leave some one asked me if I was looking forward to the trip. I replied that every time I see or hear my bike I am smiling on the inside, Could you imagine how I feel as part of 300 Ducati???
There is a DVD in production and I’ll try to post some of it when it arrives, it was made by 3 of the guys on the trip.
As a side note there was terrific support for the trip. NF Imports, the Australian distributor provided the organization including the Ducati Transporter truck. If anyone broke or crashed they were following along to PROVIDE assistance or pick up the pieces. Brisbane Motorcycles and Ducati Penrith (I think) had a mechanic each on the trip. If anyone needed help, anything checked or repaired these guys just did it. They offered a very handy pre-trip scrutineering plus daily mechanical repairs if needed. Good thing Yellow bikes are reliable and the most I wanted was to get their expert advice on chain tension, all was good.
Tyres 4 bikes and Michelin Australia combined to provide 5 days of tyre changing and repair. These guys worked their butts off each morning to keep people going.
Ducati Noosa organised the welcome afternoon with sausage sizzle and some great prices on parts. Their workshop was open for pre-trip repairs, the owners only paying for parts. I know one chap who had two tyres, chain and sprockets all changed to begin the event. I don’t personally agree with that because he arrived knowing it needed doing.
Lastly I’d like to thank all the people I met along the way, people who made the trip EVERYTHING it was, ALL the other participants. I was wearing my Ducati.MS shirts nearly everyday; no one tagged me about it so I guess not many of you have the shirts. I was hoping to see a few more or meet up with you, perhaps next year.
Mal
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Luvlee Jubblees!
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