Final Leg and 1/2 ! Back to Sydney and bike drop off point.

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The Last Leg & (1/2) The Return to Sydney and Karen's arrival.

Left Canberra around 9:00- I intentionally didn’t gas up because I need to turn my bike in with just a small amount of fuel for the transport back home. Rain was threatening and it did indeed spit on me a little but not enough to make me don my rain gear.



Note: Of my eight major rides this trip was my longest (# days), yet is the only trip that I didn’t have to don my rain gear at anytime during the entire trip!



While a little chilly it wasn’t very windy on the trip up to Sydney. The terrain was hilly with lots of sheep and cattle farms. I had to stop for gas about 100 miles from Sydney and had to guesstimate how much fuel to put in. When I arrived at the hotel I still had over 60 miles of fuel. I figured I’d have to go for a ride to burn off some fuel. When I contacted the folks at Crane Worldwide about picking up the bike, Travis asked if I could run the bike out to the distribution center tomorrow (about 30-45 minutes in the West suburbs) instead of having them come to the hotel with a trailer. The good news is that this would take care of the fuel burn off problem -the bad news is that I would need to need negotiate Sydney traffic one more time.



Note: I would gladly do 3 consecutive days of 600 miles a day in the outback, then drive 10 miles in Sydney. My Garmin is often confused in the city this combined with the traffic and goofy street layout in Sydney make it a real pain to ride a bike in this city (much less, a bigger bike like my 1600).

Pulling back into the MARRIOTT was like old home week. Saw a lot of the same staff that had helped me when I started the trip. Had a nice Teppanyaki dinner and of coarse a few pints to celebrate back at PJ O’Briens. Met some great guys involved in the environmental and water industry at the pub. I also got reprimanded by a guy at PJ’s because I had a few black velvets (Guinness and Bulmers cider mixed). I rarely drink them and when I do it is usually the last pint of the evening. I was planning to head back to the hotel after having the Black velvet but struck up the conversation with the environmental guys and just kept ordering the same. Instead of telling the guy who came over to bitch about my drink selection to mind his own F&@%ing business, I actually apologized for disrespecting the Black Stuff! Black Velvets or Black and Tan's are sort of like ordering a really good Whiskey or Scotch then mixing it with coke. Basically I deserved a good lashing! 😊

I told the guys from Crane that I would drive the bike out to the center in the morning after my wife arrived at the hotel. Karen landed at 8:00 and made it to the hotel by 9:30. I grabbed some breakfast with her then headed out on the final leg of the 5,000 mile trip. As usual my Garmin was more trouble then help in the city. Fortunately however, I had looked at a map and had a pretty good idea which general direction and which bridge I should head for. Once I got away from city center my Garmin kicked back in and I was on track for Yennora in the western suburbs. Don (the guy who dropped off the bike was waiting for me outside of the facility and had me follow him to warehouse where my crate was waiting for my bike. Don gave me a ride back to the hotel. We talked about my ride and about a ride he’d be doing in three weeks with about 75 bikers in Oz. He asked if I had many problems with Roo’s on the highway- he was surprised that I didn’t see even one on the road in 5,000 miles. I attributed this to the good advice I got from Mark at www.Bikeroundoz.com bike rentals. He told me to stay away from riding at dawn and dusk and I’d be better off. Thanks Mark- you da man!



Karen and I will explore Sydney for two days then fly out for 4 days in Alice Springs and Ayers Rock, then we fly up to Darwin for two nights, then over to Cairns and lizard Island for three days, and finally fly down to Melbourne for a couple days before coming back to Sydney to fly back home. I probably won’t blog that much on the flying part of the trip but I’ll be happy to post some pictures on the blog if anyone is interested in these spots.



I’ll do one more blog with some stats, a summary blog and a long thank you list.

G’day Mate,

Jim





P.S. I received permission from 3 different Aussies in three different territories/states to use G’Day and Mate. ? One Aussie said "you've seen more of Australia then I lot of Aussie's I know" "you earned the right to use Aussie lingo!

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