Ride Report

[ribbert]

Something to look forward to and whet the appetites of our Northern members coming out of Winter hibernation.

I went for a 600km ride on Easter Monday, got lost and found myself on some of those minor roads that exist purely to service the farming communities they thread through. Single car width bitumen, no white lines, no road signs every 100 metres and no traffic.  A row of magnificent old Gumtrees forming an arch overhead separating the road from the farmland either side and stretching out to the horizon, mid 20's (C) blue skies and plenty of sunshine. The countryside has turned green again after a particularly dry, hot and brutal summer.
Riding weather at its best.

Penalties in Victoria are now so harsh that at best you get to sneak in the odd burst of speed here and there at great risk not only to your licence and wallet but also your freedom.

However, laid out before me was a road that I felt confident offered no such risk and the opportunity to reacquaint myself with the joy of the FJ's top end.

Redlining in the higher gears, settling into a few K's at 160kmh, then back to 4th and back up to redline, sat on 200 for a while, found a few sweepers that could be taken at that speed. Got to keep it flat out for a few Km's. I  Had to slow down for the odd bridge and corner then got do it all again and again. I hit some crests at 200 that had my stomach rising and some dips that wanted to push everything into the ground. Finding a quick succession of these was magic.
The tunnel effect of the narrow road, the trees overhead and the mottled sunlight through them at speed was exhilarating.

I was pleased to see my recently fitted clutch would not only bite banging it though from 4th to 5th at redline but do so aggressively.

After this ride there is nothing else I could put my Chinese (Arashi) discs through and I am very happy with them.

To many of you, depending where you live, this may not be a novelty but here, these days it is.

For the first 15 years or so of my riding life this would have constituted a normal ride, anywhere, anytime.

It was a lot of fun playing at the top end of the speedo for a while and put a very wide grin on my face.

The rest of the ride was just normal endless twisties, no traffic, beautiful countryside, great weather and coffee and cake stops with the mighty FJ right on song.

Bloody magnificent!

Noel

[Steve_in_Florida]

Excellent!   

Just think about how clean your carburetors are now.

You now have permission to fall asleep to "The Notebook"...

[racerman_27410]

SOunds like a perfect day in the saddle..... cheers!


KOokaloo!



Frank

[FJSpringy]

mmmmmm cakes, coffeeeeeee 

[cyclenutk75]

Awesome description of your day in the saddle, ribbert - made for a great read.  You should be submitting to the M/C mags.

GT

[ken65]

sounds like you had a ball, on the few occasions that i get stuck into it i picture myself losing my licence these days , i have a couple of spots i can go from 0 to around a 100k's safely enough but thats about it, a few years ago a copper on a bike pulled me over, he was at the lights waiting for green but there was traffic turning in front of him, i gave it a quick serve up to 145k's in an 80 zone then backed off, he caught upto me a couple of k's later,pulled me over and gave me a hard time as he couldnt get me for anything, then said nice bike,lol. its just so hard now with our gov't revenue raising and if i lost my licence wifey would just about kill me ,

[Country Joe]

 :good2:I'm glad you got to enjoy what the mighty FJ does best!

        Joe