17th January 2015 Ashbourne

We had an OzStoc meet at Ashbourne for the local South Australian owners which we only decided to attend at almost the last the minute.


http://www.google.com/maps/d/edit?mid=zkXIyCrs72-Y.kbElMPFtSH0o This was our route  and apart from the loop at the bottom we returned the way we had come. With recent fires in the hills near Adelaide and with some roads still closed another route other than through the city had to be selected.

For us it meant staying overnight at Strathalbyn caravan park for $17 for an unpowered site rather than getting up early and riding 4 hours in the morning and back again later in the day. This was also a trial run for the new Esky which was placed on a partly finished shelf on the trailer drawbar. Not to forget the GoPro cam being its first major outing as well.

To get the day started we finished packing the trailer and were under way at 11am on Friday the 16th with a planned rest break/lunch 80 km later at Burra. The main road through Burra was no doubt built before Noah built the ark and I thought itmvery strange that I should be feeling excessive movement through my foot rests. After stopping in the car park I noticed this; a missing bolt on the RH side.

 

What happened? I don't know but I'm guessing I either didn't tighten the old one enough after the last tyre change or the bolt snapped (remote) but I did find something to fit at the local hardware store for the massive sum of $1.80 and luckily two of the tools from the bike's tool kit were 14 mm so I could tighten it. The finished adhoc repair meant we could continue on our way after a bite to eat.

 

 

Heather at Burra with her new Bikers-Gear riding pants http://bikersgearaustralia.com.au/index.php?route=product/product&path=64_70_84&product_id=165

 

 

Our next stop was beside the Warren reservoir about 5km out of Williamstown

 



Our messy campsite at the caravan park.

 

After we left the caravan park we had a coffee in one of the local cafes and used Heather's phone (Samsung Galaxy S4) to take this one of the bike and trailer parked in one of the streets.

The Greenman Inn at Ashbourne where we had lunch on Saturday......someone left their bikes out front to spoil they view......awfully inconsiderate these Honda ST owners.

 

So I took a close up

 

I parked ours around the back in the shade.

 

 

Hotel lawns

 

 

Nice view of the surrounding hills

 

This is all of us who attended and from left to right in the photo we have Stroppy (Terry) all the way from Canberra, 1300Panmagic (Don), Chris, Richo, Heather (WildfireAngel), Kathy, Alan (Alans1100), Pete (StinkyPete) and Les (LesPearce). Photo courtesy of Pete.

 

 

We all parted to go our own separate ways at about 2 pm with us arriving home about 7:30 pm. There was a couple of rest stops on the way home plus one stop off at the supermarket in Gawler. Manoora is about half the distance from home to the city so we stopped there before the final homeward leg.

 

Video of the beginning of our trip home

 

Before leaving Strathalbyn in the morning I refuelled at the local United servo at $1.087 a litre. The bike took just under 21 litres for 313 km or just under 15 K/L which is close to average when towing. Apart from the mishap with the bolt, all went well even though I neglected to adjust the shock absorber rebound for the added weight otherwise the bike was ok with this towing set up.