Hamilton

“I have stopped finding fault with creation and have learned to accept it. We have some power in us that knows its own ends. It is that which drives us on to what we must finally become… This is the true meaning of transformation. This is the real metamorphosis.” 

I rode to Hamilton yesterday to stay overnight with a friend, and returned to Melbourne today.  The weather was forecast to reach 11 degrees and then 13 degrees today, and I think that forecast was about right.  Drenching rains were also forecast and that came true.

I took scenic routes both there are back.  Yesterday I took back roads out from Melbourne and made through the Brisbane Ranges and Meredith.  I continued on such roads beyond Meredith.  The dense rain made it hard to see my surroundings (including the road ahead) but I found my way easily enough long winding single lanes and then dirt roads.  Now and then when the rain stopped I stopped for a photo or to check my paper map.

I continued in this way until Skipton.  I stopped to look at interesting buildings as my whim dictated.

My friend expressed surprise at the fact that I went ahead and rode to him despite the weather.  But I quite enjoy winter riding.  Riding is in important part about losing oneself in the elements.  That means that in the heat I get hot, in the cold I get cold, and in the wet I get wet.  It's a matter of not fighting whatever happens, not finding fault with it, but giving oneself over to it as an inviting experience, as something with the potential to surprise, enliven and transform us.  The thing to then notice are all the shifts, the constant new details.  The most obviously example of this was the sudden transformations into sunlight, before the rain and clouds came again.

Today I left Hamilton at 10AM and headed north to Halls Gap, in again more drenching rain.  It thick, cold and misty.

I took an arc northwards that returned me to Melbourne via Ararat, Avoca, Maryborough, and Bungaree.  It was a good ride.

Royal Enfield tops the pops

Top of the pops as always, the Royal Enfield has featured in a music video.  I mention this only because it is so.  Whether you want to actually watch the video is your choice: I myself suffered an allergic reaction, and then panicked as I couldn't close it (my computer is on the way out) and the muzak just kept on and on!  Mariah Carey astride a Royal Enfield Interceptor:

I'm off now to cleanse my ears and soul with Johann Johannsson:

In a magazine

One of the biggest motorcycle magazines in Australia, Australian Road Rider, approached the club I am in, The Royal Enfield Club of Australia, for a story on the club.  I put my hand up along with others to submit some writing and photos, including mostly photos of other people in the club, and today I was a little embarrassed to buy the magazine and see that the story used just my words and photos of me.  It certainly is a bit of fun to appear in a magazine.

These are photos of the story - when I get the opportunity I will change them to scans.  You might want to open them in a new tab and enlarge in order to be able to read the words.  I have removed my surname.

Five hours on an autumn day

I have not been taking photos of late on my rides, so I have posted nothing up for a month until now.  Today I spent five hours almost unbroken on the road, in a nice loop taking in Daylesford, Maldon, and down the Burke and Wills Track.  At Clarkefield I stopped for photos.

Winter is coming and I am determined to enjoy the season.  In recent years I have slowed down - ridden less - as I seem to feel the cold more.  But I have this week invested in new gear, and am investing in more, to keep the cold out and the pleasure in.

It was a brave decision to buy a white helmet.  In many people's eyes they have the aura of dorkiness, of 'Safety Sam', of the Learner.  Now, graphics and multi-colours in helmets and gear do nothing for me (yuk!).  And so I generally wear black.  But when it comes to helmets I am tired of that colour.  And black is so ubiquitous now.  "Matte black is the new chrome."  Well that was a few years ago.  It's now become so unimaginative.  And indeed often a little pretentious with its hint at bad-boyness.  White on the other hand is clean, fresh.  It says classic.  It also says "no statement, it's just a helmet".  It also has connotations: classic bike, whether 1950s British, 1970s Japanese, 1980s European.  And although my reasons are aesthetic, from a safety point of view I reckon it can be seen from out of space.  I dig it.


Johann Johannsson's music has been accompanying me on my rides of late.  I think there's something beautifully wintry about his sounds.

They being dead yet speak

I use those words for the title because today, after hours winding through cold wind-swept roads, paving a way through nature's attempts to take back the tar, when I looked over a grey expanse of water I heard this music.

Marlon and I road today.  It rained so heavily at times that we hid under trees, soaking, while Marlon rolled wet cigarettes.

After the Reefton Spur we stopped at Warburton to warm up.

We were to ride new roads.  Greasy clay roads amid giant ferns.

We returned to Melbourne at the day's end.

At one point early in the day, after rolling through the Black Spur at a delayed pace, we pulled up together and all I could say was, "What fun motorcycling is!  It simply is damn fun!"  Motorcycling gives me a simple, profound joy.

Caveat-Ruffy Road and a good soaking

It had been so hot last week, and in my bare brick 19th century house the air hang thick and sticky.  Most nights I could not sleep 'til 5 or 6 in the morning.  So when the overcast sky and the rain came today I was not daunted, I would ride anyway and let myself soak in some cold.  And a cold soak it was!  But that was later in the day.  Earlier patches of blue broke up the sky and this song played in my head as I rode to Yea, then north.

Beyond Caveat I took a new dirt track: Caveat-Ruffy Road.  Only 8km long, it offered a rich and varied scene of farms, creeks and ponds.

I rode on to Longwood and Euroa.  The country up there is the scene of some of my best rides and I'm at a point now, years on, when I have a soft sentimental feeling for the feeling of riding there that was present in earlier years.  In a sense I've put roots down there, without ever living in the place.

It was interesting to dwell in the memories of the feelings of riding that were normal at that earlier time but not now.  Riding is a very emotional activity, incorporating perspectives on the world, life and death.  I feel that my riding is not as emotionally rich these days even though I think I'm emotionally wiser and emotionally more skillful.  Perhaps that skillfulness is a kind of enlightenment which, like the Western Enlightenment of the 18th century onwards, involves a certain disenchantment in exchange for its clarity?  Or perhaps, more banally, it is a consequence of the loss of novelty that comes with familiarity in a place?  Either way I feel the loss.  I need to find my way back there without giving myself over to pathos, to re-enchant the experience regardless of the cause of the loss.

From Euroa I rode up the wonderful mountain to Strathbogie and stopped for coffee.  The alpine town seemed to be hosting some small yoga festival (it's so nice not to be surrounded by the usual bogans that infest small towns).  So I tarried for a while under the impromptu, bright monotone flags.  Then I made down the mountain and, as I did, the rain came.  Then it stopped:

And then it came back.  With a vengeance.  Dense, thick rain, but warm at first.  It waited for later to turn cold, when my gloves and boots were full and running with water, my clothes soaked through under my plastic outer layer, and the fog so thick that I feared I would run off the road as I crawled into King Lake.

There was no change for the rest of the home-making: the rain was permanent, dense, and cold.  At one point I thought it was hailing.  Even on the freeway at the end it was hard to see the lanes.  I rode with my visor up, squinting to see ahead.  And took a secret pleasure in tearing along at 100kph while everybody else in their cars slowed to 70.  A dare devil bike boy of the 1960s.  A viking, laughing from deep within his fearless gut.  A creature of the storm, possessed by his animal spirit.

This post is dedicated to Mav, a member of a bike forum I'm on. Aged 30 and with a baby due in a few weeks, he died a few days ago aboard his motorcycle.

More photos from my Tasmanian trip

Here are some more photos from the final days of my trip to Tasmania.

The trip was two weeks long.  I spent most of it in the Huonville area, with a short trip to Port Arthur and another to the Gordon Dam, but otherwise I did none of the intense west and east coast rides that I had planned.  The reason for that is because I spent my teen years in Nicholls Rivullet, outside of Cygnet, and while I visit every two or three years this is the first time I have had my own wheels and the opportunity to 'just be' in the place, like a local, exploring all the nooks and crannies of its beauty.

This is an island that I would ride past every few days.  You can see the quality of the water.  It was a fantastic area to meander through.

Here is a view from Cygnet Coast Road.  I loved this road, which curved along with the water's edge, a constant right-left-right on my bike, with my vision repeatedly flooded by the golden light that broke through the overhanging trees or glittered on the water.

These photos are from the day before I left.  This is Bicheno:

   

And here are some photos from the Bicheno Motorcycle Museum.

 

Here is the typical view on the east coast.  While it is the more celebrated area, in my opinion the water in the south is superior.

And here, onboard The Spirit of Tasmania on the way home, dolphins attended us.