Tasmania Photos

Photos from Tasmanian trip - in reverse order. Best if read from the bottom up. Latest photos have been archived due to there being so many, so read archives last.

All home safe and sound. So, start writing your articles for the magazine! 

Ern and Pete stay another day, checking out the wineries.

Ian Black's Speed Triple 

Cliff and Jason Peters, mid afternoon, last day. 

Dave adjusting Danny's ZX10 suspension, a full time, every day task. Danny had to call Melbourne to get the standard settings at one stage. 

Dave's MV SPR, Elephant Pass 

The amount of time and love expended on this bike ... Ron's Bandit 

Nothing like a decent feed to bring a smile to everyone's face. If only they had more than two people serving the 30 customers. It certainly was leisurely and gave the roads more time to dry.

Last day, from Kettering (60 km south of Hobart) to Devonport via the east coast to St Marys, Scottsdale, Derby and Launceston, a memorable 525 km. Wet roads till about 1 pm, and very greasy around Scottsdale. Only "moment(s)" all trip. Picture at Swansea after major mix up coming into Sorell.

Perpermint Bay conference centre. fastic venue we ate at rather than Kettering Pub. Prices on a par, quality much better, surroundings top class. Must go back. 

Bronwyn Manifold. Oh so happy to be riding. Or, not riding on that crap roadworks section?

Dave Moore's beast. Check out the ocky strap work.

Tahune Air Walk: tree hit by lightening left 2 metre hole in ground and stripe down tree. 

The gang on top of Mt Wellington, Hobart in the background. 

Paul Southwell and bike at Poatina after a 100 km loop and back. The owner of the servo was so taken by the number and quality of bikes (and leather clad riders?) that he set up a tripod on the street (not real busy) and took a few photos of the group. That is him in the background talking to Ian. Good stuff. 

Ern Reeders 

Rob Langer 

Ian Black 

Renzo Cunico. 

Yours truly. Thanks Pete.

President, Ian Payne 

Day trip up to Poatina and back. Rob's R1150GS outside Bothwell Pub. Glorious weather. 

Serious stuff - but turnaround time around 20 minutes. Grouse. 

Of course, as usual, tyres were a problem. Luckily we had three vehicles, 5 spare sets of tyres, and the tools to do the business. Tahnks to Cliff and Danny for providing the bead breaker and the skill. I changed my front after 2 days and destroyed a rear after 7 days, like most others. Picture: Jason and ZX12R. Check out stand under swingarm. 

More stuff than you can poke a stick at. 

Half a 916. 

Hobart Garage Bar. What an amazing place. If only they sold decent food, then we would have stayed all night. a real "Blokes World" sort of place, if you get my drift. 

Ronny. Very handy to have around. Helped with the diagnosis and replacement of the thermatic fan in the Magna. He then fixed the door lock on the Ford. Of course his muffler exhaust bracket failed and he found a cocky to do some stainless welding in Bothwell. Always something happening. 

The steering damper! It was a very bumpy road compared to last time two years ago, and not worth the effort. At least we didn't get two broken legs like last time. And the argument about high high Renzo's master cylinder is embedded in the rock face will never be answered - it is all overgrown now. 

Dave tightening up something else that was about to vibrate loose. He had already lost screen screws. 

Big Dam. 

The troops headed down the Strathgordon Road next day while Julie, renzo and I did the Mt Field walk. Jason Peters, looking young. 

Bush Inn from the road. Apparently it was pretty noisy on the street side. But cereal and full cooked breakfast each morning included in tariff made up for it. Top accommodation.

Getting his fork seal replaced after it blew catastrophically, oil gushing. It took a call to Jack at Redwing to get the part number and models that it fitted, 3 hours to fit, and a lazy $200. "Never done one before" said the mechanic. Paul drove Dave's van down the middle while Dave and Bron got to enjoy their bikes for a whole hard day. 

Sunset, New Norfolk, Bush Inn. We made it! Another 500 km day. 

Queenstown to Tarraleah. Multiple leaders - which usually means conditions are perfect and the lads fire up. They were and they did! 114 km of great roads. Look out for guys repairing boat trailers without wheels mid corner, or camera operators at the side of the road getting all wide eyed as Ron gets excited. 

The power of the zoom lens compressing the foreground and background. Queenstown lookout. Rob, Dave, Ian Black, Ron Johnston, Ern Reeders and Cliff - just as comfortable with the helmet on - or was his wrist was hurting too much to take it off?

Heading for Queenstown. It is on for young and old. 

Front cover of the March Magazine - you should have received it by now. 

Strahan. We are all parked just off to the right, out of shot. 

We were stuffed if the putty didn't work. 

Pete's bike (and the rest). Strahan. 

Next day, Strahan. Cliff and Ben investigating radiator leak. 

And back for petrol at Moina at $129.9 c/l, the dearest we encountered. Normally about $1.09; Melbourne $1.07. 

Next stop Cradle Mountain on this 500 km day ride.  

The road past Lake Plemsoll is sensational. 

Cliff and Renzo. 

Five minutes later, second corner, and Cliff is tumbling down the road. Bike minor grazing, oggy knob doing its stuff. Cliff sustained a broken scaphoid, diagnosed 10 days later in Melbourne. He only lost one day's riding due to the pain, though it remained badly swollen all week. He rode the next 1000 km of twisties without complaint. 

The group at Savage River, on a day ride out of Somerset, 60 km from Devonport. Pete behind the camera obviously. 

Tea in Devonport, waiting for Julie in the Magna to get off the boat, dead last! Beautiful photo.

Leaving Melbourne Saturday morning (26th March). 

The next lot of photos are from Peter Feistl who rode every day and didn't miss a kilometre, and one of the five who stayed an extra day, doing a total of 3,600 km or 3.5 laps! From the beginning: bikes strapped down on the boat. His is the red CBR1100XX Blackbird. 

View from Kettering Pub. We booked all 11 rooms for a fixed price. Breakfast self serve in small upstairs kitchen included in tariff. 

At the Big Tree - 6.2 metres diameter, 87 metres high. Dark due to incorrect exposure. Only figured out how to turn off the "fill flash" that night. 

Renzo doing his back exercises half way through Mt Field walk - it hadn't started raining yet. 

Rob Langer overlooking Queenstown. 

Long way down. (Photo c/o Peter Feistl.) 

The view from the end of the cantilever section. 

Jason striding out. 

Tahune Air Walk, Geeveston. 600 metres long, $11 entry fee, 30 km of good twisties to get there.  

Top of Mt Wellington. Standing: Ian Payne, Cliff Peters, Dave Moore, Paul Southwell, Jason Peters. Crouching: Danny Hawker, Ern Reeders, peter Feistl, Renzo Cunico. 

Begonias. 

I couldn't resist putting this one in as well. Fantastic colours and lines. 

Julie and Bronwyn visited the Royal Tasmanian Botanical gardens, Hobart. 

Trees appear bleached white, stunted and twisted by fierce, windy and very cold environment. Beautiful.  

What does this look like? 

It got cold, wet and windy. Enzo resorted to stuffing a plastic bag beteen his T shirt and jumper. We were so buggered that we (deliberately) fell asleep in a hut for half an hour. We walked for 6 hours. 

Ben, Julie and Renzo spend a day walking around Mt Field National Park. Sensational. 

Tying the bikes down on the boat. They ran out of straps due to the numbe of bikes on the return trip - 102. Usually use two straps per bike, sometimes around the lower sub-frame, this time across the seat - which has a memory and took a couple of hours to recover. 

Danny Hawker working on holed ZX10 radiator, putty in hand. Radiator remained pressurised for the rest of the trip. 

Tasmania Trip, Feb/March 2005 The gang, waiting for radiator putty to cure. Top: Dave Ward, Bron Manifold, Dave Moore, Ian Payne. Middle: Rob Langer, Cliff Peters, Ron Johnston. Bottom: Ian Black, anny Hawker, Peter Feistl, Jason Peters. Strahan.