All photos © TFB, Fingers, & Bludnut, 2008.
On 28,29&30 November 2008, we all set off on our annual motorcycle weekend for the south-coast town of Walpole. We'd expected it to be a bit hot, but the summer started nice and cool so it was *ideal* biking weather.
The full complement of lads came along, inc. Geoff on his new z750, Warwick on his new R1, Edan on his brand-spanking new Hayabusa — which means the Katana was the oldest bike there...
The 120kms of the Manjimup-Walpole road has to be some of the best biking road I've ever ridden: fast, swooping bends, lots of rises and dips as you barrel through the eucalypt forest with the exhaust note banging off the huge trees. Naturally you have to be careful you don't leave the road and hit one, thus rediscovering the meaning of the term 'hardwood'. Unfortunately we took no photos of the road (we were too busy RIDING to fiddle about with taking pics), but if you hop onto Google Earth you'll get an idea of the kind of country we were riding through.
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Instead of doing the usual trick with tents and camping gear, this year we wimped out and rented a chalet instead, on the banks of the Frankland River.
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Now being next to the river meant we got to try our hand at canoeing. As you can see the serene tranqulity of the Frankland River was not only broken but SHATTERED as the lads took to the water for the afternoon...
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And here (above) is the last time we saw Joe & Mick... well, for a couple of hours, anyway. They got swept off down the river. 'They'll be back soon,' we thought...
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Meanwhile, Warwick and Adrian provided us onlookers with plenty of entertainment as they tried and tried again to paddle back up the river. They nearly did it, too!
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But where were Mick and Joe? Warwick and I tramped off through the bush along the river bank, to see if we could see them down the next stretch of river. But no: nothing but the sound of the river and not a sign of the Baldini brothers anywhere... so, had they been kidnapped by a lost tribe of hippies? Or were they being used for target-practice by a bunch of Manjimup rednecks?
Well we were on the verge of calling up the Westpac rescue helicopter when the lads made their belated return (below)! Wet as shags they scrambled up from the river, bracing themselves for 'encouragement' as the rest of us let them have it from the verandah of the chalet.
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Saturday evening was spent chomping on more meat than was good for us, and washing it down with ale. Adrian kindly demonstrated the gentle art of igniting cooking oil spray over the campfire flames. There might be a boy in every man, sure enough; but inside every boy is a PYROMANIAC just itching to break out! < sarcasm > As you can see, we would all much rather have been watching TV. < /sarcasm >
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We also managed to fit in a visit to the 'Tree Top Walk', not far out of Walpole. The walkway takes you through the forest canopy, and is about 40m at the highest point. It gets a brilliant sway happening if you all time your footsteps to the harmonic frequency of the thing. Below is a photo of the top 1/3 of one of the huge trees taken from the walkway.
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We also pulled in to a great spot on the coast called Peaceful Bay. Click on the thumbnail for a (rough) panorama of the Bay itself (920KB).
The machines lined up at the Bay:
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One last photo op. before we all winged it back up that magnificent road to Manjimup. That's it for another year!
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