CBR 929RR Ben Warden (Leader) Diversion 900 Ian & Sherry Handforth (Rear)

GSXR 1000 Lyn Duncan CBRXX 1100 Martin Hastie

GSXR 750 David Nimmo CBR1000F Martin Bastock & Peen

YZF R6 Eddie Seitz BMW R1100S Robert Langer

ZX9R Rhys Williams GSX 1300R Wayne Nimmo

I must admit while riding to the meeting point at Whittlesea I was thinking this was going to be a cold day. The wind was blowing straight from Antarctica. When I arrived there were 3 bikes at the servo and within a short time the rest arrived, a total of 10 bikes and 12 people.

Ben did the intro for the ride saying our next stop would be Pyalong, and Lyn warned us that there was gravel road-works about 20 kms from Whittlesea. We left at 10:40 am and the sky was blue with only a few clouds and the wind chill factor didn't seem as bad as it had been earlier. So off we went following the rhythm of the winding road. Just as Lyn had warned, at Wallaby Creek we hit the gravel road-works. Anyway after the gravel it was back into the rhythm again for a short stretch only to find more gravel works at Pheasant Creek. From here it was on the long straights to Strath Creek slowing down for the spot where Lee had his mishap in January 2001 and guess what? The road still hasn't been repaired.

Further down the road towards King Parrot Creek someone in their gyrocopter was doing some low level flying. Maybe not quite the buzz as enjoying a good ride on some great roads. While doing a corner mark stop a lady in a four wheel drive tried to tell me that the bridge was out to Pyalong and we wouldn't be able to get through. I tried to explain to her the lead rider Ben had already gone through and being Ben he doesn't believe signs until he encounters an obstacle he can't overcome i.e. no bridge. So we all had to about-face and retrace our steps when Ben returned and detoured until we arrived at Seymour at 11:56am for lunch.

After lunch Lyn and Eddie dropped off from the group to do their own thing and we proceeded to Pyalong from the other side of the bridge that was closed for repair.

From this point I began filming from the two cameras mounted on my bike. I resorted to the original camera mount positions (one mounted near passenger grab handle facing rear and the other about headlight height on the fairing of my bike). I was encouraged to do this after having one camera torn off from mounting it too low (foot peg height of fairing) and the head camera I tried on Anzac day gave shitty footage ie too high to realise it was mounted on a bike. I did get some good footage following Ben and also some rear views of the others in the group. I think my next investment will be a narrower view lens to give closer action footage.

After Emu Flat we hit a short section of gravel road of approximately 1.2 km near Baynton which wasn't shown on the map. A bit of a slip and slide but nobody had any mishaps and we continued on to Woodend via Lancefield arriving for arvo tea at 1:55pm. Four bikes left to go home and then there were 5 bikes which went up Mt Macedon to The Cross. Riding up the mountain we found a few wet spots on the road but once on top you could just see the CBD through the haze. For those interested the historical direction finder is still missing (the sign says "in for repair").

Back down the mountain including and Straws Road to Romsey and Wallan. Ian and Sherry left the group at Wallan and the rest of us arrived back at Whittlesea around 3.45pm having done 300kms.

Thanks to Ben for the ride and Ian and Sherry for rear riding. The day was great, blue sky, warm sunshine and incident free apart from being hit by a couple of stones from other vehicles.