Lavers Hill via Great Ocean Road Sunday 18^th June, 2006

Cliff Peters (leader)	Suzuki GSXR 1000	Cameron Stevens	Kawasaki ZX9
Jason Peters	Kawasaki ZX12R	Ian Payne (rear rider)	Honda CBR1000RR
Ern Reeders	Triumph Sprint	Ben Warden	Honda CBR 929
Paul Southwell	Honda CBR1000RR	Lyn Duncan	Suzuki GSXR 1000
Michael Bosworth	Kawasaki ZX10	Steve Cowburn	Honda CBR 954
Breht Emmerson	Honda CBR 954	Matt Clarke	Suzuki GSXR 750
Renzo Cunico	Honda VFR 750

Living in Healesville I find myself at the gateway to many great motorcycling roads. If I have a spare hour or two I can just jump on the bike and scoot up any of the local twisty treats on offer and be back before I am missed. With this in mind I have never really been very enthusiastic about any of the Westgate rides, and with an early 9.30am start time I still wasn’t warming to the idea. I have, however, read and heard how good the GO road and Lavers Hill run is and at least wanted to try it once. Also Cliff is good value and I wanted to boost the numbers up for his first lead. So up early and a cold boring 90 minute ride to the pick-up-point went something like highway-freeway-Punt Rd-Swan St-freeway-servo.

On arriving it was surprisingly pleasant to see a fairly bulky turn out. I thought Ron Johnston might have been on this ride but he must still be on holidays with Julie. It was good to see Jason again, ironically commenting on how it was easy for him to remember the rides he has been on. I am sure he won’t forget today in a hurry. Mick Bosworth was also making an appearance on a beautiful new black ZX10, much better looking than last year’s model and plenty of grunt to play with, as Michael would demonstrate later on. (So is anyone else jealous?)

Cliff gives us a quick run down of his route home, “I mean the ride route for today” and warns of the safety cameras on the way out. We travel along the freeway for what seemed like an eternity and then finally off at Little River road and on to Lara and Moriac for morning tea. Not much more time than to clean the visor and grab a drink and off again. After the short break we head for the long straights of Deans Marsh and the slippery, wet roads into Lorne. We stop at Lorne for some fuel and a quick refresher. Ern mentions he will leave us at Apollo Bay.

Finally I am able to sample a section of the Great Ocean Road and am pleased to see that it is dry. I was here over the Christmas break but was burdened with an extra two wheels. This road was made for motorcycles and is definitely not as much fun in the car. I found myself following Renzo through here. He was giving the 750 heaps so I was happy to sit behind him. The traffic was light and made for little hold ups and low risk overtaking.

I notice Cameron is riding well today, and has improved since his first couple of rides with the club. He has been on the last five rides in a row now and his consistency is paying off. This is one of the great features of the MSTCV: “Three months of regular attendance on club rides is worth five years of solo riding”. I remember Danny Hasnat saying that and I still believe it now. That’s partly why I ride as much as I can, not just for all the amazing roads but also to watch and learn from the others.

Ern stops and waves us past at Apollo Bay as we head onto the tasty forest roads to Lavers Hill. Still a bit cold and damp in places. I found the trick was to find a compromise between cautious riding and having a blast in the dryer sections. I tried to stick close to Paul letting him show me the way. Cliff seemed to have a good knowledge of what was around each corner. (funny that!) We stop for lunch at the top of Lavers Hill where it becomes quite obvious that something has happened as we wait for the other half of the group to arrive.

Cliff receives a text message from Jason saying he has come off way back on the Great Ocean Road before Apollo Bay, and despite a Superman imitation, is thankfully okay. Cameron soon arrives also conveying the same news. Well lunchtime means eat and drink, so it was only fitting that we did. The hotter selection seemed to be the favored option at this point. While we were sitting down enjoying lunch and a laugh, Ben suddenly shouts out, “I am not worried - much!” as coordination-challenged Chinese tourists try to find a park, coming within millimeters of toppling over his bike and creating a domino effect on the others. Now I’m not one to accuse anybody of lying but between us I think he was more than a little concerned.

We head back to Apollo Bay after lunch, reversing the route we took on the way up. Jason was stuck at Apollo Bay waiting for Heidi to come with the ute to retrieve the bike. She had to come all the way from Beaconsfield. Cliff was going to hand the reins over to Ben at this point anyway to lead us back to Melbourne but now he will wait with Jason. Some top up their tanks and most have a visor clean. I decide to get the weatherproof jacket back out and slip it on over the leathers as it is starting to cool again. We say goodbye to Cliff and continue on our way.

The roads through Forrest were very damp and tight so high concentration was essential. Back through Deans Marsh where the ZX10 seemed to spring to life on the long straights. The bike only has single K digits on the clock so far and would be a big step up in technology and power from the old ZX9. It’s already done a track day and I imagine the Kawaka would be quite the weapon on the track.

Last fuel stop at Moriac before looping back to Lara for the official break-up and final leg home down the freeway. A total ride length of about 545km for the day. I had done 668 by the time I got the bike in the garage via Ben’s house to pick up a part from his collection. The end knob on my throttle bar had come unscrewed some how and was lost somewhere at The Island. No incident occurred to make this happen, it just unscrewed itself, the bloody deserter!

Thanks Cliff for leading and Ben for the final leg. Also thanks Ian for rear riding duties again.

Breht Emmerson