Tasmania - March 4th-8th 2010 :D

Hey everyone! just got back from my trip to tassie.
Wow.

So, 4 weeks ago, we're riding through our usual spot in emerald and pakenham upper, we pull in at a servo. "We should really go to tassie again before the weather turns to shit". BOOM, a week later, tickets were booked!
Last thursday morning we setoff towards Port Melbourne and boarded the Spirit of Tasmania.
Our weapons we were armed with:

Chris - Yamaha R6 '04

Anth - Honda CBR600RR '05

Paul - Subaru WRX '01? (Yes a car lol. Chris and Paul in the background just chillin)

Me - Suzuki GSXR750 '08

We board the ship and set sail for beautiful Tasmania. on the trip over, we had a lovely sunny day, witnessing dolphins jumping in and out of the wake of the boat, and all of us itching to get on the open roads in Tassie.

Anth and Chris being yuppies on their phones haha. But beautiful weather in the background.

We land at night and set off towards Burnie, about 45 mins east of Devonport. We go to the local pub to ask the locals for directions to a camp site.
Our mate Paul, kindly offered to bring his car instead of his VTR 250, he carried all of our gear and tents etc. A few girls at the pub, smashed off their heads, gave us some pretty shit directions. As we were leaving towards the camp site one of them yells out "Do a skid and i'll root ya". Congrats honey, you just put tassie girls 5 years back in respect. haha..

We eventually find a caravan park, noone is at reception so we just setup our tents anyway and decide we'll pay in the morning. It was such a warm night, i slept inside my tent with just my jocks on and my sleeping bag over the top of me when i got a bit cold.

What our campsite looked light, Paul slept in the back of his car, Chris n Anth in the Red/Green tent and myself in the Brown/Blue

Morning greets us with warmish weather and cloudy skies. We go to the front reception after we pack up and its open but noone is at the counter. We leave $20 with a note saying "we just setup 2 tents overnight, thanks" and we leave, setting off for Queenstown.
The road through here was pretty good, lots of varying scenery and nice beautiful roads. We arrive in queenstown mid morning and buy some muesli bars to snack on and a meat pie for brekky. Perfect Very Happy

It just started to drizzle in Queenstown as We leave and head towards Hobart, but within 10 mins its sunny skies. WOW. The first section of road for about 10k's is just steep cliffs which when looking over queenstown its like a wild-west town. Beautiful landscape. About 30-40 mins later we arrive at a dam (forgot the name of it) and we take a few happy snaps. Leading up to this dam, paul was in the WRX and we could not catch him, his AWD vehicle was hammering the hill climb.

In the first pic its Paul at the dam which i forgot the name of haha, followed by Chris, followed by Anth n myself.

Upon leaving the dam, Chris and myself pick up the pace and head off hooning through the hills. This was prob the best road we experienced. It was SO smooth, beautiful tarmac, hardly any vehicles at all, and just nice tight corners that weren't too slow, but weren't too quick either. We played cat and mouse for about 30 mins and pulled over at the top of one of the hills, stripped down to just over leather pants and soaked the sun in, grinning at each other at the amazing road we just raced through. Too bad everyone in Melb got flooded and hailed on, while we were in this beautiful sunny day, couldn't of asked for better conditions.
The other boys arrive shortly after and we head off towards Hobart, arriving there at about 3-4pm. The only place to really go in Hobart is Salamanca. This street has 'lots' of bars n is mainly where the nightlife is.
We disco nap in our apartment that we had for the night, then set off to find some dinner and a bottle shop. 2 hours later we're back in the apartment, with stomachs full of food and booze. Poker chips are being thrown at each other as the cards are being delt, its nearing 10pm and we head out to the bars. We get ridiculously smashed, with Paul and myself vomitting quite a few times that night, and the next day i was extremely hungover.
The boys headed off to Mount Wellington in the Rex while i stayed in the park and slept like a bum haha. I just found a nice patch of grass in the middle of this park and slept for a good 3-4 hours while the boys went up to the mountain and back.
By this time i had thrown up 3 times that Saturday and i shit you not, Powerade is the ULTIMATE hangover cure! Within 2 hours i was feeling a LOT better.
Saturday night comes around, we're all feeling very tired, we head to the casino and grab a room. Within an hour we decide we can't be stuffed heading out so we get an early night, we're all asleep by midnight.
We wake up Sunday morning. Very cloudy skies, slight drizzle here n there as we head up along the east coast to Bicheno. Along this road there was a strip called Black Pass i think, with a river running alongside the road. Although the road is absolutely shithouse condition, the scenery more than compensates for it. We keep heading for St Helens and go through St Mary's pass, too bad the road was wet. Eventually we head off to Scottsdale and stop for lunch. If you ever for there, go to a place called Fried Chicken or something. Seriously, 2 pretty decent pieces of fried chicken, a decent serving of chips and a can of coke, all for $8.10. We head off again towards Launceston, coming up this mountain which was extremely foggy. Actually, this could've been just before Scottsdale, i forget!
Anyways, the last day of riding was pretty good pace, most of the time when it was drizzling slightly, or the road looked wet, we took it safely and slowly, but still enjoyable.
We arrived back in devonport and ordered pizza's, waiting for almost an hour to get them. No shit. We scoff these down and board the Spirit back to Melb. The captain comes on saying we have stormy weather and the trip over at night is going to be bouncy. Within 2-3 hours, a few poker games later, we were too tired, and in bed fast asleep. We wake up at 5:15am when the announcement comes on, and we disembark shortly after at around 6:15am. Its pissing down in melb, parts of the road are flooded. We get back to Chris' in St Kilda, i swap into my leathers, pack my backpack and head home by 8am, and pass out on my bed till midday today. Look outside, its sunny weather, and i'm just itching to take the bike out, but eventually sucumb to watchin movies and relaxing in bed all day.

Well, it was an amazing trip, lots of fun and couldn't of been happier with the way my bike performed. I think only one time i ran a corner too hot and grabbed the brakes instead of committing to the corner and crossed the other side of the road, and fortunately there was no oncoming traffic. (I could see through this corner anyway) But yes, 1100km's round trip.
Hopefully do this trip again in the next 9-12 months, and hopefully this time we'll have a proper camera mounted on the bike again!!! Very Happy

Well lads and lasses, hope you enjoyed reading the story as much as i experienced it, till next time Wink

-dims

Also on a sidenote, the Bitch'n Bitumen book was EXTREMELY useful and provided us with lots of info. It was too bad we already planned out trip because we wanted to do a few of the other runs in tassie too.

Hey Dim, great post! thumbleft

Nice pics too mate. I thoroughly enjoyed it!

Next time you're heading up the hills make sure you call me and I'll try to hook up with you.

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OUTSTANDING POST mate!! Very Happy

i very much enjoyed reading it, especially all the attention to detail you have included in the report.
some pretty funny stuff too. I only wish more forum members posted up stuff like this! Mind you, im assuming it would of taken you ages to write all that
and not all of us have that much time on our hands Crying or Very sad

but anyway, once again thanks for sharing it with us.

im not sure if you have done a track day, but if you havnt, i look forward to your report from your first ever track day.......
i remember writing mine, it was like 3 pages long Laughing

Best Quote "Do a skid and i will root ya" Laughing

So the big question is... Did one of you guys do the 'skid'? Shocked

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Ahh Tassie girls, i miss living there..... great report mate, makes me home sick Sad

Trackday report here -> http://www.gixxer.com/forums/showthread.php?t=250271

However i should say it was Superbike school level 1 Wink

As for the 'skid' LOL a burnout maybe haha but THAT fun stuff didn't happen till the next night in hobart, thats another story...private story. haha.

	gixxerdims wrote:
	Trackday report here -> http://www.gixxer.com/forums/showthread.php?t=250271 However i should say it was Superbike school level 1 As for the 'skid' LOL a burnout maybe haha but THAT fun stuff didn't happen till the next night in hobart, thats another story...private story. haha.

Another great post Dims, do you remember who your coach was?

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OK, just signed up to the Gixer forum so I could see the pics - that's Fatty, he's fast 39's-40's something like that. Nice one!

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yeh the gixxer forum kicks ass....I have NO bike knowlegde, basically form that forum i learnt how to do the following:

Cut off my cat and install an 06/07 slip on...(08 gixxers the cat is welded on and an 08 slip on is just for looks)
Install a Power Commander
Problems with fairings - fixed all those
Swap sprockets (back to original now)

But yeh such a useful forum.

Yeh fatty...can't remember his actual name...one of the other instructors is Aaron McFadzen, hes also the guy that sold me my bike from Peter Stevens in Dandy!

LOL.... Aaron was at the nutrider cruize last week.

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