I awoke to the sounds of bagpipes. It was Graham who had woken up early and got bored because we were all still asleep, so he decided to play the bagpipes on his mobile phone at 5.30 in the morning to ensure we all woke up.
To be fair we had did have over 250 off road miles to cover, so an early start was probably a good Idea, although at the time we didn’t think this to be the case.
After bidding fair well to our host, Chris, we hit the tracks, but leaving early In the morning meant we were riding directly into the rising sun on dusty tracks, so initially the visibility was not ideal.
We had already completed the Wartrail and Lundeans Nek on our first days riding and were now heading towards Barkly East before moving on to Queenstown and finally to the Hogsback.
The dirt tracks continued mile after mile, meandering through the mountains. The scenery was simply breathtaking.
Occasionally we came across some obstacles blocking the tracks....sheep
..and cows.
After 5 hrs in the saddle with the temperature reaching 32 + degrees, we arrived at Queenstown in need of some sustenance to provide us with some energy to complete the remaining 120 miles to the Hogsback. So it wasn’t difficult for us all to agree to have a proper lunch at the Black Swan pub.
A couple of hours and several beers later we left the pub to continue our journey to the Hogsback.
What we hadn’t realised at the time, was that we had actually spent too long in the pub, as we still had a long way to go.
We left Queenstown and were soon making our way along a slightly technical farm track before we reached the first locked gate. Fortunately the fence to the side of the gate was broken, so we rode our bikes through and continued along the track.
The track wound its way up the mountain for some way before we came to another locked gate. This time there was no hole in the fence and we were only 2 Kms away from our waypoint....Bugger we had no option but to turn around!!
Graham shot off back down the track but it was not long before he was met by a slightly irate farmer. It turned out that the track we were on was on private land and we were trespassing ....whoops!
Our little detour cost us another hour and with our extended lunch we were falling well behind our original ETA at the Hogsback.
We pressed on as quickly as we dare as time was now against us but the tracks became more technical and slower.
They were also more challenging, particularly around the steeper rocky bends, with the rocks wanting to take the front wheel off in another direction. Eventually the inevitable happened, my front wheel hit a large rock as I was turning and before I knew it I was on the ground with my bike on top of by foot. I lay there for a few minutes and then tried to move the bike off my trapped foot. Unfortunately the way the bike had fallen meant I had the whole weight of the bike to move to Get free. I struggled to move the bike and lay there thinking that one of my colleagues will come back for me. 5 mins passed and no sign of them, so I had to move the bike myself. Eventually after much struggling I managed to move the bike just enough to release my foot. The next challenge was to pick the bike up on a decline and that took some doing and had to take my luggage off the bike so that I could lift it up.
I checked the bike over for damage and was pleasantly surprised that only the handguard was scuffed, so I got back on my bike and continued down the mountain.
I had only traveled another half a mile further down the track and I found my colleagues. It turned out that Graham on the KTM 990, had a front wheel puncture and was otherwise distracted, so had not realised that I had been delayed getting down the mountain.
He managed to replace the front inner tube in about 40 mins, at which point we continued on our way. The scenery continued....
The next incident occurred several miles on when Peter had a slow fall on the grass which resulted in his tail bag coming loose. This was the start of Tail-bag rage as his back continued to come loose for the rest of the trip. It took a while for him to re secure the bag which added to the delays we had experienced throughout the day.
It was now 6.30pm and we still had another 17 miles to go. It was now a race against time to make it to the Hogsback before it got dark. My visor was covered in flys and dust, so as the light faded, I had to ride with the visor up. The only problem with this was that the bugs were flying into my face and inside my helmet. Not Ideal.
By 7pm the light had completely faded but we were only a few miles away from the Hogsback.
Fortunately we had pre booked our accommodation at the Fairy Backpackers and when we arrived in the dark, our rooms were ready and cold beer and pizza awaited us!!!
It ended up being a long day and it wasn’t long after we had eaten and of course consumed a few beers that we all hit the sack completely exhausted.
