Last weekend I travelled to Port Macquarie for Round One of the MotoStars series for 2019. Rd1 was SUPPOSED to be held at Greer Park near Toowoomba but the local nimbys have been kicking up a noise about the noise and the local council has banned all motorcycle racing at the go-kart track until an environmental assessment can be carried out (you don’t have to be a rocket scientist to figure out what the result of the assessment is going to be do you?) Of course it also comes as no surprise to you that the complaints about the noise are coming from Normans who built their expensive houses on 5 acre allotments around the track long after the track was built there.
Anyway, it is what it is, as Damian Cudlin says and MotoStars have great relations with Pacific Park so the venue was changed at the last minute. Since I was planning on taking my time, I asked Helena if she wanted to come with me. I don’t normally take her to race meetings because she isn’t that interested in racing but, because it was our first chance to have a good long run in the van,, she decided to come so I had great company on the trip.
Beginning a trend that was to continue for the whole trip, we had a dream run up through the northern suburbs, even through Pennant Hills which simply never happens. Coffee at Maccas and then onto the motorway north. Cresting the rise on the run down onto Mooney Mooney bridge we saw that the southbound traffic was banked up as far as the eye could see. As we got closer we saw that a wobblebox was lying on its side and the 4WD that had been towing it was on its roof, blocking all three lanes. The occupants of the 4WD were out of the vehicle and obviously OK and a small tabletop truck was getting into position so that it could pull the van at least out of the way so that the traffic could get moving again. We were very happy to be in the opposite lane. Damn wobbleboxes!
We stopped in at Swansea to see a mate who is opening a new coffee shop there and got the first coffee out of his new coffee machine.
Then it was threading our way through Newcastle and back onto the main road and out to Hexham. Helena loves taking photos while we are on the move and she got this cracker of a shot of the Hunter River as we crossed it.
The trip was supposed to be about the trip as well as the race meeting so we had headed off on Thursday morning leaving us plenty of time for sightseeing. Seeking out a nice spot to camp that night we pulled in to Karuah, now bypassed by the freeway, and enquired about free camps in the vicinity. We were delighted to find out that there were TWO, one each side of the bridge at the northern end of town and both serviced by an amenities block. We tossed a coin and chose the one behind the RSL club; what a great choice.
And the view over the local pool and the Karuah River was spectacular.
In the morning, just on dawn, it was even more so (see the gallery at the end of the article for more photos).
We could have stayed much longer but we did have to get some kilometres done. A coffee at the local bakery and a hello to their tame kookaburra and we were on the way.
On most of my north coast junkets I have noticed the sign to the Art Cafe just out of Taree. I’ve never stopped as what I know about art could barely fill a thimble, but Helena is an accomplished artist and I knew she would appreciate a look at it so we pulled in. What a marvellous place. Despite looking like a converted church building, the cafe was built specifically AS a cafe in the style of a church building. Its high, vaulted ceilings are a lattice-work of beams and they are worth stopping off there to see just by themselves.
The building and the surrounding yard is crammed with original art works and it would have been churlish in the extreme not to sit down at one of the tables next to the river and have a cuppa.
On the way out we found that a local hot rod club had decided to do a day trip to the cafe so there were some tasty pieces of machinery in the car park, too.
A guy can dream, can’t he?
Our good fortune from Thursday accompanied us and we pulled in to the track around lunch time where I did my usual pitlane walk with the lie detector and started getting myself ready for what was going to be a very busy two day meeting. We headed into town later and bought some provisions and took the opportunity to check out Town Beach and have a rest. One of the great advantages of travelling in the camper is that, any time you want to, you can pull over, hop in the back, lie down on the bed and rest up.
Saturday and Sunday were hectic as race meetings usually are. The intense nature of the show is always more than alleviated by the pleasure of seeing the next generation of champions doing their stuff and socialising withe their parents, every one of whom are wonderful people.
After helping out with the trophy presentations, we hit the road south, once again planning not to plan too much and letting the route make itself up as it went along. All of this has its attractions from a serendipitous point of view but it’s not always practical. My *rough* plan was to cut west at Nabiac and cruise down through Gloucester, Singleton and down the Putty. That was the idea, anyway. But as we got further south it became clear that, short of driving through the night (something I didn’t really want to do), we weren’t going to make Singleton until well after dark. So Plan B saw us back on the freeway just north of Raymond Terrace and an overnight stop in the local caravan park. As usual, the plan worked to perfection and, after a good hot shower and a good sleep, we were refreshed and on our way west again.
Without going into too much detail, I should also mention that we fell foul of two extended delays with roadworks, one at each end of Gresford. One was for fresh tar sealing and the other, at the other end of town, was while council road workers cleaned up the mess of a car that had caught fire while waiting in the Stop/Go queue. Both of these used up around half an hour each.
We stopped in at Lenny’s place near Milbrodale and then lunched at Grey Gum. I definitely need to mention that we had zero traffic heading our way from Singleton to the Grey Gum, a distance of over 80kms. This, of course, meant a perfect run through the Ten Mile as well. What a shame I wasn’t on the bike.
After paying our respects to Kimmie and Grey Gum dog we wended our way via the usual route, getting home around dusk on Monday night. The van performed beautifully and proved again that it is a worthy upgrade from the T4.
Let’s see, where can we go next?