That used to be my nanny’s favourite saying if anyone asked her where she was going. She would follow that up with, “And, if we get there and find it’s too far, we won’t go.” Pretty funny lady, was my nanny.
Well, yesterday and today we did a similar ride. And it was fun (almost). Friday we headed up to Hornsby via Silverwater Road and Pennant Hills Road then on to the OPH and a pie at Pie in the Sky. Peats Ridge and onto the Wollombi Road, stopping for fuel at Kulnura. Love that road, and still can’t imagine why anyone crashes at Lemmings Corner. Right at Wollombi and along that incredibly bumpy section that leads to Cessnock.
Being good can sometimes have its reward, too. Cruising along at 90, I came over a rise to see an HWP car heading towards me. The limit was 80 and he didn’t even give me a second glance. Arrived at Toronto around 3 and checked in at our accommodation, then back out to visit our old music teacher from school, a sprightly 80 year old who always appreciates a visit and a chance to reminisce.
This morning we headed off around 8, back through Cessnock and out to the Putty at Milbrodale and south. Absolutely bltized the 10 mile, perhaps the best I’d ever ridden it, no traffic either. Paused to see the remains of the Halfway House, noting the For Sale sign out the front, bit of a worry, that. Fabulous run all the way down the Putty (1 truck at Colo Heights the sum of the traffic going our way.)
However, about to run up the Colo from the river the whole thing went pear-shaped. HWP car and cones across the road just after the bridge. Road Closed. Nazi cop on duty informs us that the road will be closed for at least 5 hours and that we can go back to Broke and head home through Cessnock if we wish. Thanks heaps. Or, we could take the Comleroy Road which takes you across to the BoR at Kurmond. That sounded like a much better deal so we turned around and headed west from the turnoff just behind us.
What a lovely little road Blaxlands Ridge Road was, for at least the first 5 kms anyway. Then it turned to gravel and we followed it till it ran out at a farm gate. What the hell? Fortunately a local in a 4WD ute pointed us in the right direction and led us to the turn-off, about which the cop had said nothing, grrrr. Unsurprisingly, Comleroy is also gravel and, were it not so, it would make one of the “must ride” mountain roads. It twists and turns and rises and falls for around 30kms before coming out at Kurrajong Heigths. I hate dirt roads but I managed. I felt really sorry for Paul as his bike’s 16″ front wheel hates dirt roads even more than I do. Needless to say, despite a few “moments” and a couple of cars coming the other way in the middle of the road around blind corners, we made it, exhausted and bone weary from the pounding, at Kurmond for fuel and water.
On an adventure bike it would be a great run, but it was hardship (heheheeh, I accidentally typed “hardhip” and it was pretty hard on the hips too) in the extreme on a road bike. Windsor, Penrith, Glenmore Park and late lunch at the ever-welcoming Peppercorns at Mulgoa and then poker run home, arriving about 1530, tired and caned, but happy to have another one in the book.