Deane & Jack's Motorcycle Trip in
Australia and New Zealand
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Deane & Jack's Motorcycle Trip in Australia and New Zealand |
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March 21 - Sydney, New South Wales, to Canberra, Australian Capital Territory 525 km(325 Miles) |
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Today we chose a route that took us into the "Blue Mountains" of the Great Dividing Range. We rode west out of Sydney to get into the Blue Mountains, and went up in elevation. At the top, we had a good view point. They were indeed the "Blue" mountains, in that with a slight haze of moisture, one could see several ridges in the distance, and the effect was "Blue". If you have been to the "Blue Ridge Mountains" of North Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia, or the "Great Smokey Mountains", again of North Carolina and Tennessee, you know the effect.
After crossing that mountain range, the landscape again became rolling and somewhat dryer, but still pretty. On the way, Jack and I happened to find out about a road race track in the town of Bathurst, New South Wales. It was open for people to see what the circuit was like. So of course we had a run around it! Wow! - What a tough track - lots of elevation change, with a really scary, fast, and steep down-hill section, and no run-off areas at the curves!! Fun, anyway. As we passed through a little town, we saw an interesting sight. See if you can see the strange (to us in the U.S.) arrangement of cars in this photo.
The answer is that the cars are parked at an angle to the curb and street, but with the back end of the car toward the curb and sidewalk. This seems eminently sensible, in that we watched a couple of cars either park, by stopping in the left lane just ahead of the empty parking spot and backing in, (where the driver can see both forward and backward), or leave the parking space, by pulling out into traffic with the front end of the car first. I had gotten a hint of this from our bike rental owner, Dave, of Aussie Biker, when he said, as we parked our motorcycles when out on his familiarization ride; he said "Parking the bikes with the front tire out from the curb, this is the way you do it in Australia". The "way to do it" was to have the bike slightly pointed left from the curb. Interesting! As we came farther south, toward Canberra, we saw the effects of Australia's drought. Like the Southwest of the US, they are in a several-year drought, with no end in sight. The result in the cattle and sheep raising ranches was to see extremely dry pastures, to the extent one wonders if they can keep their herds or flocks going. They didn't seem to have any baled hay to feed, so I'm sure if is a real worry.
All in all, a good day's ride, to get to the national capital city of Australia. |
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