THE LOWDOWN NEWS & STUFF
Asylum Seekers Words and Photos by Sam Orchard.
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Finding new spots to ride is always a constant battle, especially in a state such as Tasmania. We aren’t graced with square miles of concrete jungles to explore so we’re often spending our weekends trekking into the more rural areas of the state, of which there are many, in the hope of finding something fun to ride. It’s pretty safe to say that over the years we’ve explored 95% of the state’s educational institutions and public buildings. So finding something new is always exciting and definitely rewarding.
The town is set apart also by its unusual history. It is home to the former Royal Derwent Hospital, the country’s oldest mental institution. The asylum is set out like a miniature village, littered with almost 30 buildings, some dating back to the early 1800’s. It was closed down and abandoned some time in the 90’s. Paperwork, wheelchairs, beds and even padded cells still remain in the buildings. It’s as if it was just neglected and evacuated in one day. The complex would be a jackpot for squatters or the homeless if it wasn’t 35km out of Hobart.
I’d been to New Norfolk before but never thought anything of it. It’s a strange town. One of those odd places where you instantly feel outlawed. Like the locals are holding some sort of secret and really don’t want you around. You can feel their eyes on you at all times as you drive through the lonely streets.
We drove out there not expecting much at all. We were keener to check out two of the schools in the area rather than the asylum itself, although spooky abandoned buildings have always been a secret fetish of mine, especially those with a dark and mysterious history. The entrance to the complex
THE LOWDOWN NEWS & STUFF
This section was cordoned off with barbed wire security fences. Thankfully the wheelchair was already delicately positioned for me beside the access ramp. How handy. Nick Hills. PHOTO Sam Orchard
was guarded by two big white iron gates. Kind of how I’d imagine The Pearly Gates, only overgrown with weeds and rusted through. Giant oaks and willow trees towered over each side of the road. We parked the cars just inside and ventured in with our rigs. We were in the oldest section of the hospital. At first glance it seemed to be nothing but broken glass and weeds covering the crumbling architecture, but after a bit of initiative and creative thinking, ideas began to form. It turned out to be a very memorable weekend, finishing with Toby Orchard hitting his head pretty hard in a mistimed bench hop which resulted in two days of memory loss and a lot of repeated questions. “You got any gum?” “No Toby. You already asked me that 49 times…” Maybe next time you’re complaining about your city’s lack of spots or skate parks, look outside the square a little. Snoop around where you usually wouldn’t snoop around. Who knows what you’ll find.
Willow Court, Nurse’s Quarters. PHOTO Sam Orchard
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Liam launching one kick arse gap over to drop. Funnily enough the first photo of the trip....
ld winter rs to Canberra in the co hold a X’e BM y an m so s ing br event that r deciding to It’s usually only an ACT wer members; Zac Mine ne tly gh sli ’s ra er nb Ca p out of it. months. But with one of y BMX got behind it and decided to make a tri re he headed fo lon Jam for his birthday, Co video and to say good bye to Mick Bayzand be am te b we a Namely to film for a change of scene. da na Ca r, ve ou nc Va to over c Gascoine Story and photos by Ni ISSUE 29 2
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Scott Greentree sizing up the supersize pipe. To say it was big is the years biggest understatement.... PHOTO Mark Watson
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B AY Z A N D You grew up in Adelaide. Where abouts in the so called city of Churches was that? I spent my younger years in Salisbury, then moved to Elizabeth. The north side baby. And so when did you get the urge to start killing it on a BMX? I was born with the urge! I started BMX racing when I was two and a half years old. Did that for years, got a bit tired of it and just wanted to jump stuff. I started thrashing around on dunga bikes, building jumps, then met Kym and the rest of the crew and that’s when it all really started. Who was the crew you rode with way back then? The crew was big! Kym Grosser, Russell Tranter, Terry Durham, Damien Daniels, Craig Johns, Arron Rankin, Troy Errington, Dunger, Jimmy Joley, Jon (Muzza) Murray, Glen Sterry, Ross Richter, Jessie Carlson, Jeremy Beard, Pelican and Kenny Raggett (even though he wasn’t from SA, he was still part of the crew). A big shout out to all these boys! If it wasn’t for them I might not be where I am today. They were the good old days. We always had the maddest sessions together. Word up boys. You and Grosser seem to always be riding together, what’s the story? Since way back in the day, we always rode the same spots and wanted to learn the same tricks. So we kinda teamed up and went on a mission to destroy everything! We just work well together. He’s a righty and I’m a lefty, so any park we go to or any street spot we hit, between us we have always got something. Plus we don’t have to fight over the same clips. It was always pretty cool to have all you guys rock up to a comp in SA and kick arse. What were some best comps you can remember from back then? Definitely the Cross keys comp at the BMX track, because it was the first dirt comp I ever entered and I won it. The Dingley Dell comp where Jessie Carlson was trying flip bar spins way back in the day, when flips were still gnarly (and years before Nyquist did ‘em). Plus all Zoli’s Volatile Visions comps were sick! Zoli was the king, he made BMX in South Australia. The Port Gawler comps were always a good time. Oh, and who can forget Jessie’s Big Gay Bikes comp. What a tripper! The scene back there then was pretty killer, especially dirt. What was up with Adelaide back then? Oh yeah, it was killer. Adelaide had an awesome dirt scene back in the day. We had heaps of different jumps going in the North and the boys down South had some amazing jumps too. Adelaide was definitely known for its dirt, especially with Zoli having so many Volatile dirt comps. It was a good time to be alive. Where were the spots that got you stoked back in the day in SA? The Gawler step up. That was the best jump in the world. We learnt everything on that jump. We would go there every weekend, throw a bit of dirt on the landing to soften it up a bit and then go nuts. Some serious stuff went down on that jump and I definitely had some of the best times of my life there. Also SK8FX. That place was so cool. It was an indoor roller skating rink with a skate park and the owner Bo was a chiller. He would always let us ride for free, let us ride when it was shut, let us stay late and have night sessions. Everyone was always there hanging out, getting wasted and having mad sessions. He even let some people live there and he’d throw some crazy parties too. But sadly both those places are now gone... R.I.P.
Double the kink, double the fun... PHOTO Nick Gascoine
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Chris Courtenay big no hander in the Ghetto PHOTO Morrisey
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While it was a miserable summer, the weather finally dried up in Brisbane. That motivation had both myself and Matt from Tempered wanting to hold our next ghetto-esque drain jam. This eventually led to the combining of forces and the Filthy Drains Jam was born. Tempered bikes had run a similar jam in December last year at another suitably ghetto drain which went down like a treat, but both of us had bigger ideas to make it better. This basically revolved around lots of sketchy ramps that may have needed to be sticky taped together after the first talks. After many days and nights of seemingly endless pallet missions, wood acquisitions (via various dubious methods) and the harsh realisation that making a concrete quarter is much harder than it seems, we had a pretty decent set up. The day was supposed to kick off around ten in the morn, but when we got there there were over 50 crew hitting it up, so the action got underway early for some, whilst the drinking got underway for others at the same time! The idea was to have a list of ghetto challenges and cross them off as people did them, or at least took them on. Some involved the likes of biggest air and the usual deal, while some involved launching death gaps and absolutely stupid shit, like look-alike contests. So from about 11am shit went nuts, and over the course of the day well over a hundred people turned up with a good amount of them actually riding. One of the days main lines was the huge ghetto quarter. Chris Courtenay blasted the absolute shit out of it and must have topped out at around the 8 foot mark with stretched no-handers and whips. This kid owned that ramp on the day, so he won that challenge hands down. Chris Edgar was also killing the beast and flaired, whip’d and lip tricked the quarter all day, so big props to him. I think he scored some pedals, cause he was riding hard all day on haggard as all hell pedals. Now you might be thinking that all this trickery seems pretty normal these days, but the run up to the quarter involved carving up a slippery bank then aiming for a rickety, makeshift bridge that had holes in it over the actual water part of the drain. If you made that, you then flat out cranked to the spongy quarter that had more and more holes blown in it as the day went on! It must also be mentioned that this not so easy to ride quarter fell over with suitable coercion at the end of the day (thanks Daffles). There was a ghetto pallet halfpipe / wallride setup underneath the train bridge which entertained everyone all day. Nick K from T-bar owned that and actually left tyre marks on the underside of the bridge, you could say he couldn’t possibly go any higher. Matt Lawton from Tempered was doing the highest Ruben wall rides off it and little Alex Hiam was throwing whips and riding it all dialled like a pro. Tiny won a shit load of stickers for pedalling his 16” bike above a mark I set for him, so props to the little man for stepping up! The riding on the banked hip was unbelievable to say the least. Josh Clark from Toowoomba pretty much destroyed the thing with whips, superseats and backies all off the ghetto bridge run in’s and flat banks. That dude owned it! Like I mentioned earlier, you probably think a wedge hip ain’t nothing special, the run in was carved out of bush before heading across sketchy bridges and then once landed, you had to aim for another 2 foot wide bridge or else go in the drink! This made for some funny stuff, especially for anyone running their ride brakeless.
Alex Haim, whip under the bridge PHOTO Nitai
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BEHIND BARS BMX 4 LIFE
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BEHIND BARS BMX 4 LIFE
Ben Clissold Resides Noosa, QLD Words & Photo by Nitai
Born 6th December 1985 Occupation Bike shop Salesman / Student I have known Ben for a while now. We met at our local skate park in Noosa back around 1999-2000. I wasn’t the best if friends with Ben back then but since he finished school travelled throughout Europe for 2 years and then moved down to Brisbane; Ben has become a great friend of mine and an even better rider. Defiantly not the some kid who I met 8 yrs or so ago, Currently Ben works at a Bike shop selling bikes and at the same time is studying to be Nurse in the emergency ward, which I really respect. If you ever have the chance to hang with Ben, make sure you bring plenty of red wine! Why are you an indie scene whore? Coz the music’s good and the girls are gorgeous + well up for hanging round dirty clothed kids with good hair, kind of like BMX riders I guess, ha! What’s with your red wine clean skin addiction? Is it because it’s cheap or because you want to be an indie kid? I’m trying to stay healthy by loading up on the antioxidants… Ha-ha yeah coz it’s cheap and I’m an alcoholic, think I’m going to crack open another! How did travelling through Europe change your life? Without sounding cliché it really opened up my head to different or alternative ways of living, I guess my point of view used to be get a wife, work the career, where as now I want to have fun and experience as much as I can! Who do you like to ride with that pushes you? My two favourite kids to ride with at the moment are Karl and Byron, those kids defiantly push me and are a laugh to ride with and with out a doubt Brenno when ever I get the chance to ride with that kid! When you going to get that hair cut? Ha-ha now you hooked me up with where you get your hair done, maybe 2moz! Thanks? Defs NItai for the questions and making me look good with your mad photography skills, 2020 for the opportunity to be in your mag, thanks to Rahda who’s up for a ride where ever and when ever and shout outs to Mum and Dad!
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