BACK TO BUSH #16

By: Duncan Bennett, Member #4171

When you’re on a good thing, stick with it. The origin of that saying was actually from the Mortein advertising team in the 1940’s and they were talking about DDT but it could equally apply to the GS Lite route taken for the Christmas in July event to Kingaroy. The B2B numero 16 was in the northwest at Mundubbera, so why on earth wouldn’t we take the western branch of the Brisbane River once again? Same old, same old. Meet at CJ’s in Woodford, spruik the ride to completely random people whilst sporting a mouth full of party pie, and hit the road. To its credit, Woodford did produce a crisis of the type which brings forth the true adventure riders – Margreth’s riding pants clasp failed. Cable ties, tape, staples, glue - indeed nothing that could rejoin things that needed to come apart again in the future were not thrown up as options. Lack of imagination had a cable tie in place before we decided that we’d better get to Mundubbera before dark. The D’Aguilar highway was swarming with Ekka weekend traffic, although not quite as bad as the carpark a.k.a M1 heading up from North Lakes, so Neurum Rd it was. High 5-ing as we passed through the finally completed Kilcoy roadworks, we soldiered on to the turn-off to Linville for the 4th time this year. Deciding that an early lunch is the worst motivator for adventure riders, we committed to Goo-mary where surely we’d deserve a pie if we managed to smash through the suicidal swarms of cattle.

Starting to think about steak for some reason

As always the steak and kidney units were just sold out when we arrived in Goomeri after the sheer joy of riding the smooth farm roads, but never mind a “left field” corned beef and white sauce pie was still available. Tools were handed to Margreth’s

husband Nic from the adventure riders’ pack to cut the cable tie from the pants, but only after we’d located a priest to over-see the ceremony.

Father O’Reilly laying on a hand while reciting the pants cable tie removal Psalm 107:16

A cheap chastity lock was fitted to the pants, and with only occasional panicky outbursts that the key was irretrievably lost, we headed north to Ban Ban Springs and around the corner to Gayndah. A discreet inappropriate touching of Gay Dan at the giant orange and I led on to Mundubbera via the Burnett River road, only to discover that half the following party decided to take the highway, only Nic followed. The feminines would later learn that they’d missed one of Queensland’s road gems – the Mundubbera Gayndah Road has sweeping bends, river views, and major scenery from the high points.

Don’t miss it if you get the chance.

Team Sunnie at the Billabong

Into Mundubbera and some wild gesturing from Nic caused a stop. Apparently there was a squealing noise coming from the bike. The piglet I’d brought along in case the Billabong Motor Inn ran out of bacon was quiet and just enjoying the ride, so the source was traced to the chain which was very loose. We still beat the other half of the party into

the motel comfortably though. Chain adjusted, the rising heat had us out of the riding gear, showered, and into the restaurant for the traditional raucous evening, with everyone but me wildly exaggerating their stories. It was great to catch up with COVID refugees Mario and Fiona, whose stories of crawling through mud under miles of razor wire, living on dried grass in the front boot space of a burned out VW Beetle, and surviving on browning lettuce leaves in the huge refugee camp near Texas were later confirmed by someone who owes Mario a lot of money.

The Herpich’s plotting how to see more bears and ride more blue bikes than anyone else

Saturday dawned. Unlike previous B2B events, the riding wasn’t over and most of us had to back up and make an appearance in Dalby, so the enthusiasm levels were high as we had another opportunity to make up for the litany of failures on day 1. Team GS Lite was slightly diminished; only me, Margreth and Cindy turned up to attempt the Boondooma Road, which is a glorious piece of graded dirt and very pleasant in the reduced temperatures. Poor Nic had work commitments so we tried to have even more fun on his behalf. The weather expanded from very nice to verging on a Sunnie Coast Riders event as we headed in Kingaroy to meet the rest of the crowd for lunch. A nasty black cloud and a brief drenching rain inspired purchase of a boiled potato stuffed with chili beef, surely we were in Kingaroy for the long term. But no, the front moved away quickly and the major delay turned out to be finishing the baked spud. Heading through Kumbia, naturally assumed to be pronounced Kum-buy-yah in a deep melodic tone, the fork in the road was reached so in the words of Yogi Berra we took it - once more unto the Bunya Mountains dear friends, once more. In four attempts since 2015 to actually see anything from the lookout, we still haven’t actually seen anything. One day the weather will be perfect, likely

just not when we are up there.

“If it’s flooded, forget it” not heeded on Bunya Mt

Rolling down the other side into Kaimkillenbun, we were mainly dried off by the time we rolled into the Gallery Motor Inn for part 2 of the B2B. A stroll to the “what do you call a man with no arms or legs in the bush? – Russell” Tavern and the crowd re-gathered for another excellent evening with friends.

Rolling BMW thunder down Bunya

Many thanks to Dave Whale for organising such a spectacularly successful event – great riding, venues, and an excellent stepping stone for Cindy’s and my Go West adventure to be reported in next months’ journal. May the B2B’s continue.....

And the thong toss winner was - Carl!