Post Card From: australia

Our 2014 annual bike trip included myself on an Aprilia RSV4, and two mates, one on a 2004 ZX-10R and another on a 2002 Yamaha R1– all amazing bikes in their day. Leaving straight after New Year’s is a perfect way to start the year! The plan was to ride to Cooma, then Mt Hotham, Canberra and then home to Sydney with plenty of squiggly roads and detours in between. The riding pace was spot on for the conditions with all three of us at a similar ability. The end of the first day resulted in my upper right back and shoulder aching from my sub-standard backpack...! My Aprilia RSV4 really only catered for my wet weather gear (perched on top), and I'm too vain to put one of those hideous racks on the back of my Italian beauty! Despite the nagging pain, we had a blast, riding demanding first and second gear corners, flip-flopping relentlessly, to open tyre shredding fourth gear stuff; corners you can see through and really open it up, all the while dodging snakes, dead 'roos (it's the ones that jump out at you from the side of the road that are the worry!), dead wombats...in fact, lots of dead animals! As treacherous as the landscape can be, it's also a reminder of how beautiful it can be as we stumbled upon roads full of haunting white trees, rolling hills and golden valleys. The bikes worked perfectly through all conditions, bringing their respective owners home safe; exhausted but thoroughly satisfied. Just watch out for the 2012 RSV4 fuel range – it only caught me out once! These were the roads travelled: Macquarie Pass Braidwood Rd (beware: dirt!) Monaro Hwy Princes Hwy Great Alpine Rd Omeo Hwy Murray Valley Hwy Tooma Rd Snowy Mountains Hwy