29th June Venus Bay

Kms to Venus Bay 200                                            Kms to date 2100

I got here on Saturday after getting a negative Covid result on Friday.  This is the day I was supposed to start the Ride Around Australia and meet Alan at Wellington. That's all gone now and I have been cancelling and rebooking lots of accommodation and reading the fine print on the State's Covid border rules.

Venus Bay is a beautiful stretch of wild ocean beach and at the back Andersons Inlet and the Tarwin River.

Evening on the Tarwin River at Venus Bay.

I have been doing a few jobs for Catherine; like fixing the shed we gave her for Christmas down to the foundations so it wouldn't blow off them again and helping her neighbour Mike and his cousin to haul the very heavy Rayburn stove onto her verandah.

This Rayburn stove isn't very big but it still weighs 250 kgs!

This stove weighed a lot so we used the "Egyptian Pyramid Building Technique".  Rollers and an electric winch (as we didn't have any slaves handy).  Once it was on the rollers we could push it around with very little effort.  We left it at the back door and Catherine will prepare the area for installation and get her plumber hook it up.  They will be able to roll it into the kitchen.

 I went for a few beach walks as Venus Bay has a beach to die for.  I met this man surf fishing.  I should really give up this trip and start doing what he was doing!

 

Lone fisherman on the beach.

Another beautiful Venus Bay sunset.

25th June "Scored it by that much!" Camberwell

 Kms today 327    Kms to date 1910 

Well I've done almost 2000kms to end up where I started!  I had just got into Victoria by a few hours and avoided being stopped and sent to 14 days quarantine.

I had to go directly to Wodonga Hospital for my test and then directly home with no stops and self - isolate.  I called up Ella our border/house sitter and asked her to stay with her aunt tonight. I also asked her to get in some food as all I was able to eat before getting home were the biscuits in the motel.

I had to queue for about 1 1/2 hrs along with NSW registered cars also caught by the border closure. There was a special testing station outside the tent for people not in a car and I was directed to go there.   I got away at about 11:30 and headed down the Hume Fwy.  I had filled up the night before but didn't really fill right up.  So I crouched down behind the screen like Jack Miller going down Gardner Straight at Phillip Island. I kept my eye on the fuel consumption and range display on the dash.  I kept the speed down to 105kph to save fuel.

The weather turned wet and cold about Benalla and got worse.  The heated gloves and grips were working overtime.  I made it home at 3:30 with about 1 litre left in the tank.  I unloaded and cooked a big fry as I was famished.  I checked out the various State Covid restrictions and worked out a strategy.

I can enter SA 14 days after I came out of NSW. I can enter NT from SA  and I can enter WA 14 days after entering SA.  That will mean that all our current bookings will have to be changed.  One benefit is that I will spend more time with Morag.

Ready to head down to Venus Bay 

The safest place to be is at my daughter Catherine's house at Venus Bay about 160kms SE of Melbourne.  I can ride up to Mildura and enter SA at Renmark on 11th July.  I decided to bring my paddock stand as the Kawasaki doesn't have a centre stand.  Having a paddock stand to raise the rear wheel will make lubricating the chain much easier.  Its very light weight and can be strapped onto the Givi bag quite easily.

So wish me luck on Around Australia Ride Mark 2!

 

24th June "Missed it by that much" I'm in Wodonga

Kms today 637   Kms to date 1583

I was checking my news feed at about 11pm before going to bed when I read that Queensland was going to close its border to travellers from Greater Sydney at 1 am on the 24th!  The restricted zone included Central Coast which meant that I wouldn't have time to get out of the area before the deadline.

I sat there stunned thinking the whole trip had gone down the toilet.  I knew I wouldn't be able to sleep that night so I made a spur of the moment decision to pack up right then and head back to Victoria.  If Qld had closed its borders, then Victoria would probably follow soon after. (this turned out to be very prescient). I was already packed ready to go so I got out of bed, got dressed and loaded up my gear on the Kawasaki as quietly as possible.  I  left a 12:30am and freewheeled down the hill to keep noise down.  I had filled up the tank the day before so I took the same route out of Sydney I had come in on last Saturday.  

I kept going as far a Marulan where I stopped for fuel and a bite to eat.  I confirmed with the cashier that Marulan was outside the Greater Sydney area: just in case! I sent Alan a text telling him what I was doing. Next stop was Gundagai and the rain started.  I had my Ray Jay's rain suit on and had my heated gloves up to the max.  I also had to fire up my heated grips.  It was pretty grim with spray off the trucks reducing visibility.  As I approached Gundagai there was a very unwelcome digital notice over the road.  The Hume Hwy was closed south of Gundagai and I had to divert via Tumut.  I stopped for fuel at about 6 am and waited until the Hungry Jacks opened and the sun came up.  I didn't fancy the road to Tumut in the rain and the dark.  I found out that a tanker truck had crashed on the Hume at 8:30 the previous night and they were still cleaning up the mess.  A customer warned me that the Tumut road was unsafe for motorcycles because of potholes, which was the last thing I wanted to hear!

I contacted Morag who I knew was in Albury on the first leg of her round Australia trip and told her the news.  I suggested we meet in Holbrook at 10:30 as she was driving through there on her way to Cowra. The road to Tumut was pretty bad, but the road back to the Hume Hwy and the traffic through Adelong was much worse and I hit a few potholes.   I arrived in Holbrook and stripped off in my favourite café, where I have stopped many times before.  They had a nice warm room with an open fire.  I called Alan and he said he only realised that I had left when he checked my room after I hadn't appeared for breakfast.  I also called my two cousins and sister who I was due to stay with to tell them the news. Morag arrived and we shared a coffee. We would not be seeing each other again for sometime. I never imagined that she was going to have so much trouble with the car.

I obtained a border pass to enter Victoria and that was no problem as my brother's house was still in a Green Zone.  I stayed at the same motel in Wodonga that I stayed in on the way up.  That evening I got a text message from the Vic Dept of Health to tell me that the Eastern Suburbs of Sydney were now a Red Zone.  I hadn't been there so that was OK.  Then I got a second text message at 10:30 pm telling me that the rest of Greater Sydney was an Orange Zone and I had to get tested and self-isolate at home until I got my result.  Wodonga Hospital was a walk-up Covid testing site so I decided to go there.

Not long after Greater Sydney was declared a Red Zone and a few weeks later the whole of NSW became and "Extreme" Zone and entry to Victoria was all but banned.

23rd June Sydney

 Kms today 4(walking to the shops for a coffee)

As I was drinking my coffee at the Elanora shops I read that the NT had closed its border to all people in Greater Sydney which includes us both.  Alan was off sailing that day and on the way home his WA border permit was cancelled because the WA border was closed to anyone in the whole of NSW. I escaped that because my home address was in Victoria.  I started to get very nervous and made plans to leave Sydney as Barbara Shaw had advised.  Alan still didn't want to change his plan as he wanted to get his second Astra-Zeneca Covid jab before he left.

Just when we thought that we had the Covid borders issues sorted it all fell apart.  I am leaving tomorrow for Port Macquarrie to stay with my cousin Helen so should be safe from any Queensland border closures but Alan couldn't be persuaded to come with me and will take his chances and leave on Saturday the 26th.  We'll both enter Queensland on the 1st July and hopefully be free to travel to Mt Isa at least.  

Then we are in the lap of the Gods.  I might be OK to enter NT as I will have been out of Greater Sydney for 15 days.  Alan will be out for 13 days.  That could mean I could go up to Darwin and meet Alan at Litchfield NP. Then we would see where WA is at.

If it seems unlikely we will be able to enter WA we would return south and maybe go round to WA the other direction.  With all this to-ing and fro-ing we should easily clock up the 16000 Kms originally planned!

My sister Barbara came over that evening for dinner and that proved a vital delay to my leaving Sydney.

It changed just before midnight!

20th June Sydney

Kms today 0                                                          Kms to date  930

I was free to move around Sydney while staying with Alan.  He was making his last preparations for leaving at the end of the month; new tyres on his BMW GS1200 and an oil change. We did some babysitting for Ewan at Samantha and Rob's place while they attended concert with Georgia. 

We applied and got our WA GHG Pass, but had to wait until closer to the border crossing date for the Qld and NT border passes.  We made some adjustments to our itinerary and rearranged our accommodation.

The Bondi cluster was spreading but still seemed to be contained to the Eastern Suburbs, but suddenly it was in the West.  This was a different situation because the residents living in the West were in larger households and were working multiple jobs in the community.  The NSW State government tried to use contact tracing to control the outbreak, but the Delta variant of  Covid was highly contagious and the only way to stop it was strict lockdowns - like Victoria had used.  Other States were getting nervous about the Sydney out- break, but Alan was confident the Qld border would remain open as the school holidays were about to start and 1000's of NSW people would be heading to the Gold and Sunshine Coast.  My cousin Barbara Shaw who lived in Brisbane warned us that we should get up there asap!

Alan was confident the border to Qld would stay open.

19th June Sydney

 Kms today 590         Kms to date 930

I was woken up by cocks crowing at 5 am and couldn't get back to sleep, so I read for a while. The aircon kept shutting down to de-ice so I knew it was cold outside, but when I went out to load up the bike it was covered in ice and the seat pad was frozen solid!  I took off before 8 to have breakfast in Albury and meet the conditions of my entry permit.  This will be a feature of this trip: entry permits different for each state border.

This photo was taken after I had knocked the ice off my seat.

                  The weather was dry but very cold so I headed up the Hume with grip warmers and heated gloves on. When I got to Tarcutta the temperature dropped and a thick mist appeared. This went on for about 50kms and hopefully will be the last time it happens on this trip.

I stopped in Gundagai and Marulan for fuel and refreshments. At Marulan I felt quite fatigued and was worried I wasn't really up for doing big daily kms like I used to, but once I got back on the bike I was fine.  As I approached Alan's house through the northern Sydney suburbs it started to rain again and got dark. I had put my rain suit back on at Marulan so was well prepared and arrived soaking wet but dry inside at 5:30.

I have to wait until 2nd of July to enter Queensland under the current rules for Victorians from Melbourne.  Alan can enter any time. So I arranged to leave Sydney on the 26th June and visit my cousin Helen in Port Macquarie and Morag's cousin once removed Jo Jo in  her new house in South Tweed Heads before heading into Queensland to Gatton to see my sister Joan.

Of course this all went pear-shaped when Queensland closed it border to people from Sydney.

18th June Wodonga

Kms today 339        Kms to date 339

The situation crossing State borders was fraught with uncertainty.  As Covid outbreaks occurred and were brought under control, each State government made its own decisions on whether residents of other States could enter freely or be subject to testing or even quarantine.  These decisions were made in secret and announced with very little notice.

Victoria and in particular Melbourne was going through a lockdown starting at the end of May.  A person, who had returned from overseas and been in 14 day quarantine in Adelaide, caught Covid from his neighbours in the hotel he was staying at just before he left and he brought the virus into Victoria.  I was not allowed to leave Melbourne, but this was changed in the middle of June.  I was prepared to travel to Sydney and self isolate in the bungalow at the back of Alan's house for 14 days.  Alan agreed to this, but he and Jacki had grave doubts how it would all work.  I studied up on the conditions for self-isolation in NSW.  There were big penalties for breaches!

I decided that I had to leave Melbourne and Victoria now to give me the best chance of entering NSW and QLD which both had a 14 day requirement to be out of Melbourne or else 14 days quarantine.  NSW dropped this requirement on the 17th June but QLD hadn't.  This change in NSW rules was published without fanfare on the same day it had re-affirmed its previous rules.  I needed to be constantly alert to the changes that States were making even on the same day!  The irony was that on the 16th June NSW Health declared a Covid outbreak in Bondi when a driver picked up the Delta Virus from an international flight crew. Everyone assumed that the NSW "Gold Standard" contact tracing would soon confine the outbreak to the Eastern Suburbs.

Leaving Melbourne in such a hurry Morag could only get a shot of my back!

I had a final check at my eye doctor as I was being treated for a rise in the pressure in my right eye.  I had had laser treatment to reduce the pressure, but if that didn't work I am due for an operation when I get back home.  The uncertainty about the progress of my Glaucoma was to play a roll later in the journey.

It was straight up the Hume in the rain to the Motel Wellington in Wodonga with a NSW border entry pass for Saturday morning. The Ray Jays rain suit was a success as were the  Ventura heated gloves as it was cold as well as wet.

Motel Wellington had an entrance for trucks as well as cars so I knew what I was in for. What did surprise me was the check in. Reception was closed and I had to register on a touch screen terminal with my details and my room key was delivered out the bottom; a bit like a poker machine! The room was large but spartan but did the job. I walked to a local pub for dinner. It was much more up market but the bistro was booked out so I ate in the bar in front of a fire.

Morag was also going on a round Australia trip in our fairly new Hyundai Ioniq Plug In Hybrid car.  She planned to leave on 23rd June.  Her journey had very few problems with border crossings, but there were problems with the car, which were totally unanticipated by me and which while not stranding her, made her journey much more difficult than it should have been.