ears that can drive a person mad ! Even writing this I squirm at the thought of the little buggers trying to climb inside my ear canal . Yuck !
On our way to Alice , we had a decision to make : take a longer route that was allegedly torrid , or an eighty-kilometre route of rough track . Richie was dead set on trying out some dirt paths , jealous of our Oodnadatta adventures , God knows why as I wasn ’ t selling it to him . Off we set , anyway .
Dave and Justin quickly tired of having to wait for Richie as he struggled from the outset , so they absconded . Richie fell perhaps over half a dozen times during those three hours , and in between falling over myself on occasion , we got a good workout when righting our bikes . Sand and bulldust , still my enemy ! I was very thankful to my engine crash bars and Barkbusters , and the Z750 fared well other than a few scratches . To quote Richie , “ the only thing broken was my pride . And temper .” Richie ’ s soft panniers and my hard-plastic ones took punishment , but the bikes kept on trucking , which was all we needed . Darkness had long fallen by the time we exited the shortcut , we were cold and tired , and our senses were being assaulted by some hideous stench out in the bushes . There was only one thing for it : Dave enlightened the mood by climbing inside pickled herring .
We stayed in Alice Springs for two nights , the highlight of which was cleaning up our motorcycles and hearing about Dave walking into the shower fully clothed , panniers and all . I ’ m not sure if he washed the clothes or just burnt them . Given I was lacking pannier space , or that I was very much the ‘ Driving Miss Daisy ’ of the bunch , I had a pink basket zip-tied to the front of my BMW during some nighttime shenanigans . It was perfect for collecting wild melons !
Despite the scorching temperatures , none of the motorbikes had missed a beat . Justin was elated with his Super Ténéré , although not so much the dirt that it accumulated ! When we accelerated hard along some straights , to its credit , the blue meanie pulled away from me easily , as did the Z750 of course . Occasionally we ’ d encounter a slight obstacle where fuel stops had either burnt down or collapsed entirely , or both , which made things a little worrisome . We ’ d all packed 1.5 litre fuel bottles though and our planning came in fortuitous – finally our office-worker preparation paid dividends !
Given the merciless sun we took it easy on the roads , and every now and again a burnt-out car would remind us that it wasn ’ t altogether safe out here in the outback . One little meeting with a kangaroo , wombat , cow or camel at the wrong time and we ’ d be toast , but there were other
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