TRAVERSE 108
On a cool April morning in the Grampians region of his home state, twenty-year-old Jayde McMurtrie cinched down the straps of his loaded Suzuki DR650 and took a slow breath of salt air. The sun was only just warming the road behind him, a thin ribbon leading away from his starting point and toward a year he’ d been imagining for far too long. It was April 2, 2025— Day One of a plan he’ d hatched during long shifts as an avionics technician in the Air Force. He’ d saved every spare cent, told his mates he was taking a proper gap year, and pointed the front wheel at Anglesea, on the Victorian South Coast, with nothing but optimism, a full tank, and the kind of quiet steeliness that often belongs to people who haven’ t yet learnt the full weight of risk.
“ Most of my mates knew I’ d do something like this,” he said later, shrugging as though circumnavigating Australia alone on an ageing DR650 was simply another weekend hobby.“ Nobody was surprised.”
From Anglesea, he drifted along the Great Ocean Road, following the coastline into South Australia. Somewhere near Beachport he decided that the perfect moment demanded a daring one, so he eased off the bitumen and rolled the bike down onto the wide stretch of sand that looked more like an invitation than a warning. Within metres the DR650 sank to its axles. Jayde dug, swore, dug again, all while the tide crept higher.
“ A guy from town came out to give me a hand,” he recalled, laughing at it now.“ After a while I just thought; yeah, nah, this is stupid. Gave up on the idea.”
Lesson one: sometimes enthusiasm makes decisions that practicality wouldn’ t.
He caught the ferry across Spencer Gulf toward Port Lincoln, leaning on the rail as dolphins raced beside the bow. Their slick grey shapes cut clean arcs around the hull, and for a while he simply watched, letting the rhythm of travel sink in. The idea of being alone on the road, really alone, wasn’ t terrifying yet. It was thrilling. Two weeks in, Jayde rolled into Western Australia with dust kicking off his boots, having already sampled the sandy coastline tracks of South Australia and pushed along portions of the Indian-Pacific Railway’ s service road. Nights were spent wherever he could find a patch of earth flat enough to lie on: roadside gravel, tucked behind scrub, a sheltered nook under stars so bright they looked fake. He was learning how to make
TRAVERSE 108