Vintage Adventure Touring - 2014 Tenere Tragics Run

[Colin Jay]

Well it's that time of year again, time for all good Tenere riders to head out for an adventure. This years Tragic Run is a 4 day 1500km jaunt through the Victorian High Country. We will all be meeting in Mansfield Sunday 2nd March for a few welcome drinks  and then heading off into the hill on Monday 3rd.

I am being a bit of  wooz, and have the faithful old Bushpig (a 1983 XT600ZL) in the back of the ute and I am driving to Mansfield. I am using the excuss of dropping a frame off for repair with GMC and picking up another Tenere in Melbourne while in Vic, but truth be known my body (knees mainly) can't handle the long boring ride on the tar over to the event and back home. Even driving long distances isn't fun, and I called it quites after 700km of driving today and I am holed up in a motel in Kerang giving my knees a rest.

If you want to have a look at where I am / have been, I will be riding with my Spot GPS Track as usual, and the link for it is below;

http://share.findmespot.com/shared/faces/viewspots.jsp?glId=0NgyadvjqqHlhihJKvsqcegO9qobPiQ7i

For those who haven’t used this type of mapping site, the best view is the “HYBRID” map, which shows roads and localities overlaid onto a satellite photo image. You will also need to zoom the map out a bit as it doesn’t show much on the real close zoom that it initially loads.


I will try and up load some pictures as I go, but post ride socialising my limit this.

CJ

[Tim754]

Not sure which way you are headed from Kerang ColJ but if you pass through Goornong on Sunday call in at my work at 55 Englishs Rd, (it looks like a refuse transfer station cos it is ) Tim754

[Rookie#1]

Looking forward to reading and seeing your journey again mate, I would have loved to have been there but timing and finance just didn't align. My poor Tenere is sitting dormant this weekend in silent protest for not taking her on the holiday we've been talking about! if she's over her disappointment and talking to me again by the same time next year I'll be treating her to a Tragics trip for sure!!

Cheers, Brendan

[curly001]

Enjoy Col hope you have a good ride and stay away from the shoulders.

[Colin Jay]

Made it to Mansfield by 10:30 in the morning and found a few other early arrivals in the car park of the resort where we were staying tonight and having the welcome dinner. After  bit of catchng up, I headed down to Stone Lea Estate, the resort were the farwell dinner and presentations will be held to drop off the ute.

Unloaded the bike and after  lot of kicking to no effect, check the fuel and remembered that I was going to fill her up, but had forgotten, DOH! There was a little bit of fuel in the tank, so onto reserve and away we went, for all of 8.3km until I ran out of fuel in sight if the town of Alexandria, Double DOH! Luckily, 1983 Tenere tanks trap a little bit of fuel in the RH side of the tank that won't cross over to the fuel tap on the LH side. So after laying the bike on its side I had enough fuel to get me into town to a servo. From there it was a plesant 60 odd km back to Mansfield to catch up with the rest of the tragics as they rolled in.



As with all these type of events there is the pre ride dinner / meet and greet.



As you would expect when you get 70 odd bike riders in  a bar it didn't take long for the staff to have to start restocking the fridges.

We have the route sheets for tomorrow, and it looks like being a fun if some what dust ride.

CJ

[Colin Jay]

Day one and most of us were on the road by 7am with the first leg of the days ride being a 40km run o the tar up to the top of Mount Buller. A bit disappointing that they wouldn't let us go the last few hundred meters up to the sumit, but the view from the top car park was worth it.



The ride down the mountain was a bit scarier that the ride up and I had to keep reminding myself that I was riding a heavily loaded dirt bike on full knobby tires as my entry speed in to some of the many hairpin bends slowly increased.

Once we got to the bottom of the mountain, it was off in to the forests for the start of the dirt roads. We would spend the rest of the day riding a mixture of forestly logging roads and bitumen back roads.





As we were riding through Ned Kelly country, it was obvious that we would stop in at a few of the historic / tourist sites, such as Stringy Bark Creek the site where Ned "murdered" the three police officers which lead to him being outlawed.



We made it to Whitfield in time for a relaxing lunch stop;



Of course, not being a BMW rider, it would have been wrong to order a latte and a baguettte for lunch, so I chose the real man option;



Yes, that is quieche on the plate, because Tenere riders are real men and are allowed to eat it.

The afternoon passed quickly with more great roads, although I probably did an extra 20km through missing turn while taking in the scenery instead of paying attention to the route sheet,,  but some  of the extra km provided some even better scenery.



I ended up rolling into Bright just after 3:30pm having put 360km under my wheels for the day.

CJ

[yzhilly]

That looks like good fun ,cant wait to get my Xr600 set up and go for a few trips .

[the stig]

      That is as close as you can get to the perfect ride in the
       High Country great scenery to see keep us posted with
       plenty of photos  and enjoy...
       The Stig

[Colin Jay]

The route for day 2 of  the ride was scheduled to be 387km, but a section of trail had to be cut out of the route as fire crews were backburning in the area the organisers didn't want to cause any problems with them.

Anyway we were on the road just after 7am for a run on the tar from Bright up to Falls Creek. On the way the group of us riding 1983 ZL's had to stop of for a photo shoot for one of the adventure bike magazines.



The road up to Falls Creek was about as good at it gets for twist mountin roads. After a short break at Fall Creek, we carried on across the Bogong High Plains on a narrow bitumen road that was just made for big trail bikes like the tenere, 35km of tight and twist going where 60kph felt real fast.





 Eventually we dropped down into Omeo for a fuel and refreshment stop, before heading out onto some forestry roads through the Apline National Park.





A restoration project spotted on the road to Buchan

 We were then back onto the tar to bypass the area where the fire fighters were backburning and had a short refreshment stop at the Caves Hotel in Buchan.



From Buchan, it was back into the forests for 40 odd km of brilliant riding on some twisty foresty tracks before hiting the tar for the final 15km into Orbost.

All in all, todays ride was one of the best days riding in a long while.

CJ

[Colin Jay]

Another great day of riding. Todays route took us back up to Omeo via a different route to yesterday, with another good variety of dirt and twisty bitumen roads.



From Omeo it was up the Great Alpine Rd to Mount Hotham. There had been a bit of rain around and to go with the damp roads the cloud cover was so low that the visibility was quite poor as we approached the top of the mountian. For quite a while on the way up the mountain I could not work out why the bike was not pulling really well. Even though the actual gradient was not that steep, the bike was struggling to pull 4th gear and 5th gear was a total waste of time.





From Hotham the route took us across the Dargo High Plains and down to the township of Dargo for an early lunch.





 It was not until we were having a debrief over a few lunchtime beers at the Dargo Hotel that the topic came around to the affect of high altitude on those of us on old bikes with carbies, as all the new Tenere's are fuel injected and had no problems with the altitude. As it is the first time that I have ridden at higher altitudes it was a new experience for me.

The final leg of the day route was supposed to be straight down the bitumen to Sale for the overnight stop, but chatting with one of the local Victorian Tragics, lead to myself and a couple of others taking an alternate route down Freestone Creek Rd, which is a twisty dirt/gravel road well known to local dirt riders.





This road was the highlight of the day for me, and I am glad I strayed from the recommended route. Overall, it was another 400km of fantstic riding which will sadly come to an end tomorrow.

CJ

[vandy010]

Top stuff Col...
Stories like these are a great reminder as to how much fun there is to be had with a trusty old dirt bike

[EML]

Good turn out and on some bloody fantastic looking roads and trails too.
Well done Col.
Any pics of XTZ 750s for me