Taroom — Banana — Taroom
25 April 2016
Master Map
On 28 July 1914 Gavrilo Princip took out Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and the minor squabble now known as World War 1 got under way. Just under a year later, on 25 April 1915, Australian and New Zealand troops joined with other allied forces in a landing at Gallipoli designed to lead to the capture of Constantinople. The Turks had other ideas and held the allies at bay until they were evacuated at the end of 1915. There were horrendous casualties on both sides.
Anzac Day is marked in Australia and New Zealand each year on 25 April. According to the Australian War Memorial, it commemorates those Australians and New Zealanders "who served and died in all wars, conflicts, and peacekeeping operations" and "the contribution and suffering of all those who have served." Anzac Day is also marked in the Cook Islands, Niue, Pitcairn Islands, and Tonga.
As part of the Rumblers Anzac ride, the crew attend the traditional dawn service which is the time the attack began at Gallipoli. They then join the town’s folk for breakfast and then, I suspect, some engage in the time-honoured Australian tradition of drinking themselves senseless for the rest of the day and playing two-up. The Rumblers also attend a commemorative march and service held later in the morning.
Two-up is an Australian game on which punters gamble. In the way of all punters, generally they lose. A spinner holds two coins (one displaying heads, the other tails) on a piece of wood and gives a dexterous twist of his or her wrist thereby launching the coins in the air. Players bet on whether the coins will come down ‘heads’ — both heads showing; ‘tails’ — both tails showing; or ‘odds’ — one head, one tail. Although it pre-dates Anzac Day, it said that two-up was played extensively during WW1.
The day began around 4.30 am with a Goldwing-riding Rumbler cranking up his stereo with some ghastly song (the name of which I should remember, but mercifully can’t) and riding around the camp to make sure we were all awake. We soon were, and headed off to attend the dawn service. It struck me as mildly unfortunate that the celebrant was the Rev. Graham Slaughter! We then took tea and toast with the locals at the town hall.
Pterodactyl and I decided to forgo the later morning march as he was keen to take a side trip up the road a bit (153 kms) to Banana where his step father was raised and educated. Banana it seems was named for an ancient bull and not for the fruit. Go figure.
We had agreed to participate in a barefoot bowling competition in the afternoon so had to be back in Taroom by 2.30 pm.
Anzac Day moon after the dawn service
Rumbler rides in the early morning after the dawn service
This Australian road train was parked next to the camp site in Taroom. It's equipped with 46 retreads just waiting to part company from their host tyre to skittle a hapless biker
Amongst the seemingly endless straights, there was some quite attractive hill country on the way to Banana, particularly around Isla. There was also an excellent set of corners just on the Banana side of Theodore. Well, to be honest, they weren’t world-leading corners, but they were very strongly marked and a lot of fun, mostly, I suppose, because a run of quite sharp corners in that part of the world is almost unthinkable.
I was standing over the road at the Banana service station when I took this. Other than the odd house and a school, there’s not much there
Our trip to Banana was uneventful and I spent a good deal of it continuing to fiddle with a Go Cruise throttle lock I’d bought for the trip.
Go Cruise in action
While it’s a very handy contraption allowing some right wrist respite, using it filled me with admiration for the people who invented and perfected the electronic cruise control with its ability to maintain a nearly constant speed. It also made me reflect again on what extraordinary things the human mind and body are capable of. Riding at a constant speed requires incredibly frequent minor adjustments to the throttle which a human seems capable of making almost effortlessly and unconsciously. The throttle lock requires endless fiddling with and is susceptible to changes in gradient, seating position and wind pressure. I confess I find it hard to set the first time due to mild arthritis in my forefinger, but I’ll continue to use it on long trips.
On the way back from Banana I was hurtling along a road that looked something like this picture and watching Pterodactyl vanish into the distance ahead.
Without warning, the bike died and the oil light came on. I rolled to a halt at the side of the road, a cold sweat breaking out all over my body. Indeed, I was so stunned as not to be able even to swear. Here I was, if not in the middle of nowhere, pretty close to it, with a broken CB1100. Resigned, I started to get off the bike to see whether there was a puddle of oil or some other indication of damage.
For some reason, as I dismounted, I looked at my right hand. The light bulb came on. Thinking to save my arthritic finger, I’d leaned over to apply the throttle lock with my left hand, and …
Wait for it …
Drum roll …
… hit the bloody kill switch!!
Soon I was on my way again and trying to catch up with Pterodactyl.
Not long after leaving Banana, we turned off to look at the Dawson mine near a place called Moura. It’s a huge open-cut coal mine and has also had underground operations in the past. It was the scene of underground explosions killing 12 miners in 1986 and 11 in 1994. I think I’m right saying that all underground mining ceased there after 1994. We climbed the viewing platform and admired the view of the man-made mountains. I was to see plenty of those in coming days.
After negotiating the marvellous bends outside Theodore a couple of times so Pterodactyl could shoot some footage for one of his epic movies, we progressed back into the hill country, stopping to admire the view at the Isla lookout. We had to negotiate bit of gravel with a couple of very dry slippery bits, but it was worth it.
The Isla lookout and the surrounding roads provide a pleasant break from the miles of relatively flat and straight road
We were a bit late back to Taroom where the locals had organised a barefoot bowling afternoon with the Rumblers. We arrived at the bowling green in time not to be selected for any of the teams. Luckily we were still entitled to access the bar, so we spent a pleasant afternoon sipping an ale or two and watching and chatting with the bowlers. The bowling and subsequent auction of bits and pieces of Rumblers merchandise raised some $3,000 for the local palliative care facility, a contribution well received by the locals.
The bowlers
Australian rural tradition has regular lucky door prizes and raffles in pubs and clubs. The prize is often a meat tray. I wish I could report that they are nearly always won by vegans, but it would not be true. I can, though, report that a Rumbler won a meat tray which was to provide a substantial contribution to the next morning’s breakfast for those who like to ingest their breakfast protein that way.
Slabs of locally produced meat are awarded as prizes Down Under
Food, a glass or two of vin ordinaire and it was bedtime. The first day of riding with the Rumblers lay ahead.
