Jim and Les were on the road early, they were heading for the Pinnacles then Perth to see some family. We are constantly saying G’day and Hooroo
I was not in a big hurry, I intended getting to Geraldton, checking emails and pm’s from VSRI forum to see if there was any Perth riders interested in a ride this long weekend. A decision would be made after that as to which way to head, south or west.
An interesting bit of scenery to start with, it made up for the cold easterly I had to deal with again.
The information centre in Geraldton had an internet access, expensive but at $3 for 15mins, it was in an old hospital building.
There had been no response from any West Aussies about this coming long weekend, so I decided to head down and do the pinnacles as well, then cut around Perth and head out to Kalgoorlie and also look at Wave Rock. But first off I had a look at the HMAS Sydney memorial up on hill and it had some nice views as well.
And this is a statue of the ‘Waiting Woman’ waiting for her hubby to return 
Then I headed south for Cervantes which is the turnoff to the Pinnacles Desert Park.
I saw these trees on the highway, you cannot tell me the prevailing wind is not from the west!!! Although if you look closely you can see the grass bending towards the west as the easterly was in full force, not enough to straighten the trees though eh! 🙂
I had to fuel up in Dongara and also grabbed some lunch and a nice apple slice, a great little bakery this one.
Then down near Jurien Bay I saw this effigy on the side of the road, I have no idea what it is all about, but it says Mr Gum Tree Man and his missus.
At the turn off to Nambung National Park I bumped into Jim and Les again, as sort of expected as I was always travelling faster than them, Les took my photo for me 🙂
The Pinnacles are a series of limestone columns set amongst a sandy desert, for no known reason as far as I know. Here are a series of pictures, the sandy track is quite hard and kind to street bikes.
Apparently this desert is called the Dick Desert by the locals, I have no idea why LOL 🙂
Then after a 3km loop it was on and out, how many pictures of rocks do I need 🙂 This is where I said Hooroo to Jim & Les again and spotted this Goanna just up the road, it stayed absolutely still while I took a few shots. The only other one of these I had seen was up near Broome. After taking a few photos I moved the bike a bit and he turned tail and shot off into the bush and off the road, so he should survive another day.
Then further up the road were some nice looking sand dunes with flowering shrubs growing on them.
It was around about this time I paid the price for having my visor up, I got hit by a bee and he must have landed arse first on my cheek, just under the eye, below my sunnies! Shit that hurt, I managed to scrape away the sting, I actually saw it on my glove and hoped it would pass quickly. On the main highway going south and there is a wind farm at Emu Downs, they have 48 turbines and power 50,000 homes.
Then I was off the highway and onto secondary back roads, this was lovely country, lots of twisties and up and down hills and dales. Even some of K1W1s girlfriends were there and lots of them 🙂
The meadows were covered in purple wild flowers and made the scenery fun. It was still windy and cool though.
From then on it was just change roads and try and bypass all the highways leading to Perth and try and get as far as I could today towards either Kalgoorlie or Hyden, my probable destination would be Merredin as this was the point I needed to make a direction decision. As it was it was getting chillier as the sun went down I needed to find a motel, I wanted a quiet evening indoors out of the cold wind. My face had swollen a bit from the bee sting but seemed to be stable. It was looking very doubtful I would find a motel in any of these small towns until I came to Cunderdin, they had a caravan park but it was nearly dark and cold, then I spotted the Ettamogha Pub and when I asked they said yes, they had units out back so I grabbed one.
It was just like the one up in Queensland on the Bruce Highway, but this one was dead as far as patrons go. I chatted with one of the locals while having a beer and some chicken nuggets and chips, he reckons the manager has stuffed the trade; it would not take much to make it better, especially with tourists around. This type of pub was built from the style of the pub in some classic cartoons that were in magazines in the 70s, they had some copies on the wall.
Anyway, I had a quiet night just relaxing and reading with the reverse cycle aircon on in my room as it had been a long day and tiring day fighting the wind 🙂
Day – 670km
Trip – 11,728km
TravellingStrom 