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Bremer Bay
Report by Darin & Pounce.
For a couple of years GasGasLex from Albany has been asking the boys to come down south for a ride. A bit of negotiation, a date was set, so it was on. 5 of the "townies" made the trip down. Pounce, Tommy, Micky450, Darin & his family and KLXPete & his family. Friday. A nice leisurely 5+ hour drive & we arrive around lunchtime at the caravan park to find Lex and Railway Bob (toot toot) booted up and ready to go. Once we get settled in, cook some snags & get sorted Lex leads us out on a short recon run to find out if the beach west is accesable for tomorrow.  Now if we had the big wheel bus thing from Lancelin it might have been. Down a bit of a trail & we hit the beach & striaght away it's deep boggy sand city. No worries. We ride along it a bit have a looks at some small dunes, then it's decided it's a bit too hard so we head back towards towards the caravan park. Back on the main road and Bob pulls up on the Husky without a clutch and a leaky fork seal. Seems the hydraulic clutch has had a spat & isn't working. While Bob goes back to the park for what we thought was a repair jobby, Lex decides to take us down to the inlet & across the other side for a look at some other tracks. We've seemd to have lost Pete aswell at the caravan park. A nice fast run up along Bremer Beach which had some nice natural jumps in it but some decieving soft bits that slowed the bikes when you hit them, we turn of into some trails. Pete eventually catches up with us then its a mixture of sandy loam & tree roots, these bits were fun, especially for Pete & Mick that were side by side on one of the windiest 4WD track we've ever been down. Seriously, left, right, left, right, all over the place. Not a straight line on the trail anywhere.  End up back on the beach which this time is pretty hard packed. A quick scoot along that then we turn inland again. Lex has taken the wrong exit so we turn around and find Mick trying to pull half a fishing net out of his back wheel. It jammed it solid and chucked him of. He though we'ld come back to help him but it was just luck. Back into the winding bits, Tommys legs are all over the place in the sandy bits with Mick taking the piss out of him. We head over to the first dunes of the trip, these are baby ones so we have a play on them. It was a good introduction into what's to come tomorrow.    Time to head back, I see a long puddle, Pete more or less pushes me through first then he & Mick follow. Good, long & not deep, a false omen for tomorrows ride. A couple more tracks then back onto the beach for the run home. We get back just in time to welcome Darren & his family. A good afternoons ride of about 70klm's. We decide to head to the local pub for dinner while the Southern crew stay put at the park. A good feed by all standards but the service was a bit slow. The kids were starving. I'm sure Darrens boy was gnawing the table leg he was that hungry. A few drinks & giggles later Darrens wife puts her hand up to cook us all breaky. (Didn't happen, she was hung over.) Back at the park we sit around the fire talking bollocks. If you ever get hurt & end up at Albany Hospital never go to the Emergency Dept in a wetsuit! Dirtbike chick has a pair of blunt scissors she's not afriad to use & you'll be nude in no time.  Saturday. Get up earlyish, & Lex must have slept in his riding gear as he's walking around at 7.30 all dressed & ready to go. "Why get dressed twice" he says... can't argue with that logic. We headed out on a tar section, it was drizzling and cold, by the time we hit the first track, we were almost frozen solid. At the first stop we all hopped of our bikes in unison to look at our front wheels, there had to be something wrong but no, it was just a lack of blood flow around the brain from the cold. We were lead onto a fencline run which was all good & fast until we came to a puddle (now in Bremer terms a puddle can be at least 75 meters long and at least half a meter deep) we arrived at this puddle only to see Lex exiting the other side with the exhaust of his Gas Gas burbling under water, like an out board motor. The general consensus amongst us "Soft Townies" was that we did not want to get our boots wet, so we were very happy to find an alternate route, only to arrive at a similar puddle not to far down the track, this time with no alternate route. Darren went in second after Lex and showed the boys where not to go. He had the DRZ at full noise, and the legs going like Fred Flintstone under the water. Darren was gently riding along thinking shit my boots are full of water when Tommy passed him through a small puddle, filling everything else he was wearing with ice cold water. It was at this moment that he realised that the saying "what goes around comes around is true. Ahead of him, Tommy taking it easy through a deep puddle. He hit the puddle at four times the speed he should have, but the result was a perfect payback, Tommy was head to toe in mud & water. There were a few more oceans, I mean puddles along the route until we came to the bike drowner.  Everyone had a battle getting through this one. Not only was it deep but the bottom sucked you down & your spokes filled up with weeds. Pounce ended up sitting on the bike pushing it through the whole way. His sexy new Tech 8's aren't that waterproof. Mich was last to attack it & unfortunatley his KTM swallowed a belly full of water. I think we spent an hour trying to revive the girl but alas we had to call in Lex's son Aaron with the 4WD to give him a lift back to the caravan park. It was a sad ending to Micks ride as he couldn't get it started again.   We head of to find the rest of the crew who had headed on down to the beach. Now this track is one of the best any of us have ever ridden. It's only about 7klm's long but it had everything from nice sandy bermed corners, up hill, down hill bits, fast bits where you got air, the lot. We get down to the beach, can't see anyone so we take of following the tracks the others had left until we reach... ...The Dunes Huge, breathtaking, awesome, beautiful they defy description. We finally catch up with the others & Lex takes us on a tour of the beasts. He warned us before hand not to go screaming up the dunes without knowing what's on the other side. Razorback dune doesn't give justice to the name. Your're up a 45 degree face, get to the top that's maybe a metre wide with a straight drop to the bottom on the other. We ride all over the place until we get to a huge bowl. All the boys have a ball, look at the pics & you'll sort of see what I mean.      Time for lunch & a refuel so we head back down to the meeting point on the beach. The others are there waiting for us with 2 of the 4WD's bogged. Pete's & Darrens wives sort of got stuck. The boys head straight to the cars, let a bit of air out of the tyres & free them with ease. Thanks to the girls for bring lunch down. Best. Salad roll. Eva.  Now I don't know if it's because the Albany crew are from Albany, but for some reason it was "Ladies Day"? Lex & Darrel had to don dresses for some reason & get their pics taken doing laps of the beach. Must be a southern thing.   It was getting late, the Perth boys were "duned out" so we decide to head back, see if Micks got the girl going & head over to another spot. Back onto that great track. Darren's leading on the big XR650 & I'm doing well to keep up with him until Pete comes blasting past me & they both dissapear into the distance. We regroup, decide not to wait for the cars & have a bit of a road ride back to Bremer. Back at base, Micks having a beer so Pounce decides to join him while Tommy, Pete and Darren decided to refuel & set off to re-ride the tracks from the previous day. Darren had a brief encounter with a roo, travelling in the same direction as he was when they bumped shoulders and headed off in opposite directions, with both of them thinking what is that bloody idiot doing"? Pete said he's impressed with Darrens riding ability as a couple of times on the winding bit he put the pressure on & was suprised when Daren took him on. We were heading back when we met up with Lex and a few guys, they invited us to join them. They went near that long puddle from yesterday but Tommy said "sod that, I had enough water this morning" & the call of a hot shower and a cold beer was too much for Tommy and Darren, so they headed back. Pete being the dedicated rider that he is accepted & dissapeared with the others. The group arrived back just on dusk all full of smiles, so it was shower time, down to the pub for dinner again (buy a counter meal & it comes straight away) a couple of beers then back to camp. Up early for the drive back to Perth with Darren staying with the family for an extra day & Pete & Gaye heading of later (after Pete had another ride I'm sure)  In hindsight it was probably good that we didn't get the numbers originally coming as some of the sandy bits were hard enough with 5-8 bikes riding through them, let alone 30. A big thank you again to our southern cousins for a hospitable weekend, some good stories & laffs & some new & different types of riding terrain. A small shout out to the guys we couldn't mention. It was great to see you out there enjoying the sport with your families, there should be more of it. |
