The story of a limb wrist, high side, jelly knee and everything in between

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Ou Ryperd

Race Dog
Joined
Jan 24, 2006
Messages
3,728
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Location
Pretoria
Bike
KTM 890 Adventure R
Eventually the date was 14 March 09, the date for our late morning tea at Dullstroom.  With all the rain we recently had, time was scarce to ride, let alone doing a longer ride. But come rain or shine, this one will happen.

It was a cloudy Saturday morning when I woke, and remembering the weather report Friday night, I packed the rainsuit - one never knows...

Onto the barricaded N1 towards the meeting point. When I arrived, I was greeted by about 6 others. Whilst catching up on the Super 14, the politics, etc 6 more bikes joined us, two with pillions (thanks Jaghond for inviting your friends!) All set, but due to larger than anticipated group a detour was planned to make up time and off we went through Mamelodi onto the back roads to our destination.

Our 1st stretch of dirt almost claimed our first victim. Sorry for not remembering their names, but X (lack of better name) and Y (the pillion) had a BIG scare when they hit some sand. I was not there, but our esteemed sweeper - Plottie - said it was well rescued by landing gear that was deployed just in time. The true gentleman he is, Plottie offered to take Y as his pillion, leaving X to wrestle alone through the sand. Now, I cannot say why, but Y apparently "jumped" on the back of Plottie's KTM, holding on and ready to race.

But X said: "No way. We're turning back. We'll meet you in Dullstroom." This made me wonder. Did X recognized Plottie from 2Wheels as the power slide king and realized that his beloved Y might get some damage, or was it her willingness to jump onto a stranger's bike that made him say "No"....

We encountered a large yellow sign claiming that the road was under construction, and no one can enter except the residents... yeah right, as if a sign will keep us out. What a fantastic piece of road!!! They are preparing to tar it, so the dirt surface was smmmmooooothe as ........... (insert own word here).

Not to soon did we reach Loskop for fuel, biltong and some black tea for the rest. The dam is still overflowing, what a spectacular sight!

At the left turn at the Blinkwater garage near Stofberg, Plottie being fast asleep from playing sweeper, did not gear down, pull the clutch, etc resulting in the bike stalling when he took the corner, end result - Plottie has a jelly knee, less 1x indicator, 1x highway foot peg and scratched crash bar.  This brings us to the limp wrist - do you remember the Heidelberg Enduro? Yeah, the one where Plottie went mountain climbing with his 300cc on his back! Well, seems like he broke something in his wrist, but being a maplotter, he refuses to go to a docter! After he picked himself up from the tar, we continioued to Dullstroom for a well deserved lunch at the Duck & Trout (I think).

With the ominous building up of thunder clouds we mounted our bikes, ready for the leg home via dirt. What piece of heaven!!  We joined the N4 at Arnot power station with the clouds looking angry. A quick coffee stop at the Shell Ultra City, on with the rain suits and off we went. A day well spent.

Thanks to everyone that joined in to make this a great ride. Thanks Fun for keeping me company in front, Zerc for the BIG camera you brought with, Frankie for keeping me nervous, Jaghond for providing us with a unplanned stop to fix your KLR and to Plottie for sweeping. Waghond, for leaving us early to wait at the airport for a car...go figure... and everyone in between that I did not mention.

Till we ride again!

H
 
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