The Lime Grove

Well we went for our first long ride yesterday, I have to say ‘long’ cause hubby saw me say just ‘our first ride’ in the forum post and started looking wounded, yeah we’ve ridden together before, he got his bike out Monday night and came to ride with me home from work. I had to get petrol and smokes so I shouted him a tank of petrol too ... ahh true love is buying your baby petrol ...

So we went to the Lime Grove for lunch, I’ve been wanting to do that ride for a while. Here’s the map....

Yep I’m sure you noticed we took the long way home. I’ll explain that later. We headed off to Narromine along the Burroway Road, it’s a nice back road cause I still hate riding on the highways, too much traffic. So just after we hit the Burroway Road I notice something coming up behind me. After a minute or two it dawned on me that it was a huge trike, I dunno Harley probably, with a bloke riding and a chick pillion right up the back, she looked like she was having a bit of a rest on her sofa, comfy!! They overtook and gave us a wave. So we kept going along this lovely country road til Terry stopped, thinking we would take some pics. Thing is where he stopped happened to be right next to a paddock where there was some serious crop dusting happening. No we didn’t get dusted but it was amazing watching that guy doing his thing, looked like he was almost touching the tops of the crops ... incredible. But I was stopped on the bitumen so I had to move on before I got collected by some idiot flying along that road. So I went ahead and took some pics of Terry riding towards me (I really like the idea of that kinda pic). I got one that I love and a lot that look good but just not quite up to my exacting standards.:D

The pic I love.

I just like the perspective of this one.

Anyways I’m sure I’ll get better at these as time goes on.

He made me stop again later and tried to take some of me riding towards him. Thing is two bloody cars decided that was the time they would come roaring up behind me. There hadn’t been a car to be seen before that.

 

He did manage to get this one that I quite like, tho I’ve photo shopped the hell outta it.

Waiting for the bloke with the camera to get orf the road.

 Then there was this one.....

So after these brief interludes we went on our merry way. We turned onto the Narromine-Eumongerie Rail Road, I was a bit worried bout what the state of this road would be but it was actually not bad at all, almost a minor highway. There were bits that sucked cause they in their infinite wisdom cut big chunks outta the road every now and then and put new bits in, this is their way of fixing them, they create bumps in the road that are another one of those things that send me flying off my seat. The other thing that I noticed when we got onto this more open road was the wind. It hadn’t seemed that bad when we were on the country road, I guess the trees shielded us, but now we were amongst the fields and paddocks, there was a good cross wind. It was gusty so I didn’t notice it at first, then the first gust hit me, it was stronger than I’ve felt before and took me by surprise. I looked at the trees around me and they weren’t moving, it was kinda bizarre cause I couldn’t work out what it was, there didn’t even seem to be a breeze but then I saw little tufts of grass blowing along the road in fits and spurts and realised I was being hit by gusts of wind. Think I would prefer a nice steady wind even if it is strong, ya got no warning when a gust is going to get you and just have to correct as you go. There were a couple of times it caused me to veer across my lane, kinda scary. 

There were some nice gentle curves on this road, and on the way home there was one that just went on forever, I was practising doing it right on this one and feeling pretty proud of myself when one of those gusts of wind hit me .. bugger swerving in the middle of a corner isn’t nice, I slowed and corrected, I wasn’t in danger but it ruined that lovely feeling I had.

Well we got to the crossroad where we had to turn off to go to either Narromine or along the Trangie Road to get to The Lime Grove, as I was slowing down I got a cramp in my leg and there was room before the corner to pull over to stand and ease it. As I stood there I noticed the sign that said ‘Warren’, hubby had turned right onto this road, I didn’t worry tho cause I knew that he knew where he was going, so I turned right and caught up to him where he’d stopped to wait for me. We headed on our merry way, me following faithfully behind my wonderful husband .. my wonderful lost husband .. as I realised when he turned into the gravel feeder road and did a turn to go the other way. I swear he did it just so I would have to ride and turn on gravel ... I don’t like gravel, it moves. 

OK so we headed in the right direction and found The Lime Grove, another gravel road, tho not really gravel just kinda packed dirt, this one was not too bad, I still get nervous doing tight right turns so parking was interesting on dirt. Did it tho see....

 

 

As we were coming along the driveway a little puppy dog noticed us and came running out to greet us. Terry made a friend ....

Shield your eyes puppy, all that chrome will blind ya!!

 

There are chooks there somewhere.

We went in and had lunch, Suzie who owns The Lime Grove is an interesting person, she’s bucked the odds I think to make her passion a reality. Food is good there, but I don’t go much on the tin shed she uses as a cafe, the views are nice, and there’s a chook shed. I didn’t get a great pic of it cause the man came in a truck with food and they all buggered off behind it .... It’s a chook palace, but they need it cause they’re huge chooks, they were as big as the geese!!

So we stayed a while, had a couple of good coffees then headed home ... where Terry missed a turn and took me around that bloody gravel feeder road again. When we were finally headed in the right direction again I was just enjoying the ride, nice gentle curves, fighting the gusts of wind, just learning really. We got new things that we were both trying out too, they’re called, oh lots of names but Cramp Buster is the one I remember. They slide onto your throttle and provide a little resting place for the heel of your hand for when you’re just cruising at a steady speed. I liked mine and had no trouble with it, hubby took a bit to get used to it, but I think he still likes the concept.

So after missing another turn we stopped and consulted, I said lets just go on to Gilgandra which I had seen signs for along this road, and come home along the highway. I’ll take any opportunity to ride more. We finally came out on the Newell Highway and turned towards home, didn’t make it to Gil, it only added an extra 10km’s onto the trip. Along the highway we came up behind a tractor towing a hay baler ... crawling .. unregistered .. with hay bale attached. Terry was right up behind him waiting for an opportunity to overtake and I was glad it wasn’t me, there was hay flying everywhere. I got to overtake for the first time on the baby and t’was easy, mind you the tractor was crawling :D I had a semi, not sure if it was a b-double or not, on my arse and thought he would try to over take us, but he just sat back behind us and took it easy, we weren’t far from Dubbo and so he probably wasn’t stressed, we were doing the speed limit though so no real reason for him to overtake, they normally do anyway.

 

We were just on the outskirts of town when Terry pulled over and said “Let’s try another shot of you”. So we did .. still not great there was a fence next to the road and more traffic around us, but we did get this one shot that’s not too bad before we finally went home.

Was a great day and I can't wait til we do it again. And I love my bike, and Terry’s too.