by Paul Carter
I smoked the rear tyre on the brake drifting sideways then flung the bike into the turn-off, Diego slamming on his brakes as he passed. It was a total split-second spur-of-the-moment thing; I was too far gone to stop, totally caught up in the setting, completely alone. All I could hear was the Harley’s roar as I stood up on the pegs and started rocking the bike on its springs; my rear wheel spun towards the apex of a silky smooth crest, straight over the top of Julie Andrews, the chase music now playing full pelt in my lid. I glanced over my shoulder at the imaginary German riders closing fast, the one on my right now racking the charging handle on his MP-40 machine gun looking to draw a bead over the front of his sidecar. The crest approached, I was now fully convinced the universe would provide a perfectly made, rubber, 10-foot high barbed wire fence propped up with genuine imitation rubber tree posts for me to jump over.
But, no, instead there was an angry farmer who looked like he was in the middle of gender reassignment surgery sitting on his tractor yelling at me to get the fuck off his property. I returned to the road where Diego was parked with a knowing look on his face. ‘Okay, you have eet out of your seestem now?’ he asked.
‘When I get home I’m going to get a 650 Twin Metisse Desert Sled.’
He grinned at me then roared off towards Southport. By five in the afternoon it was starting to get cold, my mind had wandered back to food, and that was all I could think about until we got to the end of the road in Southport where there was absolutely nothing to eat. We turned around and bolted back towards Hobart’s colonial sandstone smorgasbord of fine-dining choices and our warm well-appointed hotel, where hot showers and tomorrow’s Salamanca Market awaited us.
DEFECATION
MACHINE
WE ROSE EARLY to another sunny Hobart morning, went out into the market as vendors were setting up their stalls, ate a massive breakfast, drank too much coffee and wandered about like an old jittery married couple for an hour. Then we snapped out of it and rode off north this time.
From the city we took the Brooker Highway through the suburbs and on to what I thought was going to be another circular lap to the right, past Sorell and down to Port Arthur, then back to Hobart. But our day of riding was cut short when Diego turned off the highway and steered us into the car park of Mona, the Museum of Old and New Art. It was just mild curiosity that drew Diego there, but within the first hour in Mona I knew we would be spending most of the day in this remarkable place.
We had no idea what to expect from the museum so the entrance alone was enough to captivate our curiosity. The beginning of the journey started with a nice modern building where we were greeted at the door, then handed an ‘O’ device which was just like an iPhone with white earphones. This was our guide through the gallery. Then we descended into an ink-black bizarrely deep and expansive labyrinth of huge halls cut into the stone. It wasn’t laid out like any other museum I’ve set foot in. Like a cross between a Bond villain’s lair and a really trendy nuclear bunker full of iconic tributes to modern design that melts into the art that in turn reveals itself in a quiet private way. The place was full of people wandering about in silence with earphone cables dangling through the darkness, like zombies that just found the back door to Steve Jobs’ basement. But because it was so dark and quiet it felt like they weren’t there, just the overwhelming sensation of vast space within the blackness. It was slightly foreboding but strangely it felt safe and peaceful down there. A fascinating exploration through an impressive collection.
Well, I was impressed and feeling at peace right up to the point where art imitates life in a bad way, in the form of a piece located within a separate room that was attached to a huge open gallery. It was simply entitled ‘A Defecation Machine’. I stood in the open doorway, looking at the brief synopsis on my ‘O’ device under the heading ‘Artwank’, expecting to see a transformer dropping what looked like King Kong’s finger into a huge stainless steel potty. But, no, the first thing that hit me was the revolting smell. It was completely unexpected but those clever people at Mona have a series of high pressure air vents running all the way around the entrance that keep the smell out of the main hall. So you wander into the room all happy and bewildered only to retch the second your head clears the entrance. Dangling neatly from the roof were five manmade glass stomachs (which were labelled ‘Gastro-intestinal Machines’). I didn’t stay in there long enough to find out what happens next; suffice to say I’d absorbed enough artwank for one day.
The time passed as if through the looking glass, ending at a rather nice bar cleaved through solid stone, with single malts and cool languid echoing surrounds; it was like drinking and falling asleep in a cathedral and we emerged blinking and slightly euphoric like two middle-aged clubbers. The light was fading as we pulled away from Mona; it’s a place I will definitely return to one day.
Back at our hotel in Hobart after another top-notch meal and more whiskey, we were slightly tipsy and about to call it a night when we noticed that the nice people from the hotel had left us a complimentary bottle of wine. Following the revelation that this was indeed free to swill, we were shabby again the next morning—shabby as in a cross between shit and crappy. We paid the bill, checked out, and Diego pulled on his helmet and sat on his bike in quiet pain while I had a long think about whether or not I was going to vomit, my own alcoholic breath swirling in my helmet making me gulp for fresh air.
We retraced our steps, this time turning off towards the airport and over the first of four bridges. My head cleared as we crossed the last bridge and went south again. Sorell provided much-needed coffee and friendly locals who welcomed us into their cafe with its pressed tablecloths and faster broadband than Telstra manages in central Sydney.
The sun was out again, slowly warming my back, as Diego led us along the Arthur Highway towards two isolated peninsulas; the first, Forester, is connected to the Apple Isle by the thinnest thread of land then bulges out into the Tasman Sea, narrowing again to an equally thin thread at Eaglehawk Neck before ballooning into the Tasman Peninsula. We passed through Dunalley heading for Port Arthur but I’m not going to harp on about the disaster that befell the area in the past; instead I’ll just say that the people are what make this place special, they add to the natural beauty like the icing on a hippy’s cake, in a knit your own muesli, life is like that, now get on with it, kind of way.
The first peninsula is also special because it’s a natural ‘buffer zone’ for the Tasman Peninsula, the only area free of disease for the Tasmanian devil. For the past thirteen or so years, these remarkable and tough little creatures have been plagued with a form of cancer that is threatening to wipe out this unique species. No one knows what caused it, but let’s hope they find a cure soon. There’s a conservation park just off the highway where you can see the devils in real life, another species fighting to stay around a little longer.
After circling round through Port Arthur we cruised back the way we came to Sorell for more tea and cake then rode north, tracking up the eastern seaboard. Off to our right across the iron cold sea was another amazing green-on-blue peninsula, Freycinet National Park, with the granite peaks of the Hazards providing an imposing backdrop. We pulled up in Swansea and sat back to enjoy a late lunch of local wine and amazing fresh seafood, before ambling further up the coast, riding with no real plan or sense of urgency, watching the landscape transcend through a myriad of golden shades and tones as the sun came to rest momentarily on the horizon, flickered and disappeared into the night.
We stopped at St Helens, found a place to stay and after hot showers, hit-the-spot pub food and good banter with the locals, we fell into our rooms with no alarm clocks set and slept like logs.
Diego banged on my door early, the sun was just up. ‘Pol, eet’s time to ride, my friend.’ He thumped on the door again.
‘Okay, okay, I’m up,’ I yelled at him from under the covers.
‘I weel be waiting out the front, okay?’ To which I said nothing. ‘Fifteen minutes we go.’
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Last night over a counter meal at the bar—after I’d explained to the locals that we’re not a gay couple, but if we were I’d be the man gay because I don’t eat quiche, I eat egg-and-bacon pie, and I’m not wearing a cravat—Diego and I looked at the map and decided to ride directly across Tasmania from right to left, so that was the plan for the day: head out from St Helens straight across to Queenstown with a dip down to Melton Mowbray in the middle.
I had time for a quick shower and to get my gear on and I was out the front in fifteen, then had a few more minutes to warm up my bike while Diego did his legover and mounted his. We fuelled up and blazed our way south, criss-crossing the landscape as the sun slowly warmed the earth. As usual there was no one else on the road, and we took it in turns to lead through k after k of increasingly faster bends, cutting our way through the patchwork of lime green and banana yellow fields to hit our lefthander at the Midland Highway and start the dogleg down to Melton Mowbray.
At Oatlands we had fresh bread rolls, homemade jam, and tea made with love and brewed in a pot that was older than the town. Friendly locals stopped to chat as they entered the cafe, ringing the bell on the door. I looked out the window and on cue a boy riding an old scooter raced down the sidewalk with a stick rattling in his hand as he dragged it across the fence palings while being chased by a slightly dopey-looking labrador. We were in a 1950s midwestern American movie and I was waiting for the guy at the counter to say, ‘What’ll it be, mister?’
I’d been out of the loop for almost a week. I didn’t know what was going in the media, politics, the world. I had no idea how either of my businesses were going, I hadn’t spoken to my family for three days. Compelled by the immediacy of this sudden realisation, I spent the next hour on the phone. My wife was fine, the kids were fine, although my son had discovered spitting a few days ago and had since been mercilessly gobbing on anyone who strayed into his own personal target-rich environment. Just that morning, Clare said, he’d already gobbed on the postman, our neighbours and their dog.
Jason filled me in on business, as did Gregg. Everything was just peachy, except for my father; he was maintaining his stiff British upper lip while all along I knew that his reassurances over the phone were rubbish, I could hear it in his voice, between the breaths and smothered pain. I put my phone back into my saddlebag and sat on the kerb, trying to think of something positive to say to my father the next time we talked.
Diego came out into the sun and fired me up. ‘Come, Pol, let us ride into the mountains.’ He grinned at a random passerby, swaggered over to his bike then stopped and pointed at the road in front of him where two thick black burnt-rubber tyre marks snaked up the road courtesy of some idiotic petrol head. ‘Look, Pol, ees bogan tracks,’ Diego said, proudly showing off his command of the vernacular. Then he pushed his bike forward onto the road looking like a midget walking a rhino, humped his leg over it and rode off down the street.
Half an hour later as we wafted along, the sun disappeared like a giant light switch in the sky had just been flicked off; we both raised our lids skyward to see dark brooding clouds collide.The temperature slowly dropped as we started to climb higher above sea level towards the formidable Cradle Mountain. Into the depths of Tasmania’s wilderness it became clear that it was getting much colder. We pulled over just as the blacktop ran out, giving way to a wide dirt road, to pull on more layers. I unfurled my hand from the bars and realised my fingers were snap-frozen. Diego was excited, but of course he had a heated seat and grips, Günter gently massaging his bottom over the rough unsealed road that was about to shake my kidneys loose and make my bowel feel like I just had a 5-pound concrete enema.
Riding a remote dirt road at speed for the first time is always a bit hectic, but this one turned out to be a joy. Initially the corrugations were a b-b-b-b-b-it jittery so I stopped to let some air out of the Harley’s giant tyres and then ride faster, fast enough to plane over the top, epic fun. Rooster tails flung dirt into the sky as we throttled on, round hugely long sweeping corners, so long that I was accelerating the rear slide on full lock until I thought the circle must be complete, but then another one started. We slid and roared into an ancient forest, shattering the silence and tearing up the dust. My bike stayed as slick and slippery as Diego in a dinner jacket and I was having a ball. We were still climbing as the woods became thick with heatless layers of light, mist and cloud evolving above the treeline, then descending past us into the folds of the valleys, filling up like a Spielberg effect below me.
We rounded another climbing lefthander side by side, then on the apex of the bend we heard it first, a residual rumble over the top of our engines, bouncing and reverberating off the forest at us. Then—fucking hell—two massive lumber trucks, also running side by side, rounded the corner straight at us. With only seconds to react we just fluked it and made the right choices. Diego and I came together in the middle and the two trucks separated and ran the outside. Everyone entered the massive dust cloud together. The trucks made a hole, Diego and I touched elbows, gritted teeth and disappeared into it. As soon as we passed the trucks and were out the other side, we both stopped and sat there for a few moments, completely blind in a red cloud until the dust started to settle and we could actually see one another. I was about to say something but Diego just gave a mumbled shout from inside his helmet and bolted off, leaving me in another cloud. I love that crazy bastard.
PAVEMENT
FEELERS
I FOUND DIEGO by the side of the road making a snowman. We had turned off the dirt and were now heading towards Queenstown. He spun around when he heard me. ‘Snow,’ he said, like he’d just invented the wheel, and turned back to his pile. I never expected that we would be going from a balmy 26 by the east coast to just above freezing and snowmen by lunchtime, but that’s Tasmania for you.
Turned out my mate had never seen snow before, so we had an impromptu session involving all the snow stuff. If this were a film it would be the bit where you’re looking at the ‘snow montage’, with us throwing snowballs, putting a helmet on the snowman, laying down on the roadside and making snow angels, etc., with a nice background sound bite of chirpy and sickening pop. Instead, it started raining, hard, the snow instantly turned to slush, then cold water, the music stopped and we were now standing in the pelting rain, soaking wet and getting mildly hypothermic miles from anywhere.
Out came the wet-weather gear. As we attempted to dry off a bit under the trees and pull on our waterproof suits, I suddenly realised there was something different, and it’s not something you get on a road trip that often. Apart from the occasional clap of thunder in the distance and the rain itself, and our bikes occasionally popping and pinging as their hot steel cooled in the cascade, it was quiet—total silence. The only two vehicles we had seen on the road that day were the trucks that nearly turned us into hood ornaments.
Diego had noticed a sign just up the road and wandered over to take a closer look. ‘Pol, how big do the kangaroos get here?’ he asked, pointing at the sign.
I looked at the sign and it, combined with Diego’s quizzical face distended in real concern, made me laugh. The sign was definitely not to scale and I could see how it could be confusing for a foreigner. It appeared to be saying three things to the happy motorist: first, you should be doing 65 kph; secondly, under the heading ‘Wildlife’, there was a visual warning of giant albino kangaroos as big as your car; and lastly that they will from ‘dusk to dawn’ leap out of the bush and perform a snatch-lift on your front bumper. All it needed was a Monty Python foot smashing down on you as you read the sign.
We rode on. I was getting worried about my fuel; my tank was on reserve and good for less than 20 kilometres. Diego was infallible when I started honking on with my fuel concerns. ‘Do not worry, my friend, there weel be a station for petrol just up the road,’ and with a big gesticulation towards the west he belted off deeper into the woods. My bike coughed after five minutes, then hacked like a fish gulping in air but looking fo
r water. I pulled over straightaway, rummaged through my saddlebags, found my fuel flask and poured in the one litre, hopped on and started praying for a roadhouse. I had a length of hose to drain fuel from Diego’s ample tank if I needed to, but that was a last option. Just as I was about to run dry again I saw the pot of gold at the end of the petroleum rainbow, the Derwent Bridge roadhouse.
We fuelled up, pushed our bikes round the side, went in and ordered a big lunch then sat in the corner to wait while slowly drying out and heating up. The place was deserted; no one else came through, there were no other cars or bikes around. After lunch we wandered outside with big hot mugs of tea and lay on benches watching the sun slowly blink through the windblown clouds, not a sound, just the wind in the trees, our bellies full of homecooked pasta and properly brewed tea. Both of us promptly fell asleep.
I woke with a start, almost rolling off the bench. Diego was snoring, his empty mug still sitting on his chest slowly going up and down. I checked my watch; two hours had gone by, we were losing daylight fast. I gave him a shake and we both lumbered round the corner towards the bikes, only to discover two large salty-looking possums trying to hotwire my Harley. They had already dumped the contents of one of my saddlebags on the ground and had a good look through my shaving kit, managing to also cover each other in shaving cream. Sprung, they ran off into the trees and sat there above us, chewing on my muesli bars and smelling of lemon.
