Sydney and Shakedown

July 9 – July 25 Sidney/near Sidney.

I got into Australia fairly easy even though the security checks wanted to look at my passport and visa multiple times. In the line for quarantine/bag check the guy called me forward to ask me a few questions. An Asian guy followed right on my butt. The security guy was pissed. "Give this guy some space and privacy. Move back behind the line mate". I had gotten so used to having no conversation space or personal space in Asia, it didn't even occur to me that this guy was basically humping my leg in line. Trying to make it move faster I guess. The guy said "sorry about that." move ahead. They didn't check any of my stuff. I was worried about my moto pants and boots being to dirty because I actually forgot to wash them. Because in Bali I was so preoccupied with my bike. An excuse that would probably not worked very well with the quarantine inspection officials. I picked up a local prepaid sim card and took a taxi to the office for the import company of my bike because they needed my carnet as soon as possible. The taxi ride took about 12 minutes and cost $32. 2^nd indication I was not in Asia anymore. The taxi driver had a heavy Russian accent. When I asked him where he was from, he said "I am from Australia!". Ok. Never mind. I guess we can't make small talk about your home country.. which I've probably been to. With my bags in hand, I said "Dasvidanya" to him as I walked away. He smiled and didn't say anything back.

The next 2 nights I stayed at a friend of a friend's house who was also into bikes. He was in the process of making an old airhead BMW into a cafe racer. Apparently getting sign off on inspection is a tough process in Australia. Any modification to a bike, car or truck must be "engineered" and have paperwork. This worried me because of all the custom "un-engineered" work I have done on my bike. Cops regularly ask for engineering paper work if they pull you over. And I had heard horror stories about the cops in New South Wales.

A nice girl named Anna from Ukraine has been riding around the world on a 1190 ADV. We originally had planned to meet up with each other in Thailand. We were in Bangkok at the exact same time. But she was leaving on the bike, and I was just arriving on an airplane. She said it best, "Its funny to agree upon catching up with fellow travelers. Normally when you want to catch up with friends, you choose some coffee-house in a convenient part of a city for all the parties. With fellow travelers, you choose a convenient part of the world. Hey mate, were are you planning to be in September? Thailand? Mmmm I'm afraid I'll be in Malaysia already. Let's try to meet up in Argentina or Brazil in a few Months". We ate some sushi by the Sidney opera house, had a beer, and discussed traveling. It was nice to chat with another solo traveler. She had gone through the same highs and lows. Love and heartbreak. Sunshine and rain. You can see Anna's website here.

After a day or 2 my bike had gone through inspection and customs work was complete. Since my bike came in on a crate, I paid to have a truck bring it to the place where Craig was living, about 2 hours west of Sydney. I was lucky enough to tag along with the truck driver who delivered the crate. That night Craig and I were up till midnight getting the bike ready. We would go on a 2 day shake down ride the next day with 3 other bikers. 2 big BMWs, a DR650 and Craig's Tiger 800 xc. It was a cold day on the ride out. Shortly before lunch my low voltage lead came disconnected. While I had the tank off, we found a leak in my radiator. We cleaned it and used some steel putty to fix the leak. This would last through the weekend. We did a bit of off road riding, a few river crossings and camped at a place called Broken Hill. It was here I saw my first Kangaroo. It was a cold night but the wine was flowing like water at the local pub. I slept well with all my thermals but others were cold the whole night. In the morning there was frost on the grass and seats. By the afternoon, the sun had warmed us up.

I was un-crating when Craig and Patty arrived home.

We fired the bike before midnight. 

Found a radiator leak

Craig knows some good adv roads... even if you have to go through a gate with a "no trespassing" sign. 

I was toasty warm all night. The bikes? Not so much.

Over the next few weeks, I got my radiator welded, frame welded, new tires and other small tasks on the bike while I waited for Craig to get off work. DirtTricks said they would give me a free front and rear Ironman sprocket for the 690 since my rear sprocket lasted to 65,000km. GHR Honda is the DirtTricks supplier in Oz. They threw in a new x-ring chain. At the GHR honda shop, I got to see some amazing toys. There was a few Honda CRF450 rally bikes that had competed in the last Dakar, a Honda quad Dakar bike, and a Turbo 800cc buggy that had won an offroad championship last year. Glen said the CRF450s were getting 30,000 km between rebuilds and extended oil life because of a 3 ring piston and stainless valve. Better than stock but not quite up to par with a 690. Of corse it goes without saying, I'd love one of those CRF450s in my garage.

Good time to check wiring when the radiator is out. 

Good as new? We will find out in the desert. Better than I could do at least. 

Bracket made to keep the lv coil lead from vibrating. This was a final fix until the coil failed a few weeks later.

Getting up there in my kms.

The man himself. Glen

Glen's sweet 800cc turbo buggy. He won the championship his rookie year in this. 

Dakar and rally bikes. 

A rebuilt dakar bike. This one raced in the 2013 dakar. 

A brand new Dirttricks sprocket and one with 60,000 km on her. 

Tire delivery!

I spent way way to much time trying to find insurance for the moto. 3rd party injury insurance is required in Australia. 3rd party property is not required. In Oz, the 3rd party injury insurance is tied into the price of the registration. So what do you do if you can't legally register your moto because its on a carnet? Well, you are actually fooked. In NSW, you are insured by the government under a sort of umbrella policy. The other states don't do this. Northern Territory said they would insure my bike if I got it inspected. I could not get a straight answer if other states would honor the NT insurance. I called all the insurance companies who others had been insured by, they said they wouldn't insure me. So I made the plan to get my bike inspected when we got to Alice Springs and buy insurance. But what happens if the inspector asks for my engineering documents? My bike is so custom its is barely recognizable as a KTM 690 anymore. So.. Do you risk riding with out insurance? Or risk getting "black listed" because your bike doesn't comply to a countries stupid rules? 

The night before we were supposed to leave, we installed a new battery in the Tiger. We thought this would fix the starting problem Craig was having with it. Unfortunately it didn't. We added grounds, tested solenoids, tested contacts. Finally we pulled the starter motor. The 4 brushes were all but spent. We searched and searched and finally found a used one locally in Sydney. When we picked it up, we pulled the back. The brushes looked good. We got back home and installed it. Same problem. Bike would start with 2 batteries in parallel, but not with only one. Finally we pulled the starter again and I pulled the back off it. One oft he brushes had stuck and wasn't contacting the rotor. So the starter motor was only able to output 1/2 the torque because it was only using 1/2 the windings. We put it back together and the bike fired up. Finally we would leave in the morning. Well afternoon. 2 days later than planned.

All packed up.

Craig is ready. 

The Liger is ready (Tiger + lada... see here)

Bali

June 23. Pemuteran to Canggu. 135 km

This is a map of Bali.

I had a nice ride over the hills to get to Canggu. The back roads in Bali are quite nice and way less traffic. But once I got to the coast road it was very busy. I thought I new where a decent hostel would be close to the shipping company I was using. When I go there, they were full. Just down the road I found the Berawa Beach Surf Stay. It was great. The guy who lived there and ran it was a French guy name Fred who grew up in Africa. He had spend the last 20 something years surfing in Indonesia and now had an Indo wife. He spoke French, English, Italian, Spanish, and Indonesian. It was really impressive listening to him talk to guest after guest in one language then another. Canggu is about 20 minutes (by scooter) north east of Kuta. It is a very chill area and was quite a nice place to hang out for a few weeks. BB Facebook page.

Amazing fried chicken. 

The giggling girls who made the chicken

Sasquatch crossing? 

Apparently this works to sell cigarettes.  

They just love taking corners way to fast. 

Fred's sweet custom Honda 150. It was very fun to ride. 

View from the top

Truly a paradise. 

Kites. Huge kites. it was kite flying season. 

June 24 until July 8

A Kiwi named Shane was about 3 months into his RTW on a DR650. He and I had been emailing back and forth and he made it to Canggu the day after I did. The girls I met a few days before in Mt Bromo (Kim and Lucia) wanted to go out that night. So Shane and I went into Kuta to meet up. The next night they came to Canggu to stay at our place for the next few days. Its really easy to get sucked into paradise so everyone would wake up in the morning planning to leave, then say "I'll leave tomorrow". There was a Deus Ex Machina shop in Canggu Shane and I went to check it out the custom bikes. They made bikes, surfboards, clothing, art, there was bar, cafe and even a barber shop. What started as custom bike shop had turned into a full out hipster haven. The bikes were cool but they were 3x the price they should be. Regardless, they had a free rock concert every Sunday night. On a Wednesday they were having a viewing of the movie "Why we ride". The movie itself is decent, but it is very "California" if that makes sense. The 2 parts that resonated with me was an interview with Ted Simon and an interview with Dave Barr. Both did solo travels around the world. They both expressed the same emotions that I have been feeling. I'll admit, it was hard to hold the emotions back and I did tear up some. Shane is in the first 2 months of his journey and I told him I was envious of him right now. His life is going to change so much. Much more than you can comprehend. All I could say was "You are going to have such a good time".

A few bikes from Deus Ex.

They all left in one form or another the next day. Shane went west toward Java, Sumatra, the rest of his RTW. Kim (South African) went back to Kuta. Lucia (Hungarian girl) left east toward Lombok and some other islands for a month on a rented scooter. I gave her a raincoat, sleeping bag and some tie down straps I didn't want to take with me to Oz.

Saying good byes...

Shane is still going. I'm not sure how he hasn't totaled his DR yet. 

My Indo visa was only a 30 day visa so I needed to extend it before the 30^th of June. I went to the Indonesian immigration office on Thursday the 26^th but I was to late. The office is open 8:00 to 11:00 pm. I went back the next day with my paperwork filled out. They said "Come back on the 2^nd to pay."

"Will I get my passport back on the 2^nd?"

"No. Maybe on the 4^th".

So just to be clear about this. You go to the office one day to hand in paperwork. You come back a few days later to pay. Then you come back a 3^rd time to get your passport and visa. Ok this seems simple enough.

In the office I met a very cute little Russian girl who was going through the same trouble. We talked for a while and She gave me her number. I would pick her up on the 2^nd on a scooter to go pay for our visas.

"Power is off in building. We cant take payment".

"I can't just give you the money and you do the computer work when power comes back on?"

"No. Come back tomorrow between 8 and 11".

My Russian friend left on a tour for a few days so I went back alone the next day.
"Is power on?"

"Yes."

"Cool, can I do payment?"

"No. System is down"

Ok. this is getting lame. The next day was same thing. Saturday I she was back and we went together. The office was open for cleaning but not for business. We went back on Monday (at this point I already had a flight from Bali to Oz the next day). On Monday the 7^th of July, they finaly said they could accept payments. She went first. They told her "you can get your passport Wednesday". This was't going to work for me. I told them I have a flight and I need my passport back. They took an hour to find it and I went home. That night my Russian friend and I had one last date.  That's all you get to know.

During this time I spent about 4 days cleaning the motorcycle because I had heard horror stories about Oz. I dissembled the bike piece by piece and spent countless hours washing parts individually in a tub like I was washing dishes. 3 days of cleaning and 1 day of assembly. In order to ship on the airplane, I had to drain the petrol, oil and disconnect the battery. At first they told me I needed to drain the battery. I told them its a sealed battery and there is no possible way to drain it without ruining it. It seemed to work. Later, they told me I needed to remove the spark plug cap also. Luckily I had a spare spark plug under my seat. I told them "this is the spark plug".

Supplies

Teardown

Washing EVERYTHING!

Putting her back together. I'm not sure why it took so long. Maybe there was distraction.

Cleanest she has been in years.

Even girls who aren't single want a pic on her.

I had been quoted around $1800 for a 200kg crate. When I brought the bike to the shipping agent, they said "this is to big, it will cost more". The airline charges by kg or meters cubed.. depending how they can make more money. With everything but my wind screen, the bike and crate was 3 cubic meters. Apparently 1 meter cubed = 165 kg or something ridiculous like that. So the new cost for shipping the bike as it sat would be about $4,600. I wanted to tell them to get bent but I needed to get to oz. I went back to the hotel and had a beer to think. I looked at pictures of the bike on my computer and did some calculations of the size if I removed parts. All said and done I was able to get the bike down to 2 cubic meters. The tires, forks, front fender, part of the fairing and headlight were removed. Price now was $2400. Tough to swallow but oh well. Moral of the story, Indo to Oz is stupid expensive. Turns out you might be better to buy a bike in Oz while you are there. I will rant about that next time.

All crated up.

At Immigration in the airport I had to explain why I was 10 days overstay on my visa. I knew I would have to pay 200,000 rupiah per day overstay. This was about $17 a day. In the little office I explained to them why I did not extend. I showed them all the paper work. It didn't matter. Then I went to pay them 2M rupiah and they told me the fee charged to 300,000 rupiah per day on the 4th of July. I went back out to an ATM and pulled another 1M Rupia out. It was only after I paid and I was on the plane I thought "Dammit, 4 of those days should have been at 200,000 rupia. It would have saved me $20". Basically, spend the time and get the LONG visa before you get to Indonesia. Their Immigration is ridiculous to deal with.