It’s what we do

This entry is part 1 of 16 in the series Adventure Rider Issue #53

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I sometimes try and pinpoint when I officially became an adventure rider.

It comes up from time to time in conversation, and I occasionally hear ad manager Mitch saying, “He was an adventure rider before it was ever called adventure riding.”

I often feel I was close to being an adventure rider when, as a kid filled with blessed ignorance, I’d fire up whatever worn-out late-1970s model second-hand shitter bike I had at the time – I couldn’t afford anything better – and just go. If I’d tagged up with a group to thrash along a beach or do loops through forestry, or head out to watch an event 250km away up the main road, I’d throw my weight on the kickstarter, wait until the oily smoke cleared, and join in.

In those days, as I remember, a town 40km or so away could take a full day to reach, and the bike would sometimes be equipped with a length of rope. When terrain became really savage all the riders would join their lengths of rope together to drag bikes, one-by-one, up tough hills or across deep water crossings.

That sounds like adventure riding, doesn’t it?

It was called trailriding back then, and I was a trailrider.

I think my first trip to Cape York with Roy Kunda and Cape York Motorcycle “ In those days, as I remember, a town 40km or so away could take a full day to reach, and the bike would sometimes be equipped with a length of rope. ”

Adventures must’ve been in the mid-1990s. I rode a TT-R250, and even now I get goosebumps thinking of that eight-day experience. Belting along at full throttle for minutes at a time, carrying the bike across rivers – not creeks, rivers –
sleeping under the stars and, finally, fulfilling a lifelong achievement as I threw the bike on the side-stand and stumped out over the rocky headland to the marker for the northernmost point of the Australian mainland.

I remember there were dolphins just off the point as I arrived, my heart bursting at the enormity of being there.

But that wasn’t considered adventure riding back then, either. It was a trail tour.

I expect genuine official adventure riding began when I first moved from a specific-purpose bike – a motocrosser, trials bike, enduro bike or road racer – to an ‘adventure’ or dualsport bike, and I remember the occasion very clearly.

I took my XR250 race bike around to Marty Hardcore’s place for our regular Friday afternoon’s grasstracking. Marty had – and still has – a DR650, and I sat on it and thought it seemed really comfortable, but still really ridable. In the space of a few days I’d ordered my own DR650 and was once again at Marty’s when I mentioned I was picking up the bike and would head out to Cameron Corner on it the next day.

I don’t know why I decided that, I just did.

That night I received a phone call from one of the riders who’d been at the grasstrack asking if he could go with me to Cameron Corner.

We had such a trip. It’s still huge in my mind as one of the best rides I’ve ever done. Ozzo – the other rider – was a brilliant riding partner and we had a ball.

We’re still good friends now, all these years later.

Everything about that ride qualifies as a dead-set adventure ride. The destination, the bike, making a new friend, seeing places I’d only read about and dreamed of, dealing with a few setbacks and laughing our heads off when things tickled our funny bones. We camped, stayed in a couple of country pubs, and, most of all, rode and rode and rode. I picked up the new bike from the dealer on a Monday and returned with it covered in heavy red dust and 3000km overdue for its first service less than a week later.

In the scheme of things that ride doesn’t seem all that long ago. In fact, it was August 2006.

So how long have been an adventure rider? Not long enough.

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