Page 6 - December Exhaust Notes

Dec 2021 Exhaust Notes - Edition No 308 

RIDE REPORT – BEAUFORT –

21 NOV. 2021

Photos and report by Peter Townsend

9 riders gathered at Waurn Ponds Maccas car park for the start of this ride and those
using the “Nicollian” ride calendar turned up for a 9:00am start, and those using the
“Kluzekian” ride calendar, including myself, turned up for a 9:30am start – the good
news was that both calendars had the same day and the same starting point! The
weather forecast was predicting a cool day with our ever present cold south westerly
breeze to keep us company, but more importantly it was going to remain dry – a bit
unusual given the wet Spring we’ve endured so far. So, after a briefing from ride leader
and planner Mark, and a happy snap we made our way out of the car park with John G
volunteering for TEC duties. Time was precisely 9:29am, so Mark, you did indeed get
your early start!

We headed out through Highton and Ceres and across to the Hamilton Hwy via
Pollocksford Rd, then up through Inverleigh taking a righty on the Teesdale Rd and into
Teesdale. Here we had an unscheduled stop as Mark had a mobile call from TEC John
alerting him to a problem with Mike’s big black Indian – apparently an oil warning light
lit up on its flight deck so he pulled over by the side of the road to investigate. After
some head scratching by Mike, John & Gentle, Mike decided to check oil level in the
engine and removed the dipstick, wiped it clean, put it back in and lo and behold the
warning light went out – There ya go – those big Indians even have a warning light to let
you know when the dipstick gets dirty!! Geez – ya can’t beat modern technology!

After regrouping, we then continued on through Shelford and turned right onto the Mt Mercer
Rd, past the huge wind farm at Mt Mercer and on into Buninyong, our morning coffee stop.
Along this road the temperature took a bit of a nose dive alerting us to the fact that we were
getting uncomfortably close to Ballarat! We parked in the Buninyong pub car park and wandered
across the road in search of hot coffee, sustenance, stretch of legs etc.

After our break we headed out on the Sebastopol road, turned left before Sebastopol and
eventually found Bells Rd and then travelled through Smythes Creek and on up to Cardigan
Village (It’s near Ballarat – hence its name!) Here we turned left onto Remembrance Drive
which is part of the Ballarat Avenue of Honour commemorating local servicemen and women
who enlisted during WW1. This memorial stretches for 22 Klms with a tree planted for each
person – 3771 trees – it’s the longest roadside memorial in Australia, if not the Southern
Hemisphere! We passed under the Ave of Honour overpass on the Western Hwy and
commenced to wind our way along minor country roads that service local farming communities,
with names like Weatherboard, Addington and Ercildoune, eventually finding a very long

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