Tas to Cape York
 

Hi
Im 15 and ride dirt bikes. When i get my L's next year im organising some friends and myself to ride from the bottom of Tas to Cape York.

We plan to use AG100's for the trip:eek3:

ANY info/advice is welcome as i want to use the year ahead of me to organise the trip.

Thanks Matt

Good choice of bike mate, they will see you proud. My advice for cheapish waterproof luggage is look at a canoe bag across the back carrier, and work out some way of putting a 100-150mm diameter tube of PVC sewer pipe with screw end end caps across under the front motor for tools and spares. Soft side bags (some old Drifter or similar throw-over bags off eBAY might be a good idea) are OK for that sort of trip and way cheaper than metal or plastic side pannier boxes. Take a small tent and gas cooker. Get someone who knows how to camp cook show you a couple of simple things each to cook and then take turns.

Enjoy!

Regards

Nigel in NZ

hey cool dude
 

you may be the youngest yet ,dress up in super hero outfits ,if your not having a back up vehicle fuel will be a real issue up at the cape so you will need BIG tanks as stock aggies don't have much range ,if you try postie bikes you can put that second tank on them , make sure you do a great trip report ,better yet ,call SBS ,it would make a cool doco ,kids to the cape,lol ,haha way to go ,better yet ,maybe i'll call them ,i'd make a film about that
oh yeah you need some croc off ,you need to watch the crocs ,lots of crocs

Thanks for the tips and advice, its a great help about the fuel range, i think we will carry a 10L jerry can each. Would this be enough?

Think one of teh mags dist a trip "tip to Tip"? So you might get some ideas from that .. TBAM? If I Recall Correctly...

Go to your local libaray and see if they have any guides .. the Moons book on Cape York should be avalible .. might be an old edition in the Library - good info even if old.

Maps - the Hemma Victrian High Country one is a must .. join the RAA and get the maps - they should be free ... NRAM, RACV, umm forget teh Qld mobs name .. but get them all - you may have to write to them to get teh maps .. the RAA should have a touring department - they may help?

Posties to the Cape '08
 

Congratulations Matt on planning such a trip, never to young to start mate. Anyone can make it happen! Give me a few months and I will tell you how we went. Starting August 23rd there is 3 lunatics including myself riding CT110 Postie bikes from Cairns to the Cape and back to Cairns. XR250 tanks are an easy mod and will give us a range of somewhere around 340km. Lots more planning but that's the short of it.

Glen

WHen i go i would rather spend more time off the blacktop and was wondering whether the maps suggested would show all of the off road tracks or not?

it would be great to get a trip report from you when you get back! that info would be gold:thumbup1::thumbup1:

does anyone know what sort of weight the AG's can take happily
also the greatest distance between petrol stations
if we could get posties lots cheaper than AG's we could consider them too
does anybody know of any large fuel tanks that will fit an AG:helpsmilie:

thanks for your help guys!!!

hey dude
 

nearly any old xr tank will fit a postie bike and they are a lot cheaper than an aggie bike to buy ($800-$1600 as a rule),all those posties keep buying new ones ,farmers only sell aggies when the fence wire and baling twine no longer will do it,and if you want a lot of dirt time then you better have plenty of time up your sleeve ,not to mention kanga , get a sponsor ,are you all going to be on your L plates ,
keep the questions comin

How much time would we need if we took about 80-20 dirt-road?
Maybe a postie would be better for us
what do you mean by "kanga":blushing:
I dont reckon anybody would sponsor us, we have been talking about making it a charity run for some sort of group like camp quality or a cancer
We wont all be on L's my dad will come and his mate and possibly some others with full licences
Also what are some of the "must see's"
the super hero outfits sounds good:cool4::cool4:

Rule 6. No map shows all the roads.


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The Hemma Motorcycle Atlas shows the petrol stations where they matter .. and if you are thinking of motorcycle riding around OZ for some time in the future it is a good purchase. Bound so you can put it in the map pocket of a tank bag, enough detail but large enough scale that you are not constantly stopping to turn pages.

More detailed maps ..
Hemma and West print do ones for most areas of interest.
Catoscope have some free ones (PDFs) on the web ... they are more touristy but have some of the major dirt roads of interest too .. Welcome to Cartoscope's Tourist Maps and Holiday Guides

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Planning
1 in 7 days rest. Max 6 days a week travel .. but I'd throw in 1 more day off a week too ..

Max 400 kms per day ... average.

Figure out roughly how far you are travelling add 20% and go from there with the above average travel figures. That will get you are rough calculation.

Do figure the weather in your plans - you won't get there easily in the wet season. Nor do you want to go through the hight country when it is snowing ... they close some roads off then even if you tassies can stand the cold.

hey dude
 

kanga is dosh ,bucks ,moola ,doe the stuff that makes the world go round,in your case the postie bike wheels ,400 km a day on a postie bike is a big ask,it aint no GS Beema, especially if you put dirt into the equation,hobart to the top is probably 5000 + km,so allow your self at least 2 months for your trip ,if you want to stop and smell the roses that is ,unless you sell them all in cairns to japanese tourists as cape ready bikes,lol,then fly home ,if you only pay a little for them they would owe you fark all, on the way you ask ,when i did it, i stayed away from the tourist traps along the east coast and camped in the national parks, etc still plenty of great places if you keep off highway 1 good luck

We will definetely be trying to spend as much time in the bush as possible
How many K's would be realistic a day remembering that we wont to spend as much time possible off road and that we will be using AG's?

max 200 -250 km a day
 

remember 80 kph on the freewa y but the bush aint the freeway

Cape run
 

We are planning on approx. 90 - 100km per day average including rest days. The more rest days the more K's to make up. All depends how big the wet season was, how deep and fast flowing the river crossings are and how much of the road has been graded/repaired before we pass through. If you push to hard things will break and it's a long way to anywhere for parts.
There will be breakdowns along the way for sure. Realistically the bikes are only worth $1000, if it is a terminal breakdown the only sensible thing to do is take whatever gear you can carry and leave it there. Recovery is not an economical option.

Max. sustainable speed for a Postie if you want it all to last is approx. 70kph on flat ground. Any small capacity bike is just not built for this type of riding, so slow things down, look after the bikes, and keep it all together. Don't forget to have good safety gear, don't ever be fooled into thinking that slow speeds mean nil personal injury. I have seen RFDS planes take off many times and I never want to see the insides on one.

Roll with the punches and it will all work out in the end. :D


Glen

onya!
 

brilliant plan, matthew.
it is possible to get from near healesville in vic to near jindabyne in nsw on dirt for all but about 50km, no big river crossings or anything like that, and using mainly roads marked in the Hema motorcycle atlas mentioned by others above. i have done canberra - melbourne in a day this way, of course the more time you take the better. after that, from canberra out west of sydney you can get to at least about dungog on dirt, as i recall.

thing is, half the fun is planning, and half the planning is changing plans! don't forget there are plenty of backroads that are not dirt, and this may be good especially if you end up travelling on bikes without a whole lot of suspension.

i would suggest contacting your local abc radio station, or maybe triplej, as they may be interested in following your trip with you as the reporters. a couple of years ago there was a series on the abc called (i think) 'bloke on a bike'. although this means they have had a similar story before, there is every chance they will be interested. you can only ask and it might be fun.

cheers,
andy.