From the Library

[Biggles]

Showered up and happy, I was back out the front or the motel, just checking out the scene while I waited for Diego- it was party time now and the street was packed with punters.
Then I saw him running towards me like someone just stole the family empanada recipe. 'Pol, Pol .... I can't believe eet ... Eet cannot be possible .. he gasped. He was really agitated, and frantically going through his jacket pockets.
"What is it, mate?"
His dark Argentinean eyes fixed on me, his expression bewildered and gutted. "I have lost the keys to both our motorcycles."
Ride Like Hell And You'll Get There  Paul Carter p93

[Biggles]

Colin and I were no longer just two guys in a bar planning to go fast on a bike, we had morphed into a team- designers and builders of an outstanding motorcycle and everything that encompasses. But now we had to put it to the test, against the implacable speed-cubed law of drag. If you're male, you will understand the quest for more speed- as pointless an exercise as it may, perhaps, be perceived. All known barriers need to be pushed- whether it's a land-speed record at age 40 or peeing highest up the wall in the school urinal at age eight, its just the way it is.
Ride Like Hell And You'll Get There  Paul Carter p110-1

[Biggles]

I flipped down my visor and just hammered it as hard as I could. As she leapt through the gearbox red-lining the gear changes, I held the throttle fully open the whole time and all too soon I was reaching the point where brakes would have been applied back at Tailem Bend and it would have been over at 170 kph. But this time I had more blacktop in front of me. In fourth gear I glanced down, passing 190 kph and still pulling hard as the engine started to shriek under me, vibrations reaching a crescendo as the perimeter of the runway flickered past in a sickening blur. Her revs hit the redline again and another glance down: 200 kph. She was deafening me with noise from the darker reaches of Hades, her vibrations not letting me focus my eyes on the instruments. My peripheral vision liquefied, orange cone, orange cone... I had two more seconds on full throttle before I had to brake.
The fear, the very real moment when I reached the braking point and passed it, tore through my mind like acid; my stomach, groin and brain had turned into stone and I could feel my heart pounding on my leathers. Then it went calm, built up to the point where speed, vibration and pressure reached a bizarre balance and for a second we were just flying on air. I was laying over the bike cocooned inside the massive front fairing, wide-eyed and high as a kite, as the end of the runway hurtled towards me at somewhere over 200 kilometres per hour.
Brake! said the voice in my helmet. She dipped down hard, the front forks bottoming out as I squeezed both front and back brakes harder and harder while the end of the runway's hold lines streaked past under my face, which was now doing Edward Munch's "The Scream" as I desperately tried to stop the bike before we hit the end.
We stopped right on the edge.
Ride Like Hell And You'll Get There  Paul Carter p114-5

[Biggles]

We didn't get there in the end, though we got very close. If only we had the chance to see what this bike could do on 16 kilometres of dry salt lake, with the proper DLRA track, officials, Federation Internationale Motorcycle timing gear and everything that makes Speed Week a world-class event. For now, Corowa's 2 kilometre main runway was ail we had, and it was over. Frustrating does not begin to describe it. I was accelerating at a rate of 2 kilometres per hour per second; all I needed was another three or four seconds.
Ride Like Hell And You'll Get There  Paul Carter p117

[Biggles]

The boom gate opened and we formed up in a queue waiting to enter the belly of the gargantuan ferry. While the massive line of vehicles waited to board, people got out of cars and stretched their legs, occasionally chatting with other passengers. Here we got our first look at a 'Taswegian', a species of bogan found on the Apple Isle. He emerged from a horrendously battered Kingswood that was parked next to us, wearing pyjama pants and a sauce-stained singlet, about 50, overweight; his nose alone suggested large amounts of beer were about to be consumed. He smiled and asked if we were "goin' tourin".
Diego froze in complete astonishment before glancing at me.
"Yup," I replied and smiled.
"First time to Tasmania?" He was openly and unashamedly scratching his balls.
"Yes, we're really looking forward to it."
He removed his hand from inside his pants and offered it up to shake, I stepped aside and deflected the shake to Diego. "This is my friend Diego," I said as the manky ball-sweat-stained-hand was redirected at Diego.
"George," said the man.
Diego smiled serenely and put his gloves back on. Nice move, mate- and shook the offered hand then continued to smile and nod so much he started to look like a stroke victim. I pretended there was a problem with my bike and lay on the ground tinkering with it. Eventually the Taswegian went away and sat on the bonnet of his Kingswood, pulled out his false teeth and started polishing them with his singlet. Diego and I hid behind my bike, consumed with our all-important task of tinkering, while Diego whispered "Unbelievable" and "I have never seen anything like eet, Pol."
Ride Like Hell And You'll Get There  Paul Carter p125-6

[Biggles]

George Town offered up a warm fire, awesome hospitality and contented stomachs. Fully fuelled we consulted our map and hit the bikes. We skimmed along empty roads in a state of bliss, stopping again at Bridport, hitting some unsealed road and getting it a bit sideways on the way round, then joining up to the main road, the A3, that plugged us into St Helens for lunch and a brief game of 'Spot the Local'. Then it was back up in another big dogleg after Fingal towards the silly but fun part of the day called 'Jacobs Ladder'. This involved a world-class blat through Ben Lomond National Park; some of it was blacktop and some of it was dirt, all of it was fun. The Ladder is a curious succession of six very steep switchback hairpin climbing turns that slither up the side of the formidably wet and Scottish-looking Ben Lomond. Going off the edge of the ladder was a frightening prospect; any mistake would result in a proper caber toss into a red stain at the bottom, so we took it nice and easy to the top. Sufficiently ready to call it a day, we headed to Launceston for the night having done just over 500 ks since we landed.
Diego had it all worked out. "I've booked us a bakery," he said, beaming. I debated whether I should ask for an explanation then decided just to go with it.
Although I have not yet fallen at the altar of App]e and am able to say "There's an app for that" while someone is talking about hippo mud wrestling, I'm not too proud to admit I was glad Diego had an iPhone. When the sun is going down and you're getting cold and tired on a bike rolling down a random street in a strange town with no information and no plan, that phone is a crackerjack piece of kit.
We pulled up at the rear car park, checked into bakery (converted into a very nice hotel) and enjoyed another great meal. I fell asleep to the sound of rain on the tin roof and thoughts of home.
Ride Like Hell And You'll Get There  Paul Carter p134-5

[Biggles]

"Well, it would have been in the 60s. Dad was flying Javelins, I believe."
He smiled. "Wonderful aircraft. So is he a bike nut, too?"
I laughed. "Mad for them, cost him dearly, though." I went on, "He got smashed in the officers' mess one day and on a dare tried to ride his bike right through the bar..."
Jethro sat forward, his face lit up and to my complete surprise finished the story off. "He rode up the steps to the entrance, paused on the nice clean red carpet that ran the entire length of the hall, dropped the clutch and sat there pissed while the long red carpet was hurtled out the door under the spinning wheel. He runs out of carpet, the back wheel hits floorboards, flipping his Vincent up into a trophy cabinet, then bursts into flames and the whole bloody place nearly goes up- your dad's a legend." I was speechless that Jethro knew the story which I had grown up with.
"You know, that bike is mounted on the wall behind now. I used to stand there with a pint looking at it."
Now I was really stunned; my dad's bike decorating a bar, that I did not know.
Ride Like Hell And You'll Get There  Paul Carter p141-2

[Biggles]

The asphalt gods were good to us that morning, the beautiful green undulating hills revealing picture-postcard town after town with names like Snug, Flowerpot and Woodstock. The road, however, was the opposite of its laidback sleepy surrounds; it was draped like a discarded black necktie over the landscape, serious aggressive riding; as soon as you're out of a blind turn you're already setting up and looking for your exit from the next one. Concentration on the relentless corners should be forcing you to slow down and enjoy the surrounds a bit more. Instead we opted for the riding experience, though we did stop at every town to take a look and almost every town had something interesting to look at as well as the occasional tourist coach to avoid slamming into the back of. It was a weird time of year to tour Tasmania, in between the energetic grey nomad ramblers of summer and the winter walkers.
As we hit the bottom of this little cape, the road offered up wonderful sweeping seaside corners that gave a visual all-clear for any other traffic and an open invitation to lay the bike over, drop a gear and use the whole road to take it as fast as you can. And that's where the local police will nab your arse for speeding, lesson learnt. Speeding fine neatly folded in my wallet and a friendly wave from the cop who just blew my beer money, we mooched along well under the limit back up the other side of the cape till we hit the A6 at Huonville, turned left and tracked down to Southport. I started thinking about the endless choices for dinner; the food was good, really good here. Progress was stress-free, and we had plenty of time to admire the views.
Ride Like Hell And You'll Get There  Paul Carter p146-7

[Biggles]

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 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.
Ride Like Hell And You'll Get There  Paul Carter p156

[Biggles]

Diego came out into the sun and fired me "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.
Ride Like Hell And You'll Get There  Paul Carter p157-8

[Biggles]

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 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.
Ride Like Hell And You'll Get There  Paul Carter p158-9

[Biggles]

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 your front bumper. All it needed was a Monty Python foot smashing down on you as you read the sign.
Ride Like Hell And You'll Get There  Paul Carter p162

[Biggles]

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.
Ride Like Hell And You'll Get There  Paul Carter p163-4

[Biggles]

I heard the car before I saw it. Sally and Simon Dominguez's battleship-sized 1979 Special Edition 'Bill Blass' Lincoln Continental. Even though they weren't deliberately driving like maniacs, the massive 21-foot- long two-door coupe's tyres squealed like dying rabbits as they hurtled rounded the corner and pulled up in the car park grinning like a couple of outpatients. The Lincoln was all blue leather, the hula-hoop-sized steering wheel sat in front of the hilarious instrument cluster; all chrome and long with a Cartier clock at the end, it looked like my grandmother's silver service. Simon sat in the back sprawled out like a pungent bum in a leather dumpster. The car was bigger than the flat I grew up in.
Ride Like Hell And You'll Get There  Paul Carter p180

[Biggles]

"Nice lid," he said as I bounded up the steps to his porch. "Pity." He gulped his coffee.
"What is?" I asked, sitting down.
"The dog's pissing in it."
"What?"
I spun around in time to see Boston shaking off the last few drops on the rim of my upturned no-Ionger-smells-like-brand-new carbon-fibre helmet. That dog lets go like a racehorse. I spent an hour washing it out while Erwin got his bike out of storage mode. He kept laughing whenever the image of Boston popped into head. 
"Sorry, mate," he said repeatedly. "How's your lid?" I had finished hand-washing the liner and scrubbing out the inside, but it didn't really matter what or how much I tried. I slipped my head inside its super-light carbon Darth Vader slick cottonwool internals, and for a second everything was fine, like shoving your head into an Aston Martin's glovebox, then finding a sodden nappy in the corner.
Ride Like Hell And You'll Get There  Paul Carter p205-6