Going for Broke: Hunter Valley Motorcycle Ride

The proverbial felines and canines were falling on my roof Wednesday night!!! Will I have to ride through the pouring rain to McGraths Hill to find no one there?? No chance. Thursday morning weather was bright and sunny, the rain had cleared and so off I went on the trek to McGraths Hill full of hope for a pleasant days riding. Fifteen or sixteen hardy souls assembled at Maccas McGraths Hill ready to go. I even arrived in plenty of time at 9.30am for our 10am start. The lack of traffic because of the school holidays made the trip quite bearable. The route was pretty straight forward … up the Putty Road for morning tea at the Grey Gum Café and then on to Broke for lunch. Red Leathers Ron (in white leathers) was nominated by me as TEC as I had no volunteers. He accepted the nomination gracefully and did a fantastic job. Because of my latest accumulation of speeding tickets I told the assembled throng that I was going to stick to the speed limits and anyone wishing to chance their arm were welcome to pass me. A couple of riders duly did so. The ride to the Grey Gums was incident free with no traffic to hold us up and pleasant sunshine to enjoy. The café is only open Friday to Sunday so we availed ourselves of their tables and toilet facilities and enjoyed our morning tea delights whilst talking total crap as is the norm. Soon the riders got restless and moved to their bikes so I took that as a signal to get going on the second leg of our trip to Broke. Two riders left us and headed back to whence we came with all sorts of lame excuses like … I have to work on the boat etc??? The rest of us headed north through the twisties to Milbrodale road where we took a right turn (I took a shortcut through the school zone!!) and headed on to Broke and the renovated park with skateboard deck and kiddies playground. Some of the riders were suggesting they ride their bikes on the skateboard deck but grandma said no??? With lunch finished and the threat of rain looming everybody headed for the hills (PITS etc) asap. I made a leisurely getaway with John Osborne to Wollombi, Laguna, Bucketty where the rain decided to force us to put on our wets. Within five kilometres the rain had stopped and we cruised on down the old road and past the PITS as I had a heavy date at Jonah’s, Whale Beach in the early evening so I had to get home to get my finery on???