Today was a day for ticking things off the bucket list.
After trying to play a little catchup with the blog, I headed to the Mt. Panorama racetrack, unhitched my trailer and chained it to a post at the motor museum. I then had 5 laps of the track.
It’s a normal road so the speed limit was 60 – which they patrol quite regularly apparently – and bi-directional. So, it wasn’t going to be a race following racing lines.
First impression was the surface was like a billiard table – quite different to the last few days of riding. Then, lots of concrete (no sandtraps apart from the one at the bottom of Conrod Straight), and such a difference from top to bottom in terms of height. Of course I’ve never driven on a racetrack before so I have nothing to compare it to, but the gradient isn’t that obvious on TV… it’s one of those sensations that you have to experience yourself methinks.
Here’s a video captured from my helmet-cam, with my own narration: here
After my gentle hoon, I headed to the National Motor Racing Museum next door to the starting line.
Lots of history there, and of course there’s Brocky’s corner.
Tick.
Next, I headed to Parkes to see the CSIRO radio telescope there – aka “The Dish”. I’ve wanted to see this for some time, and even more since the movie. It was a longish drive for what amounted to only about an hour, but it was worth it. You can’t get into the control room as it is still in use, and in face the dish was moving about while I was there.
Tick.
I had originally planned on moving on to Cowra, but thought I might be able to make a bit of an advance on Katoomba. Except the bloody Russians were playing with my GPS satellites again and I got confused. I’d also woken with a sore throat and had felt the dreaded man-flu infect me throughout the day. It was getting on so I gave it and headed to Cowra anyway.
As it happens – quite a nice town.