Vinventure | Adventure On A Time Machine

The Jerkyls’ Vintage Dirt Odyssey

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GENTLEMEN, START YOUR ENGINES
When the mighty Jerkyls decided to tackle the famed 20 Creeks Ride to Nundle on 40-year-old ‘vinventure’ bikes, the only question to be answered was, what could possibly go wrong?!

The four oldest bikes were Yamaha TT600s — Scruff’s 1983 model, Tony’s ’84 model and Randy’s ’84 model fitted with a later disc brake. And then there was TT’s TT600, but the determined Queenslander was a DNS — more on that shortly.

Meanwhile DP rode a 1990 model Honda XR600. None of the bikes were concourse condition, while Randy’s ’84 was a chain smoker from the get-go. Plus all bikes had standard fuel tanks, which were on the small size for covering big kays.

Because we are an inclusive society in this day and age, there was no strict rule that your machine had to be old, so we also had a Yamaha WR250R, a Suzuki DR650 and a Ducati Desert X along for the ride. I had the option of riding my Ténéré 700. Which of course would have been far too easy, so I chose my 21-year-old XT660 mongrel instead. Not quite from the aircooled, drum brake era, but with a holed radiator, cracked rim and leaky exhaust, I reckoned the challenge would be similar.

Our plan for coping with any major mechanical drama would involve dumping the bike in a nearby paddock and picking up the wreckage some time down the track — probably in Scruff’s 1979 Ford F100 pick-up. Yes, the vintage vibe runs deep! To add to that slightly uneasy feeling, the weather forecast was reading 80 per cent chance of up to 30mm rain for the weekend. Right.

Our route was Sydney to Nundle and back via the 20 Creeks Crossing loop — a legendary adventure route. We would be taking in the Watagans, Yengo, Wollombi, Broken Back Road, Bowmans Creek with fuel at Gundy on the way, and an overnight stop at Moonan Flat. Day two was the 20 Creeks run via Barry Station, followed by sliding around in the mud in Hanging Rock Forest before hitting Nundle’s Peel Inn for the night. The journey back was via Crawney Pass then south to the Hunter Valley and home. A simple enough ride on a modern bike — even when the creeks are full. But on old bikes with relatively new owners and questionable history? That’s a different story … and so we set off on a fun weekend of man and oil burning machine versus terrain.

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EASY RIDERS
So let’s start out with what went right. The old bikes handled the rough stuff superbly. Light, agile, capable of cruising dirt roads at between 80 to 100kmh and fun when the going got sketchy on the forest trails. With no expensive panels to scratch, dropping a bike was not a concern. None of the older bikes cost more than $3,000 to buy and we were all confident any issues could be fixed with basic tools. The ride was mint with plenty of banter back and forth between the old and new riders. The modern riders were impressed with how well the old bikes performed and the vintage blokes secretly hoped the Ducati would suffer some sort of glitch (spoiler alert: it didn’t). When other modern adventure riders clocked the unsuitable steeds in Nundle and asked about our route, they were reasonably complimentary with comments ranging from ‘great work’ to ‘you mad bastards’. And ‘please keep the noise down, we’re trying to sleep’.

The group chat in the lead up to the ride was full of suggestions for riding gear — because it’s just not right to ride a 1980s ADV weapon with a full GoreTex adventure suit. It’s a bad look when your riding gear cost more than your bike. Scruff, Randy and DP dug into their extensive collection of retro riding outfits — back to an era when waxed cotton was the go-to bike gear. Scruff even made his own waxed cotton jeans by treating the front of them with some kind of waterproofing gunk. Randy went for an open face lid with Scott moto mask and I found an old pair of leather pants and a plain black helmet that was two sizes too big. Steve McQueen has a lot to answer for …

MINOR ISSUES
So what went wrong? We had quite a few minor issues but all made it to Nundle and back. Except for Tony Tamba, who attempted to ride down from the Queensland border.

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EVERYONE’S A WINNER
So all the old dungers made the 1,000km round trip and while not drama-free, they ran all day at reasonable speeds on the dirt and no-one was holding up the modern bikes. Sure, the Ducati could have gone faster, but there’s no point scaring the cattle. The trip was super-fun with some absolutely ripping dirt roads, legendary ADV scenery and a couple of great pubs in which to conduct the evening’s bench racing. Even the weather played nice — just 10 minutes of rain in the Watagans and one very brief shower just before Moonan was the lot over three days.

The trip was a real throwback to the 1980s, when the term adventure riding didn’t even exist. Back then it was just riding. Who remembers shooting off for the weekend with minimal prep on a bike that, looking back now, was unsuitable for the task? Issues can be dealt with on the trail. And back in the day you’d be pretty confident that you could get a simple single cylinder, air-cooled, kickstart bike going again. No fuel-injection, no radiators, no power maps and no fancy electronics to go wrong is a throwback to simpler times with easier fixes. Bend it straight, kick it in the guts and keep riding! Check out today’s current crop of ADV bikes and ask yourself how many you’d be happy to take on an adventure in 40 years time? And here’s another thought: if we had attempted this trip in the 1980s with 40-year-old bikes, we’d be riding classics with magnetos and girder forks, while wearing tweed jackets and flat caps! Next time, perhaps? But for now, let the vinventure good times roll!