Around the bay in a day  -- February
8th

Six bikes headed off
from the Highway Inn on the Maltby bypass at 9am.

The weather was at
least much cooler than the 46 degrees that Melbourne had the day earlier. ( little did we know the extent of loss of life and property
damage that had occurred on that horrible day ). A few minutes down Geelong
road we pulled over to put on wet weather gear – yes we did actually
experience some of that stuff falling from the sky !.  A drive past at Corio
picked up Nev and going through Geelong – Kim
and Sue joined us.

At Queenscliffe we found out that the ferry ride was dearer
than I’d been told on the phone a couple of weeks earlier. No group
discounts. Not even for pensioners. I won’t repeat where Nev told the lady to stick the fare but it wasn’t in
too pretty a place. Emotions aside we all boarded the Ferry for the trip over
to Sorrento.

Two phone calls on
the Ferry – one from Shrek to let us know He, Kazza
and Steve would not have enough time to meet us at Sorrento,  so would catch up with us at the
Flinders pub – and the other was from Jeff our tour guide for the
peninsula part of the journey – that he was waiting for us at Sorrento.

Ably led by Jeff,
once we left
Sorrento we picked our way through the back streets and some
interesting pinch points on the road. Including an
interesting side tour by Sue – all well.

After we’d
finished our meal at the pub ( Yummy ! ) Shrek and Co.
arrived – Great to see Kazza and Steve again
after such a long time – be it all too briefly as they wanted to eat. We
departed to Arthurs Seat via Red Hill and back down into Dromana
for a refuel stop. We said goodbye to Jeff and thanked him for his help on the
day handing over a bottle of Red ( Yep He’ll drink
anything – and he totally enjoyed his day with us – a good group or
something like that ). At the refuel stop some bodies wanted to follow the bay
intimately – Nepean Hwy. Some wanted to go the most direct route- East
link – Monash Fwy.
While Gavin and Myself continued with the planned route all the way up East
link – with a coffee break at Doncaster. Before going back into Melbourne on the Eastern and Westgate Fwy’s. Getting back into
Hoppers at appr. 5.20 p.m. Did you guys pick
up the wrong turn prior to Franskton ??. Glad I had a map with me !.

Peter Dyer