Motorcycle Adventure Outback Australia Part 4

Motorcycle Adventure Dirt Bike TV is proudly supported by Giant Loop, Rally Rave Products and Adventure Moto. Is there any truth that Nugget has come off today? Yes. In this episode we have our first day in the Simpson Desert and take on some of the smaller dunes. It should have been relatively easy but frankly it didn't go too well. We lost a rider, a bike, picked up a couple of extra broken bones and other injuries, lost valuable fuel, a tent and riders clothes. But hey that's the nature of motorcycle adventure. Well we're finally there mate. Yeah it's exciting isn't it? So we all had a pretty good sleep. We've had a swim in the springs which I'd recommend to anyone. Just going to wait for the sunrise which will be spectacular. Then we're going to go early before the four-wheel drives. The mozzies are good now? Yeah but once the sun comes up they go away and then you get the flies. But Dalhousie we're leaving and hitting it and uh yeah hopefully a couple days time, birds will. Look we've got it all together here. I've got my seat just in case. Yeah. Sleeping bag. I'm a bit worried with how much fuel I'm carrying on this back rack but I'm just going to take it easy. So what you're slowing down 120? Yeah I've cut off another plate because I keep bottoming out. It's held together with the spaghetti tin but yeah I think we're alright. Heading out into the desert early in the morning has a number of advantages. During the cool night the sand settles and in the morning it's not as slippery and much easier to ride. Getting out before the four-wheel drives ensures we have the best riding conditions for the day and then of course there's the heat. Well it's just before sunrise and we're heading into the Simpson Desert to keep ourselves cool. Today is 30 degrees. The conditions in deep sand. We're heading to Pernibor for morning tea and this will be the easiest riding conditions we'll have for the day. After Pernibor the dunes get bigger and the sand gets deeper and more challenging. How's our bikes Philippe? Don't they handle the sand well? It's fantastic. I'm in dreamland here. Yeah. The weight distribution is just perfect. Perfect isn't it? The corrugation we barely feel and we would just cruise along. It's really fantastic. Sorry mate. This is a desert machine. I think we did really well. What? Oh sorry. Oh look there's the desert princess. And then the gremlins started to emerge when Wayne discovered he'd lost valuable fuel. So you lost your fuel can Wayne. Did you lose much fuel? Yeah I lost about half. Half? Yeah. Geez. So then I had to stop and refill. So now I'll make it or I'll use everyone else's fuel. That's all right I've still got 11. So thank god everyone's got extra fuel. Whilst these riding conditions were easy, spare a thought for Alex who was dosed to the max on painkillers and had a broken back. I have no idea how he was continuing on. Oh so we're uh here at Purnie Bore. 30 k's to go before the rig road turn off. Basically 30 k's to go then another 40, 50, 35, 40. If we can make Popal Corner today I think we'll all be uh rather happy with that. Hey Wayne. Yes? Is there any truth that Nugget has come off today? Yes. Nugget have you come off today? Poor Royanke was under the sand. He couldn't go. He had a soft patch. Just lost the front end and ended up biting the dirt. Sand I should say. But it's not only a DR sort of problem. Mal. I went down there on sympathy. You went down on sympathy? Yeah I saw him down there and I caught the same, well not the same but another route and lost the front end and down I went as well. Mal would later discover he had broken two ribs. Hit a bit hard but okay. How are you going Alex? Going all right. Yeah no going fine. Bike's handling well. Now that I've dropped an awful lot of weight. I'm feeling good. For most average riders heading straight in soft sand isn't too much of a problem. But negotiating an off camber soft sand turn whipped up by four-wheel drives on heavily loaded bikes is another thing. Welcome to the Simpson. These types of riding conditions in the heat of the desert quickly drain your energy. The name of the game is to ride as many of these turns as you can clean without any struggle. But for Alex disabled by severe pain from a broken back these riding conditions quickly took him to his limits. Meanwhile Philippe and I were eating up the miles on our Kato's. There is nothing more pleasurable than sitting behind one of your mates clipping along on a great adventure trail. Our bikes were balanced and handled the conditions perfectly. The extra effort we had spent setting up and tuning the suspension for the weight of our gear had all been worth it and it made riding these conditions all the more pleasurable. The riding was brilliant. Each dune was different but there was a rhythm between the sand and the hard pack between the dunes. It just put a smile on your face. Adventure riding in the middle of nowhere, eating up the miles, taking on the challenges and moving on to the next one. This was ADV heaven. So Nugget we're in the middle of the desert here. What's happened to the Suzuki again? The same mistake. The spaghetti tin, the Campbell spaghetti tin is made of too thin of a metal. It's come loose but I've rigged it back up. You got some other problems? Yeah my rack, I've lost a bolt here which I think's caused my rack to snap on the other side. I'll have a look at that. Just hang on. Yeah. So put that on. Yep, one snap. Okay. As we headed further into the desert the gremlins started to add up. Wayne with his lost fuel, Mal with two broken ribs, Nugget with a broken rack and continuing exhaust problems and Alex with his serious injury. What we didn't know was for the past 200 sand dunes Alex had been constantly slipping his clutch at full power in an attempt to smooth out the ride and ease his pain. Life was about to get real difficult. Alex what's happened? Well it would seem I've probably been riding the clutch a bit too much and now I have no clutch so we're letting the bike cool down. I hope that the clutch might come back to life. No the clutch is f***ed. My prognosis is the clutch is knackered but and if it is hey we've only got 800 sand dunes to go. Well that's a relief. Wayne's ready to push. Look hey Wayne put up your hand you're ready to push. See that? Oh it's a little hand wasn't it? The DR's got a tow rope. It would be no inconvenience for the DR to tow the KTM to Birdsville. Oh ouch. Yeah I don't think I could live with the indignity. I think I'd just die. I think I'd have to put you down Alex. There is no way that a DR is towing us into there. Yeah I think I'd put myself down actually. Anyway let's see what happens. After all it is an adventure. It certainly is. Thinking of you Darren. As doubling Alex or towing Alex's bike was impossible there were now two priorities. The first was to call for assistance on our satellite phone and provide our location and set a recovery plan in place for Alex and the bike. There's not too many taxi services in the desert and options for Alex were looking bleak. One thing was for sure we weren't going to leave him there alone. Hello you there? Okay the coordinates are south 26 degrees 07.75. We're on the French line approximately 155 kilometers from Dalhousie Springs. As we were contemplating Alex's fate a little luck finally went our way when a convoy of four-wheel drivers stopped to help us and generously agreed to take Alex to Birdsville. Alex's journey would now be a lot slower but he would live in luxury and be fed like a king. Now knowing Alex's injuries I'm pretty confident he would not have made it as the conditions were only going to get worse. Keep up the fight. I'll see you soon. You've probably got three days in the desert now. You won't get as close a look at it. Thank you very much. Thanks for your help and generosity. Thank you. Nah that's what I thought. For a first timer in the desert Wayne was setting a decent pace and seemed to have the sand riding figured out but with all the delays we were getting well behind schedule and we decided to up the pace and push on. With water reserves planned for two days no one was keen to spend a third day in the desert. Half the secret of riding the desert safely is to understand fatigue and know when to rest and recover before mistakes take over. In hindsight we should have been looking for a campsite to rest for the night. Pushing on merely led to more crashes that damaged riders and bikes. Oh boy there's not one thing it's another. That's pissing out. We've got to get that out of there. Here's a hose. Here just take that. Just pull this off the end here. You got a pair of pliers. Just get this off the end. Come on mate we've got to get this done. It looks like the series of mishap is going on and now I got a ruptured petrol tank so we are trying to recover as much as we can. Fortunately we it must have happened you know just a few hundred meters away so we got most of it out in time. I'm putting back what was in my back tank. So you're going to save most of it. Yeah yeah. Lucky the DR was carrying a spare fuel tank. Nugget it's not stopping mate. It's not stopping yeah and Mal how how are you going? I'm struggling. I'll be perfectly honest mate. I am struggling. Yeah you've hurt your ribs in a four today. And if I stand it hurts if I sit it hurts and I'm just having trouble over the top of the dunes. Very soft of an afternoon aren't they? The sneaky old DR just keeps on keeping on though. I love you brother. Mate this has been relentless today. Lots of mishaps. So you went over the handlebars while Philippe was having his petrol crisis. Yeah because it was a big clump of bush. I thought it'd be sand but it was concrete. You all right? Yeah yeah. Philippe just bend over this won't hurt. Philippe was the next one to take a fall and I would give him some first aid at our campsite for the night. He'd finished the day rather badly. He had cut his nose, lost his tent and his clothes had fallen onto the exhaust and had been destroyed. We had made up time and were now in striking distance of Birdsville the following day. But at what cost? The great thing about working on Philippe he's got a large nose. There's tons to work with. Yeah for anybody um you know the size of the nose is in direct relation to their attribute. Is it? Oh yeah.