A hell of a weekend...

Having just finished up with the truck, I can say that I'm over it! New water pump, filter, thermostat, heater hoses, coolant, gaskets and a healthy coating of skinned knuckles...! But to backtrack a little...

Last weekend, phew what a pain. You know when things just should be exceptionally simple, and end up being a true nightmare? On friday, what should have been some fairly routine car maintenance, turned gruesome, with 2 screwdrivers peircing the fuel filter to get purchase on it after breaking a filter wrench first, followed by a simple thermostat gasket replacement cracking the thermostat housing (quite terminal...)

So getting a little frustrated with that, and not being able to start the car post filter replacement(air in fuel lines), I called it a night. Next morning, up at 5.45am to do hell ride, only to crash (see last post) not more than two minutes from my door. Deciding it was an omen, I got onto some of my other projects nice and early (a poof for my deck- to put your feet on!), then off to mate Chris' wedding at a damm big church, followed by a damm large night at the Atheneum club in the city for the reception.


Somehow I managed to wake up at 6am to meet Johnny and Jason for some hours of suffering in the hills, and heavy machinery was certainly on my 'to avoid' list in the morning. Belting up Devils Elbow (MT Dandenong Tourist Road) in the wee hours of Sunday was a good pennance, although it took until coffee o'clock to come good.



After the headsplitting hangover was beaten out of me in the hills, a nice apple scroll got me going,

and away we went to clock up 5.5 hours of chamois time. Beats a hangover!


But you couldn't beat this sight we stumbled accross! (click the photo and check out the bikes all the way up the hill! It was some charity ride and we were absolutly stuck for more than 15 minutes whilst an endless stream of bikes rolled through. And made Johnny late for his bonsai exhibition?! True! Some with frilly pink lesbians astride, some with dogs on fuel tanks and some with both. Either way, it was a hell of a lot of bikes, and only mildly less amusing than the motorists with something better to do than sit and wait- there was some very irate motorists there, even more funny for us cyclists :)