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You have obviously never ridden on the roads over here. Very few are as you describe. Most are full of potholes even the big highways are rough in many cases. Then add in that I did it on a hardtail with a springer front end. I'm not taking away from his trip just sharing mine as well. Anything over 300 or so miles in a day is a pretty long ride on any road.When talking about road conditions try and speak to what you actually know.



Not ridden per se, but I've driven all over san francisco, and all the way from st louis to new orleans and back and trust me, I saw nothing that compares to the tracks we laughingly call interstate highways here. The Putty Rd I was talking about is at best 1 lane each way, is narrow, rutted, mountainous and winding with no shoulders other than a 2' wide gravel strip. Rather than barriers on the sides of the road there's often nothing but bush (you'd call it forest) that runs hard up against it from which large, suicidal kangaroos appear in the blink of an eye. You of course also get the occasional wombat (imagine a 20 gallon drum with legs), echidnas (a bit like your spiny ant-eaters), venomous snakes, and all manner of weird and wonderful wildlife... plus the occasional SUV that thinks they own the entire road. Oh and on the whole 150km you only see one building - a gas station halfway along it. You gotta remember, our country is about the same size as the USA, but we only have 20 million people compared to your 250 million so we don't have towns every 15 minutes apart and gas stations everywhere... once you get out of civilisation here most roads become more "idea" than "reality". Oh, and can forget cell phone coverage unless you're on one of the major trunk roads. You pull into a town after 2 hours of not seeing a building or sign then check your phone to see if you missed anything.

I do have to express admiration for anyone who can do a ride like that on a hardtail & springer though... that's madness.

Matt Electronic mods for TBA/SM!