Wet Season Woes.
A couple of weeks ago I was on one of my regular Sunday afternoon loops and left it a bit late getting away so that it was dark about half way through the ride.
We had been getting some flooding as the wet season was in its last throes and the Muun River was wider than a mile. In fact it covered the road for about 3km. The water was about a foot deep and in the dark I was doing OK and could see the white line through the water to keep me in the middle of the road, then the white line disappeared and I started going downwards.
All was black around except for my light and I went down to about knee height and the surface became rough and there was a sideways current. I had no idea where the edge of the road was so just kept going straight ahead. After about 5-7 metres I started to climb out the other side but because I was in second gear the motor stalled. OOPs.
The bike ran backwards so I had to put my feet down and the water was up to my knees.
Thank goodness for electric start. I started the motor again kicked down to 1st gear and slowly climbed out of the hole and back to the sealed surface found the white line again and followed it to dry road, happy not to have been sunk, fallen over, snuffed the motor, or been washed away. Of course when you are looking across the surface with your lights you can’t tell how deep the water is -1 inch or 1 foot.
I went back the week after and took a couple of photos of the washout. There had been some gravel put in the worst hole but it was still looking quite ugly.
Lessons;
1. The dangers of riding at night, everything is so much harder to assess.
2. It would have been smarter to wait for a pickup to go through first and follow behind.
Which reminds me of a story I heard a little while back.
Flash Harry had just bought a new car and was out in the countryside testing it. There had been rain and there was a puddle about 3 metres wide in the road. Flash Harry stopped, got out of the car and asked farmer Joe who was standing nearby how deep the puddle was. “Aw it’s not very deepâ€
A couple of weeks ago I was on one of my regular Sunday afternoon loops and left it a bit late getting away so that it was dark about half way through the ride.
We had been getting some flooding as the wet season was in its last throes and the Muun River was wider than a mile. In fact it covered the road for about 3km. The water was about a foot deep and in the dark I was doing OK and could see the white line through the water to keep me in the middle of the road, then the white line disappeared and I started going downwards.
All was black around except for my light and I went down to about knee height and the surface became rough and there was a sideways current. I had no idea where the edge of the road was so just kept going straight ahead. After about 5-7 metres I started to climb out the other side but because I was in second gear the motor stalled. OOPs.
The bike ran backwards so I had to put my feet down and the water was up to my knees.
Thank goodness for electric start. I started the motor again kicked down to 1st gear and slowly climbed out of the hole and back to the sealed surface found the white line again and followed it to dry road, happy not to have been sunk, fallen over, snuffed the motor, or been washed away. Of course when you are looking across the surface with your lights you can’t tell how deep the water is -1 inch or 1 foot.
I went back the week after and took a couple of photos of the washout. There had been some gravel put in the worst hole but it was still looking quite ugly.
Lessons;
1. The dangers of riding at night, everything is so much harder to assess.
2. It would have been smarter to wait for a pickup to go through first and follow behind.
Which reminds me of a story I heard a little while back.
Flash Harry had just bought a new car and was out in the countryside testing it. There had been rain and there was a puddle about 3 metres wide in the road. Flash Harry stopped, got out of the car and asked farmer Joe who was standing nearby how deep the puddle was. “Aw it’s not very deepâ€
