I recently had the good fortune to take some time off work and ride my motorcycle across some of the best scenery and roads in Australia’s east coast. Had a blast and many memorable experiences, but I must admit, I think my favorite will be the strange and bizarre road signs I saw.
Amongst the road side “tutt tutting” of the modern nanny state with its road safety obsession, “don’t smoke” barrage and constant roadwork’s, there were some standout classics. Like the Victorian nanny state’s advice to tired drivers.
“Sore eyes? powernap now.”
Subliminally, I’d say that’s rather a dubious piece of advice to someone driving a motor vehicle at high speed. I had visions of people simply doing what they were told and having to navigate my way through piles of wrecked cars and copulating Winnebago’s. I actually stopped to see if there was anything on the sign that said it was sponsored by the local auto wrecker. But nope, this entertaining piece of suicidal advice was from Vicroads.
Another that caught my fancy was situated on a perfect road though a lovely stretch of rural sheep country. Someone had tied an old “for sale” sign to a gum tree, and written on the back of it in big letters
“Lost Kelpie, phone ########”
I’ll admit, I saw a funny side to that. Thought to myself, “I knew kelpies were smart, their smart in Queensland. Probably smart enough to read, but in Victoria they’re carrying mobile phones!”
Had visions of a farmer in his driazabone and akubra sending his kelpie out to herd sheep.
“Get around Shep” he’d call “It’s a long way fella, better take your mobile.”
And the lost, but loyal dogs relief when he finally saw the sign. A quick doggie dial and its
“G’day dad? Its Shep! I’m at the sign. Get the Ute!” lol
Modern technology eh, isn’t it great….
But the most thought provoking campaign of road side doomsaying was on the approach to the puty road.
If you don’t know the Putty road its 150 kilometers of sometimes narrow and winding road between the mountains of two national parks. Its described as one of the best roads to ride in Australia and imho deserves the reputation. Its fantastic. But needless to say the government has noticed that the road can lead some folks to overestimate their prowess and end up in a tangled mess of broken machine and bleeding person. So they were particularly keen that we all knew the dangers that lie ahead.
“Winding road ahead” a sign warned (enticingly ;-) “Road slippery when wet” “High crash zone” and the lovely pictorial cartoon shapes of bikes and cars sliding helplessly to their doom. It started off with the mild ones and worked up to “Speeding motorists die” I half expected to see one after that that said “Ahead there be dragons, for gods sake turn back!”
But no, the next one was in a rest stop and showed the basics of how to take a corner on a motorbike so as to not overshot the corner and run headfirst into an oncoming car. Without being graphic it was fairly convincing that running headfirst was in a car was a bad thing.
Overall it seemed to take the approach of “Well if you haven’t stopped yet you probably aren’t going to so you better know this!”
I wasn’t planning to set any land speed records. I was ridding a bike from last century (1997) carrying a swag, bulging saddle bags, and had a lot further to go today. So a high speed entrance into the scenery (however lovely,) really didn’t suit my plans.
Instead I was planning to take it with gentle enthusiasm.
Enjoy it, but leave enough room to cope if I misjudged a corner, or there happened to be a rock slide, speeding car or exotic fauna behind that next blind corner. At least slow enough to have a hope of getting around it.
I call this my hedonist approach to ridding motorcycles. Have fun, but try to survive the experience so you can continue to do so in the future.
So needless to say the road signs were more a source of amusement than anything else. Till I saw one that really slowed me down.
It was an animal sign.
In Australia we post small signs on the side of the road to let motorist know what local animals are most likely to try to kill you in the near future.
This may be sheep, cows, the ever popular kangaroo, or something truly exotic. Such as an echidna, deer, saltwater crocodile, or koala. Even if the animals small and fairly harmless they warn you.
I’m not sure if its so sick people can play “road safari hunter” in their cars or to support a mysterious road kill appreciation society. But either way if you pay attention you can normally recognize most of the smeared and flattened meat messes on the side of the road. But this particular animal sign really got my attention.
It showed a wombat.
Natures answer to a bulldozer. A dense muscular form that looks like a small thick tree log has grown four stumpy legs and has been fur upholstered. They are approximately one meter in length when fully grown and I’m told weigh in at roughly 35 kilos. They also have a think protective shield of cartilage that they turn on attackers that is almost impervious to harm.
I’m reliably told colliding with a wombat is like crashing into a tree stump. A tree stump with a butt shield!
They destroy cars, and there are many stories of trucks coming off second best from hitting one! And in these stories the wombat normally scurries off unharmed.
A wombat is like a medium sized scurrying boulder. Hit one, and your going to know it.
I slowed down a little and really kept my eyes open.
I’ve read somewhere they can reach 40 k an hour and a bloke in Victoria was mauled by one. Wombats are a hard core Australian road hazard.
But by the time I reached the other end of the road it occurred to me. Wombats are also quite rare.
Some are endangered and most people who have ever seen one have done so in a zoo. You just don’t see wild wombats. Ever
So I wondered at the sign. I thought maybe road safety association had hired a country bloke with the sort of humor that occurs in the areas I grew up. He’d have sat back at the meeting and gone “well if you really want to slow people down put in a wombat sign. I know I’d slow the f@#k down!”
Thus despite their endangered status the wombat could make a noble contribution to reducing the road toll.
America has smokey the bear, we’d have our “slow the f@#k down wombat.”
And it worked, I’d slowed down. I’d ridden carefully and precisely and kept my concentration on the task.
I’d been alert for scurrying tumbleweeds of solid mass and had got through safely.
A number of times on the ride I thought of “slow the f@#k down wombat.” A number of times when I was tempted to nudge the needle above the mandatory speed limit I had little images of a wombat looking stern and pointing at his butt. I’d chuckle and back off. It never failed to bring a smile to my face, the feeling that I’d been part of a delightful bit of clever manipulation. Someone had played a very cunning, very clever joke on me and I could see the funny side.
At least till on the return trip when I happened to see on the side of the road….
A dead wombat!
Holy crap people, the little beggars are real!!!!!!!!
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