Ok Beags, here goes.

This is actually a, "Show us your bike -Touring" thread, so in case we have wandered a bit off topic going down the food poisoning hole here is a pic of my touring steed when this story started. My beloved 850 Moto Guzzi.

I did my apprenticeship in Sydney from 1980 till 84 in a heavy industrial situation and fucken hated it.

Started getting full tradesmans wages in 85 and decided to try and save up enough to jump on my bike and just fuck off for a year, do the lap of Australia and retire a millionaire and live happily ever after with all the opportunities that were bound to present themselves to me on the way.

After 3 months the saved money had all gone and was heading out of Tassie in a clockwise direction around the rest of Aus with a very nice girl I had convinced to drop her uni studies in law for a year and join me.

In those days you could be on the dole and travel around no problems, it was ace. Especially if you did it on the CHEAP.

We were in Darwin in about November, when it was starting to get pretty humid and "Crocodile Dundee" had just come out. So we treated ourselves to a night at the movies and were disappointed with the film, as we'd seen real crocs in the Kimberlies not long before. We also had to buy a new tyre in Darwin so that took a huge chunk of our dole cheques.

The next day we decided to spend the rest of our money on supplies....food that would not go off in the heat, a 4 litre cask (bladder) of red wine and head to Kakadu to spend some time before the next dole forms could be lodged.

We had enough money left to go to a takeaway shop and treat ourselves to a nice greasy snack before heading to Kakadu.

I can't remember what my gorgeous law student companion had at that takeaway shop but I sure remember what I had.

I had a spring roll, (those big oily fuckers that are about the size of a chicko roll) and a pint of milk as the shop had no flavoured milk.

A few bites into that spring roll and the alarm bells were ringing. Something smelled a bit whiffy about it, and even though I was a WHITE OX smoker with not much sense of smell at the time I soldiered on and ate the whole thing knowing there was only Spuds, rice and tinned food to look forward to for the next week or two and washing down each mouthful with the milk it was almost bearable.

Darwin to Kakadu is about 160 ks.

A pretty casual ride really in the scheme of things.

Started to feel very queasy about half way there.

Then started to think I could see Roman Gladiators on horseback charging at us out of the scrub on horseback swinging big spikey metal balls at us.

We might have been in Kakadu by now and decided what attraction to see. I don't know or remember.

But I did know I had to vomit.

Stopped the Moto Guzzzi and told my gorgeous companion.

FUCK!, I feel really crook and have to spew.

Wandered off into the scrub a bit, in case any happy families were driving past and spewed a spew the likes of which I have never seen before......or since.

Usually if I have to spew, vomit, chunder etc it is a pretty straight forward reaction.

Not this time.

Imagine if you were really badly constipated and had a backlog of cast iron turds in your guts that were super hard to eject from the ole sphincter.

This Spew was like the same thing from the mouth end of things.

Big,white,hard, milky rock hard turds eminating from my mouth trying my hardest not to choke to death in the tropical heat.

Was feeling pretty crook by now.

Part 2 to come.

It does not get better.

Good story FC !

Looking forward to part 2

( I think  )

Can't wait FC. Laughing already.

Does ep 2 involve a young priest and an old priest

Not really part 2, just a continuation.

After the first spewing episode there were a couple more on the same day, next ones involving lots of bile as well.

Gotta admit I felt pretty ordinary, like I had had a big ball of stainless steel scouring pad pulled up through my stomach and out my throat. In fact felt stuffed for days on end and could hardly even eat, just drink tea, coffee and boiling hot red cask wine purely for  medicinal reasons.

A moto guzzi 850 LeMans was not the ideal vehicle at the time to explore Kakadu as most of the great locations required 4WD's to get to them. We did have one trip out to the East Alligator River where you could climb an escarpment that was loaded with aboriginal rock paintings and had a great view over Arnhem Land which was cool but aside from that we were fairly disappointed with the place. You really did need a 4WD and probably not a shoestring budget.

Stayed in the place for a bit over a week then headed back to Darwin feeling slightly better the further from Kakadu and the memory of those spew-turds we got.

We were very low on tucker by now and came across an unmanned roadside stall that was selling rock melons. We put all our remaining loose change in the honesty tin and dishonestly (I hate to admit) loaded up the bike with as many rock melons as we could fit on board. Further along the road was something or other "Springs" where you could go for a swim and not be eaten.

It was nice, we went for a swim, ate some rock melons, got hot, went for another swim, ate more rock melons, repeat.

Left whatever Springs later that day and got into Darwin. Last time we were there a bit over a week ago we stayed in the University grounds, on the sports oval. Uni was obviously on summer holiday and there was no one there, well no one came and told us to move on anyway. You could just lob up after dark, the bike would fit through a gap on the main gate and you could just sleep on the grass of the oval under the stars.

This time we were after free lodgings with an ocean view and found a park somewhere not too far out of Darwin. A nice park with a sturdy cyclone proof BBQ area/building, dunnies and the usual "Day Use Only" signs that we were by now expert in dis-regarding.

We sat under the cyclone proof BBQ area and ate lashings of rock melons and drank delicious hot red wine. Then went and hid the bike in the scrub, put our ground sheet on the ground looking forward to a sleep. It gets dark really early in Darwin plus we did not have clock or watch between us but I guess it was pretty early in the night by normal (non stealth campers) folks standards.

As soon as we lay on top of the sleeping bag to get some sleep we realised we were not alone, the was millions of mosquitos buzzing around, in fact the air became thick with them. So we got inside the co-joined Kosciusko Vee tube down sleeping bags rated to minus 10 degrees celsius to get away from them, you had to get completely inside head and all to get away from them.

Of course it was just stupidly hot inside there, it was hot enough outside.

Started to feel a few twinges in my guts and wondered if eating stacks of rock melons was such a good idea.

Next minute a vehicle or two turns up to the cylcone proof BBQ area and maybe 10 people jump out, fire up the barby and start to party. Completely unaware we are trying to get some sleep only about 25 meters away.

We peek out of the sleeping bag and decide the people do not look like murderers or particularly unsavory folk and decide fuck it, lets go and join them. We have lots of hot red wine and few rock melons left and the Kosciusko vee tube is not where it's at.

So we wander out of the darkness, half startle them all and say Gidday. Explain ourselves and what we are doing there and have a pretty good time with these folk who just turned up.

It was apparent during the evening some of them worked for the government in Customs.

There was a pretty cute little blond chick there who invited me and my girl back to stay for the night at her place. She also asked everyone there back to her place to get on the piss and party on.

We could not refuse, anything was better than the mozzies at this park.

Back at the pretty blondes tiny flat in Darwin we were all drinking away and talking bullshit...you know the drill, just having a good time.

 I noticed there was no music playing, not sure why but gee it sure was a small flat too.

 It became clear me and my missus were kind of invited there out of desperation by the pretty blond chick because her husband was away on customs business and his mate/workmate was trying to horn in on her while hubby was away and she did not want to go down that road. So me and my girl were sort of live in chaperones till her hubby got back from whatever custom people do.

That was fine, we were happy to be chaperones ......but my FUCKEN GUTS! after all those rock melons.

Started to feel really uncomfortable and could not concentrate on what people were saying, there was such an immense pressure building up in my guts and knew I just had to do a big, big shit very soon.

Problem was the dunny was just off the living room where everyone was sitting and of course it only had one of those flush panel doors that are about as sound deadening as a tally ho paper.

I knew if I just sat there I would shit myself and that would be not ideal.

So got up sweating bullets and staggered to that flimsy dunny door, closed it behind me, sat down, noticed everything had gone quiet in the living room and then just unleashed, detonated and exploded.

Just like the spew in Kakadu that I've never done before or could even imagine, this was the shit to Trump it.

No fucken lie, I half filled the toilet bowl with shit, rock melony shit.

It must have been the right consistency to somehow not go around the "S" bend in the dunny.

Also I made quite a big noise performing this deed and was very aware there were people just on the other side of that thin flush panel door.

It took two flushes of the dunny to flush it all away, I was very worried that the flushes might not flush it down and instead the whole lot would start overflowing on to the floor. Thank goodness it didn't, sometimes there might be a god.

Exiting that dunny was almost as bad as walking the plank, there were lots of eyes looking at me and a kind of stunned silence.

Turns out I was an excellent chaperone, no one came to visit for the rest of the time (a few days) we stayed there till Hubby got back.

I have never had the urge to go back to Darwin or Kakadu.

No Fatbat, I did not take a picture of my spew in Kakadu. It was not something I wanted to really remember even though I cant forget it. Strangely enough my camera also seemed to get poisoned by that spring roll and started taking double or triple exposures.

Here is one of some of the law student, well 2 if you know what you are looking at, but it's a triple exposure by an old fashioned camera with film in it.

How about a photo of your missus?

Thanks Steelo.

Gap years are just the best thing!.

Gap lives are even better.

Me and a mate  ( a bloke )  spent a month in Kakadu.  We were trying to save the cash so we didnt bother buying a tent and bought a blue tarp instead.  We were up there in the dry season and I just slept on the ground in a cheap sleeping bag.

Luckily the cheap sleeping bag had a hood that you could pull up over your head because the mozzies were fuckin terrifying.

Nothing worse than exploding in a dunny around strangers. Too much rockmelon will do that. I’m thinking the law student chicky ended up as your missus?

Supertrapp Headers, Rinehart Cans, SE Torque Cam, Maximus Tuner. 14” Reverse Highball Burleigh Bars. Few other bits. The difference between this 114 M8 and my old TC103 is like night & day.