Those on the safari may have seen a white land rover defender beside the road a few times. That was me, taking photos of my dad (a rider in the event). Many other riders came up to me to ask how they could get the photos. Well, it's taken some time but all the photos are now available at gs2012photos.com. Here's a breakdown of the bikes that were on the event (based on the photos) R1200GSA - 36 R1200GS - 49 HP2 - 3 R1150GSA - 2 R1150GS - 2 R1000GS - 1 F800GS - 47 G650X - 8 Sertão - 7 Dakar - 11 F650GS - 3 G650GS - 2 Other - 1 The landy (just to jog your memory) Some sample photos (3 of 652)
For those guys who have a GS and are wondering wether to ride in these safari events - All I can tell you is DO IT! My experience at the 2012 Safari was extremely positive on the whole - with some great memories and some of the most memorable dirt - or dirt tar combos with endless twisting sections - anywhere - The main thing to appreciate is the flexibility to allow riders from a wide background (road or dirt) the choice of departure times, the number of stops and to self-determine-set the pace that you like to ride at. There is soooooo much scope in this that it truely becomes a safari and lets you extract as much fun, pace or put-along in a social group if thats your style and intent. I would say the high light was just set off pronto - set your own pace - then - finding a fellow rider who is near 99% perfectly matched to your riding style on the route - you might not know his name even - but thats where the fun just goes up to 200% - open road - lots of it - somebody who loves to ride at your pace or you his - and go for it ! Hour after hour - it was special.
Those Blue/White 1150's are a bloody nice looking thing! How can I be thinking of replacing it????? :eek1 Jay, I didn't realise you were not affiliated with the Safari! I've had a look at the some of the photos, very nice, and an awesome idea. Now what to order.
There were some interesting moments early on where I was getting the hang of it. A few times I'd be driving along, wondering if I was on the right road, only to have the first riders fly (and I do mean fly) right past me. At that point I typically just had to make the best of wherever I was at and setup in time for the rest of the riders.
Finally decided which GS2012 photo print of me to order to go into my IKEA frame - a 400x500mm RIBBA that I already have sitting here - Now to see how long it takes for the print to arrive in Qld from Nulab. The shipping for this large size was $16.50 so I am assuming it must come flat-packed at that price. The IKEA frames are hard to beat for value and hoping that the Glossy metallic print will have good contrast and colour under the glass.
The GS2012 Photos print arrived from Nulab a week ago ( so Nulab turn around was 6 days to get the print) packing was massive to protect it from being bent - the detail is very good and the gloss paper has a kind of metallic gleam under bright lights. I had to order a small matt insert for the IKEA frame to keep the glass and the print apart - this was easy using www.mattcutting.com.au - they made a custom white edging matt of only 15mm which slips between the glass and the print - the original IKEA frames have huge white borders on their free included mat - about 60mm - so hence the new one in the photo is custom cut down to 15mm by John at Mat Cutting in Melbourne. heres a photo of the finished object waiting to go up on the wall - colours are very accurate and realistic i think.
It's a little tedious to click through all the photos on the site, so I created a little YouTube video that shows all my images from the safari. This should give anyone who's interested a pretty good overview of the different riders and bikes in the event. Now, if I can just get the youtube embed to work... <object width="560" height="315"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/14q1eG3lRr8&rel=1"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/14q1eG3lRr8&rel=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" width="560" height="315"></embed></object> Nope.
