Unforeseen hold-ups on Saturday morning meant a frantic mid-day dash to pack up the ute ready for a dirty weekend in Kapunda.

Kapunda is a mining town, and this chappie stands guard at the border of the town and welcomes visitors - fab enough to stop for and take a piccie of, I figure :oD

We were heading out there to watch the annual 24 hour dirt bike endurance race. (made you look with that title though, eh?)

The drive to our temporary home only took about half an hour from the city, and despite our late start to the day, we only just missed the last of the entrants leaving the main control as they started their race. After looking at the map, we headed out to the control we'd be camping at and following a few false starts, eventually found it, said hi to Rob's friends manning the check point, then headed out to try and catch up with the riders he knows and see them as they went through the check points.

As it was a timed race, the riders each leave on an appointed minute, then race to the next checkpoint as quickly as they can, where they get a signature, and wait to their appointed time before setting off to the next control. The faster they race to the next point the longer they get to rest. The entire race of 24 hours would only be 4 full laps of the circuit, so to see the riders, we had to follow them around the course and try to get to to a good vantage point before they raced past us.

Here are some of the pics I got during the day: View image, View image, View image, View image, View image, View image.

As it got darker, we headed back to our control station and waited for the riders to come to us. Despite the dire rain-filled predictions from the TV weatherman, we had been enjoying the most beautiful day - all clear blue sky and warm weather. So nice, in fact we decided not to bother putting up the tent, but to sleep in the swag in the back of the ute - a truely Aussie experience!

The first of the sidecars arrived at about 5pm, and for the next couple of hours, riders trickled by, covered in mud but still going strong. By around 8, the beer was flowing, the BBQ had been fired up and the socialising had begun in ernest. The riders wouldn't be back till after 11 and it would take almost 2 hours for them all to pass through, then the first of the sidecars would be calling on us again at about 6am. We wouldn't be getting a whole heap of sleep, but the poor riders were getting less. The beer was cold, the night was warm (especially round the campfires) and the company was good.

I was a total lightweight and disappeared off to the back of the ute for some sleep after 2am - the stalwarts stayed up drinking till well after 4am. Waking up to the noise of sidecars and revving dirtbikes at 6am was an experience - especially as mist had descended on the hillside and the all I could see was white in front of me.

Being the bright type, I had left my boots outside when I crawled into the ute under the roof cover the night before, so the first thing to do was to pour rain water out of them before slipping, sliding and squelching my way to the checkpoint - doh!

Packing up in the morning to head out to main control for coffee and breakfast took a matter of mere minutes. As you can see from the picture, it was chucking it down, and the hillside was fast becoming a muddy mess as all the cars, vans and utes churned up the ground as they headed back to main.

As pretty much the last ones to leave the hill, it took us a while to get back down the steep hill, as the front tyres locked up with mud, and we had to have a few friendly hands to help us out after we got stuck... We finally made it in time to see most of the racers finish; wet, muddy, tired, but very happy to have got there! A real achievement methinks. I was deeply impressed that they managed to keep going through the night.

I had an awesome weekend! I got home on Sunday afternoon still wet, caked with mud, and very tired, but loving it and deeply tempted to have a go at sidecars in the future. There's something about them that are just begging me to give it a shot. Maybe one day?