Over the past few weeks I have noticed a petrol smell around my motorcycle, and I have made various efforts to see if fuel was leaking or whether the smell was some combination of imagination and vapours escaping from the fuel cap. Well the question was answered yesterday when I noticed a wet patch under the bike after it had been parked at the Kidman motel overnight. I even managed to see a few drops of fuel fall from the skid plate onto the ground. After some thought I googled for motorcycle repair shops in the area and eventually found Motorcycle and Marine in the town of Hay and made an appointment for today the 20th May. Thus the task for today is to get to Hay and make that appointment.

Before getting on with the day a couple pf photos of the Kidman Motel in Hillston

The 150km ride to Hay via Booligal was uneventful except for the unexpected 20+km of gravel road. The bike is definitely a lot more twitchy on gravel with the weight of my luggage and I was somewhat nervous and tense during that period of the ride.

I got to Hay in time for my appointment, dropped my luggage at a local motel, and delivered the bike to the repair shop. Thereafter I explored Hay on foot, here are a few photos.

The mechanic John was confident that the work would be finsished today 20th, but I have been around this loop before and so extended my motel booking for a second night on the expectation that I would not get the bike back until after checkout time tomorrow (21st May).

As it turned out I picked up the bike just before 10:00am checkout time but by then I had extended my room for another night. To fill in a bit of the day I did a little local sightseeing in particular I wanted a few photos of the famous Murrumbidgee River which passes through the town and is the source of water for much of the local farming activity.