Wandering Walgett Wildcats

Once upon a time, in the land down under, there lived a fair haired maiden named Katie, actually she has dark hair, but, for the sake of the tale, we will call it fair. Katie was on her way to the Wildcats Christmas in July Party, when she decided to make a last ditch attempt to wrest the highly coveted Wildcats “Road-Kill” trophy from Shano. From the word go, it was going to have to be a determined effort, Shano’s tally was currently standing at two roo’s killed at the same time by his own bike, albeit the second one was the first ones joey, but, within the strict guidelines of the adudicators it’s numbers that count with Road-Kill. So, due to the fact that a trio of roo’s were nowhere to be seen that day, it seemed, with every kilometre passing under Katie’s wheels, that the trophy, with all its accompanying accolades were quickly becoming unattainable.

Then, precisely at the time all Katie’s hopes were seemingly dashed, suddenly salvation appeared to be thundering down the road towards her, as in the distance a veritable herd of cattle hove into view. The road seemed to arc away to the left forever as they rushed towards each other, Katie’s heart rate quickened as they inexorably drew closer together, her vision blurred momentarily, as a vagrant tear, caused by the air rushing past her, welled in her eyes, then, casting all caution to the wind, Katie, her head filled with a vision splendid of dead cattle strewn all over the road, and the trophy held high in her hands, crossed the centre line of the road and aimed her bike for the front of the oncoming herd.

Ok, so perhaps it would have been better if it had happened that way, because, like any good fairy tale it would have had a happy ending, sadly though, for Katie, the cold hard truth, is, that, there was a mob of cattle, and Katie did hit the front end of them, unfortunately, the biggest problem was, they were in a B-Double at the time!! and I think a trophy was probably the furthest thing from her mind as she and the semi-trailer collided. The resultant amputation of Katie’s lower left leg, and the ensuing hardship, both physical and financial, led to a fund raising campaign that culminated in the running of the “Peg Leg Poker Run” Obviously we couldn’t help Katie with the physical pain, but, with the help of a hell of a lot of true blue Aussie bikers we at least helped a bit with the pain in the hip pocket.

For the Poker Run, many of the 70 plus riders had already done an impressive amount of kilometres just getting to the start at Walgett, so, for the likes of A.J., an oyster farmer, who, apart from riding 900 kilometres just to get there, also bought 11 dozen of his fresh oysters in the shell for the other riders, the final destination at the shed of Bikers Australia, Gilgandra Branch, was no doubt a more than welcome sight, made doubly so, by the sight and smell of a huge pig roasting on the spit as they wheeled around the back to park the bikes. It has to be said that the Gilgandra Branch were the highest standard of ambassadors for Bikers Australia, they bent over backwards to ensure, that, when we arrived everything we needed was there, the safe bike parking, mowed campsites, plenty of liquid refreshments, and the huge feed they put on at $5.00 a head for all you could eat, plus breakfast the following morning, meant that for the most part, they were all working flat out for most of the day and night, add to that, the cash donation to the fund raiser from part of the food and grog sales, well, like I said, “great ambassadors”.

An added bonus to the Poker Run, was, that with Katie managing to score an overnight pass from the hospital, she was able to spend a fair bit of time with us, including being able to draw the winners of the raffles and door prizes before having to head off. All up, I reckon it was a true showing of how bikers, probably more than any other sector of Aussie society, dig deep into their pockets and give a hell of a lot of their time to worthy causes, mind you, they usually always manage to have a bit of fun at the same time, but, the real reason why they are doing it and their sincerity is never very far from their hearts.

To all those involved in any way with the fund raiser, every member of the Wildcats thanks you for helping us. Stand up folks and take a bow, you more than deserve it.

Many thanks to Santa and Shadow for their photo contributions.

And in closing, a few words from Katie.

Although the trophy for the A-Z of Road-Kill is safely in the hands of Shano, how often can it be said that the winner of the most improved rider trophy also receives the coveted worst at keeping the shiny side up trophy on the same night.

Although the events of the day were very tiring for me, I had an awesome evening, wouldn't have missed it for the world. (Wouldn’t have had it, if I had missed the truck). Thanks to Bikers Australia for the fantastic evening and to all the Wildcats that made it all happen. Thanks also to the Ulysses mob from Tamworth for making my stay in Tamworth Base Hospital a little bit more bearable.

As I said in the discussion forum, the biker’s fraternity are an awesome family.