beauty and the beast

Massive and Everywhere.

We have arrived at Eden, (it’s in New South Wales, for anyone whose been looking for it) and we’re finally heading North towards Sydney. John’s bike has developed a healthy ‘Clicking’ noise, which has left two bike shops stumped. My favourite reason for it is, “because it’s an aluminium frame”.






People talk about the Snakes and Spiders here in Oz but I’m far more worried about these bastards! Massive and Everywhere!

....lovely

For the last week, every camper going the opposite direction to us has said the same thing; "Are you going to Mallacoota? It's Lovely."


Wanting to know what all the fuss is about we took a 23km detour to get there. Situated in the middle of Croajingolong National Park, it’s a quiet little town where everything shuts for the weekend and it becomes a ghost town after 4pm daily; we arrived at 5pm, Saturday.
To stop us from starving a friendly fisherman gave us some of his morning catch, the fish was beautiful, and had a hint of green about it. The locals are welcoming and the weather sunny (of course!). It was lovely, although much the same as all the other small towns we have visited recently; only this one had shops (except, of course, they were shut.)

4wheel drive? ones' enough for me!

Feeling very good today, we’ve done 2 days of cycling through Rainforest and National parks. We found a track called the Old Coast road, it’s strictly 4Wheel Drive and includes lots of big climbs up mount thingy before it drops steeply down into a swampy creak. By the end of the first day having only travel half our normal distance we were talking about hiring a van and throwing the bikes in the back; luckily, we found a pub were we had quite a few beers and a big steak, slowly but surely our confidence was restored.

The next day, knowing what we were in for, we felt a little more at ease, and soon we were ‘happily’ pushing our bikes up a sand track into the wilderness. After that everything seemed also easy. The Forest rolled on as far as the eye could see; we’d steadily climb to the top through the bush, admire the views (usually the next mountain we had to scale) – then plummet down the rock-strewn paths. But perhaps the best thing of all was that in the 2 days that we were out of civilisation we saw 2 other people.

1000km down,....100000 to go

“Hurrah! Hurrah! + Vive l’Empereur!” We cried, a major motion has come to pass…. (John has almost finished War and Peace) but Also…. We reached the 1000km mark… It occurred during a Very lazy day of cycling too, so we were able to really appreciate the moment; forgetting the hills, nay, Mountains we’ve scaled to reach this point.
But some of you, mainly our mothers, may be worrying that we’re not eating enough, for this gallant effort. So let me put your fears to rest, today we had Nutella and Banana milkshake for breakfast, Crisps, coke and hamburgers for lunch and Chips Calamari, deep fried prawns for dinner, with Marshmallows and gobstoppers for pudding. The Chip Shop was a most excellent place, serving Platters of chips and everything in extreme portions; all under the slogan “You Catch it… We’ll Cook It.” (not that we did...) well there was nothing else in 'Marlo'...

single track mind

The mail we were waiting for has arrived! So we headed out of Bairnsdale on Thursday (16th March) morning. It’s only 35km from Bairnsdale to Lake’s Entrance, but we came across a superb bike track which covers 65km to get to the same place. The first leg was along the East Gippsland Rail Trail (This historic trail has not used since 1987). The trail took us 35km up Mount Little Dick, north to Bruthen, where we stopped for a sandwich and stretch. The first 8km of the afternoon leg was a gradual climb into the beautiful Eucalyptus forest (the Kookaburras laughed constantly as we struggled to get to the top). Once at the top we joined the Gippsland Lakes Discovery Trail and were able to put our mountain biking skills to the test; 20km of single track, with white knuckle steep descents and sharp sandy turns. To intensify the brilliant experience, thunder and lightning hammered down on us as we flew through the eerie creaking Jurassic forest.

Upon leaving the forest, soaking wet, freezing cold and one puncture later (I don’t know how Ann managed to find a drawing pin 10km from civilization) we found ourselves in Lakes Entrance, camping next to 90-mile Beach.

be civil

We’re siiiiiiiiiiiiinging in the rain… it’s ‘coastal’ here, near the sea.
We have some weather at last and our tent is awfully damp but so far only on the outside.

We’re in Bairnsdale(which sounds like it should be ‘up north), waiting for a letter from the friendly Medicare Centre who’ll pay towards treatment should the untoward happen to either of us.(although we have waited 6weeks so far - Bloody servants of the public, taking their good for nothing time over the simplest of matters, and no doubt this outburst will put me at the bottom of a pile in the darkest corner of a deserted town regional head office marked Urgent.)
Luckily we have almost all the time in the world.

Some locals we met on the way there...

nearly there...

The last few days saw us pass through San Remo, Inverloch, Wonthaggi, Walkerville, Tarwin Lower, Foster, Toora and Welshpool ,Yarram and Sale. There were many more that flashed by but were of such littler substance that I can’t ratify their existence.

(For us..)Today's the 14th; On the 12th we cycled 80km in one day to get to Sale, so we decided we'd earned a day off and treated ourselves to some lovely lamb chops on a BBQ for dinner. We didn’t cycle yesterday as, I’m sure you’ll all be glad to hear, we had a heavy storm and lots of rain. So today we're finally heading out of town towards Bairnsdale.

Come Fly with me.....

3rd March
Up early(ish) and headed out of town. Feeling confident we cycled the extra few Kms to see the Grand Prix Track … it’s flattish and black. A few miles down the rode we saw another sign we couldn’t ignore… Helicopter Rides $50. As we ummed and erred we saw a helicopter whiz through the air above our heads, and the decision was made.



(Ann got over excited and rode straight towards the aircraft hanger never mind the ditch in between! – In slow motion, she flew over the handlebars followed by the trailer – which appeared to be travelling a lot quicker )

2 Cowes? 2nd Mrach

Set off on our adventure just after 7am, dashed through town and quite impressively only missed our train by a few minutes. Still, this afforded us a day in Frankston a town we rapidly passed through on our tour of the bay.
3 hours later our train deposited us at the ferry port and we waited for the days last ferry to Phillip Island.
The ‘Ferry’ turned out to be a glorified fishing boat, and as it was packed with senior citizens we sat at the very back and got soaked by spray. We landed at Phillip Island’s biggest town…Cowes, which was preparing for two big celebrations. The arrival of the Queen’s Baton Relay on it’s way to the Commonwealth Games and the annual Superbike round the island race. Despite there being many visitors the place was very sleepy and everything was shut by 4pm!
We attempted to see little ‘fairy’ penguins waddle their way up a beach to their nests at dusk (Phillip Islands biggest tourist attraction is the Penguin Parade) but having booked to share a taxi with a fellow bicycle tourer; he sadly backed out at the last minute, so we will have to visit the penguins another time.