Dave and his Bike

Days 149 to 152.

Day 149.

Rest Day.

After five days on the bike I felt the need for a day off. My legs need to recover, and an overall ‘re-charge’ wouldn’t go amiss. Bendemeer seemed like a good place to do this; the campsite is cheap and clean; the pub serves breakfast; the countryside around is beautiful. Other than that there isn’t much to do, which on this occasion is rather nice. Most of my days off have been taken up sightseeing and walking, so a proper rest day of sitting with my feet up makes a nice change.

The aforementioned breakfast was excellent, marred only by the confusion caused by a computerised ordering system and till, making Jane’s poached eggs on toast an almost impossible feat. We got there eventually. The rest of the morning was spent doing laundry, sitting outside the van drinking coffee, and chatting with our neighbours.

The afternoon brought more of the same. I had a snooze and checked my bike over, Jane read her book. We didn’t leave the campsite.

Early evening here is early morning in Europe, so we caught up with a couple of video calls, had some dinner in the van, sampled the whiskey we bought yesterday, and had an early night as a storm grumbled it’s way around the valleys. We had a few drops of rain, with 10-20mm forecast. We’ll see what has transpired in the morning.

Day 150.

It had rained overnight, and was therefore pleasantly cool when we got up this morning.

When I left the campsite there were a couple of kilometres of very gentle ascent to start with. At this point my legs regretted having a day off – there was absolutely nothing there; no energy, no power, nothing. That’s quite often the case following a rest day on a long tour. I ground along in a ‘granny gear’ wondering (again) about how I’m going to get over the Andes in a few weeks time. Soon though came the big descent. I’d been at several hundred metres above sea level for a few days, and I knew that today’s route would take me down again. It did, quite spectacularly. For about 20km there was a mixture of steep and gentle drops, meaning that without much effort I hit my fastest speed so far (82.4kph), and recorded my fastest 5 mile, 10 mile, 5 km and 30km times on Strava. I’d planned to meet Jane in Tamworth after 40km for a coffee after 2 hours. I was there in 90 minutes.

Coffee was at McD’s – cheap and reasonable – then back on the road. It has been overcast pretty much all day, and the occasional shower started before lunch. We met again at the brilliantly named Currabubula for a sandwich, a cup of tea, and with enough time for Jane to fail at Wordle. No sleep this time – I decided to carry on, as my legs had remembered what they are supposed to be doing.

The road undulations were back to 2 and 3% climbs (mostly), but still enough of them for me to accumulate over 700m of climbing. There was also quite a good headwind, so it wasn’t all a free ride today – I still had to work at it.

I was riding towards the Towarri National Park, with the Coolah Tops NP also in the distance, so the scenery around me was interesting. I passed through Werris Creek where I stopped at the ANZAC war memorial, then carried on over the last hill and dropped down into Quirindi.

I was surprised to find Jane at the side of the road, and not on a campsite. Apparently the site wasn’t good, so after a search of several internet sites we found a site 30+ kilometres away which looked nice. It was good timing. Just as I put the bike in the van the heavens opened, and didn’t close again until we had arrived at the site, had a brew, been for a shower…

We are now on the site at the also excellently named Murrurundi. Clean, tidy, great showers, inexpensive. It has also stopped raining. Not sure how long for though.

Distance cycled so far: 7923km.

Day 151.

Not a brilliant day.

It had rained overnight, and apparently rumbled with thunder at times. I didn’t hear a thing and slept well. Sitting in bed with a cup of tea, and another almighty storm broke directly overhead. The sort where the lightening and thunder occur at the same instant. Impressive, but still makes you jump. The rain that accompanied it was of the same magnitude.

Having checked the forecast, I felt it prudent to wait a couple of hours, when allegedly the rain should have stopped. Therefore I set off at around 1030hrs in light drizzle and fair visibility. I planned to ride 30km until lunch, then 40 odd afterwards. Jane would have to skirt around, as I was going on gravel roads which the rented camper van is not allowed on. 15km in, and the rain came again. The road was quiet, and still tarmac, with some nice little climbs through the hilly landscape. Jane caught me at 20km, just as the rain was at its heaviest, so I sat in the van for five minutes until it eased, then set off again.

Unfortunately I then caught up with the slow moving storm again. At 24km I had decided that gravel riding in these conditions wasn’t the best idea I’ve had, so essentially was riding to the point where the tarmac ended and I would turn around or climb off. It seemed a bit of a futile exercise, so as much as I was enjoying the ride (which weirdly I was), I called it a day.

Over a damp lunch in the van we looked at options. No campsites nearby, so eventually we headed to our destination for the day (Scone) and I sacrificed the miles on the bike. On arrival the campsite wasn’t great. The office was also closed until tomorrow, so we drove on. We are now at tomorrow’s destination. More mileage lost.

I’m more than a bit miffed really. My mileage plans for Australia have completely disintegrated. Now that it’s not too hot, it’s too bloody wet or the route we want to take has no tarmac or no campsites at the end of it. And I’m running out of time to visit the places we want to go to, and make up the mileage. And whilst I’m ranting, saddle sore is becoming a right pain in the arse. Literally. I think it’s the heat, followed by the wet. I can’t win, despite chamois cream and a rigorous cleanliness routine.

To make matters worse, once we were installed on the very lovely campsite in Singleton the sun came out. Typical.

Rant over. I think that got it out of my system. It’s all just first world problems anyway.

On a brighter note, 50km or so tomorrow puts us in the heart of the Hunter Valley wine region. So at least I’ll be able to drown my sorrows and hopefully stop feeling sorry for myself. I’m looking forward to some nice red wine tasting, and no doubt we’ll come up with a plan for the next ten days.

Distance cycled so far: 7947km

Day 152.

Normal service resumed.

It was pleasantly cool again overnight, but no storms or much rain to speak of. Since my destination for the day wasn’t far away I was in no hurry to leave, so had a leisurely couple of cups of tea and some toast before setting off. I’d identify an indirect route to a campsite at the centre of the wine production area (or as near as we could find one). What I didn’t realise was that it passed by several open cast coal mines. Whilst you could see them from a distance, the only evidence that they existed closer up was the signposts to them from the main road. They’ve done a good job of not wrecking the area for hundreds of square kilometres around the mine, and judging by the number of kangaroo carcasses at the side of the road, the wildlife still exists in the area (and is subject to road collisions obviously).

Jane met me at Broke. We had a coffee and moved on as there wasn’t much there. The road was a bit rolling all day without feeling hilly, but the headwind from broke made me work a bit harder. I was soon riding through the Pokolbin area, where affluent wine estates started to appear.

At the junction with the main road is a small private airfield with a large number of hangars, positioned as if to accentuate the wealth of the area.

Jane had already pitched up and plugged in when I arrived, and a sandwich appeared a few seconds later. After lunch and a shower we headed out to the Tempus Two ‘cellar door’ (wine tasting and commercial outlet) to try some of their produce. We’d never heard of it until Brisbane, where we tried a bottle and loved it. The tasting session did not disappoint. We’ve booked onto the campsite for two nights, so another, possibly smaller producer, will need to be visited tomorrow.

A quick supermarket hit for dinner ingredients and we headed back to the site for a Dobson’s G&T and to turn the ingredients into a meal. Accompanied by a glass of Shiraz. Obviously.

Distance cycled so far: 8005km