From Goulburn, the Hume Highway is increasingly busy as we cycle towards Sydney. Getting closer though. Nearly there. 

The Blue Dot at Goulburn – 200km from Sydney. 

After 5 days cycling from Melbourne we have left the state of Victoria and reached Wagga Wagga in New South Wales.

Wagga Wagga is midway between Melbourne and Sydney and sits on the traditional land of the aboriginal Wiradjuri people. Wagga means crow and to create the plural the Wiradjuri repeat a word, thus ‘Wagga Wagga’ translates to ‘the place of many crows’. 

To arrive here we first cycled 81km north to Broadford. I’m now using Google Maps for navigation rather than the ridiculously poor Garmin Edge GPS and Google came through and found a series of cycle lanes and paths to get us 30km out the city.  One of the very few times we have found cycling through a city to be relatively pleasant.  Well done Melbourne and Google.

As we were cycling on the outskirts of Melbourne we spotted some ‘Roos. Now we’ve seen lots of countryside ‘Roos but these were the first inner city ‘Roos. 

They were lounging around in the afternoon sun, probably drinking and obviously didn’t have jobs. A couple of them stood up with attitude to guard their ‘corner’ of the neighbourhood and one of them, just outside the photo, was wearing a baseball cap back to front. That’s just what happens to ‘Roos when they reach the city. 
Second day, we continued 104km north to Shepparton via the Freeway M31. It’s really the only feasible cycle route north and it’s okay. A bit like cycling on the hardshoulder of the M6 and not for everyone but it gets the job done. 

Next day was 102km to Berrigan. It was sunny and hot (32c) and we were fried and tired by the time we reached our destination. Just when we needed a motel we found our arrival coincided with Berrigan Races and there’s was no room at the inns. Thankfully, there was a nice campsite and after a shower we headed to the local hotel. Everyone in Berrigan was at this hotel all dressed up like they had been at a wedding and having the biggest party. It was a big hotel with three marquees and I’m sure there must have been about a million people. After a few beers, Susan and I went to the local cafe for food – it was the only place for food. We had cold chips and salt and vingear chicken. Not the food of champions but I must say it’s the first time I’ve had salt and vinegar chicken. Nice. 

We kind of expected what was going to happen next. Although we were sleeping by 10pm we were awake again at 1am.  Yes a large number of guests from the biggest party the world has ever seen were also camping!  No point complaining because I think it was only Susan and I in the whole campsite trying to sleep.

Next morning we were pretty tired when we cycled out the campsite. If zombies could cycle we could have got a part in The Walking Dead. Now that I think of it, imagine how much excitement you could add to a zombie movie if they jumped on bicycles to chase you. It would certainly give the zombies a bit of an edge in a chase scene! 

Our destination for the day was Lockhart, 114km down the road. Although it was Sunday and everything was closed the lovely lady of this general store opened up and made us sandwiches. Thank you. 

 

Unfortunately that day we had a reasonably serious head wind. Now in general day to day cycling we have been pretty fortunate with favourable winds. I don’t really mention these winds as I prefer to have a moan about the wind and this day gave me real reason to moan. 

The wind was classified as moderate Gale Force. I mean what’s that all about? When is a Gale Force wind ever moderate? Oh, it might be moderate to all those sailor boys in their designer ‘Musto’ clothing but to us Lycra cyclists it’s definitely not bl**dy moderate! I think cyclists should ditch the Beaufort Scale and have their own wind classification ranging from ‘can cope with that’ through to ‘ridiculously hard’ and ‘efin unbelievable’. It would certainly be more relevant. 

On our cycle we reached a flat open area where the wind could happily blow to its hearts content.  

Large swathes of Australian countryside have been cleared of trees over the last two hundred years for farming. Sheep farming has now halved in the last 20 years and there are vast tracts of unused empty pastureland. Here’s two lonely trees.

Crossing 15km of this flat plain against ‘ridiculously hard’ head wind was probably the hardest cycle we have had since the last hard cycle I moaned about. Average speed was 9km/hr and that was with all our effort. At times we were blown nearly to a stop. 

Now was the time for Susan and I to dig deep and at moments like these we have a motivational saying. It’s kind of a family motto. ‘When you just can’t keep going. Keep going‘. 

You see I’m right into these management motivational posters. You know the type – the ones with pictures of whale tails and mountains and sunsets with words like ‘attitude’, ‘teamwork’ and ‘success’. Pride of place in our living room, above the fireplace of course, is a poster of a cycle and Everest with our family motto. 

So when Susan looked at me with pain in her eyes she knew what I was thinking. ‘Keep going Susan’ was the message. She just smiled and nodded. ‘Keep going Clif’ she wordlessly replied. So we battled on. We kept going. Honestly, we were an inspiration. 

We made it to a small town called Urana, still 44km from our goal destination Lockhart. The wind was still blowing hard when we turned eastwards onto the Lockhart road. We stopped, looked at each other with pain and tiredness across our faces and started cycling again.  

Actually, we cycled back 500m to the campsite we had just passed! I secured a nice cosy cabin even although we had a tent and within 15 minutes we were sitting eating ice cream. Sweet. 75km cycled that day. 

So we have now changed our family motivational motto to something far more realistic and ordered a new poster for our living room. 

‘When you just can’t keep going. Get a cabin‘. 

After a good nights sleep in our cabin and a huge bowl of porridge we headed for Wagga Wagga. The road was relatively quiet for the 111km and we celebrated being half way from Melbourne to Sydney with beef nachos and beer in the local pub. 

Cycling life is great.

Particularly if you have a cabin. 

4,349 km to date. 

1 cabin to date. 

The Blue Dot moves north towards Sydney. 

Perth is okay. Adelaide is good. Melbourne is marvellous. 

We have spent the last few days wandering the streets and taking in the sights since we arrived on Sunday. Although we would love to have a full on, non stop, city break the reality is a little different because we are knackered. On our first day we actually had to return to our hotel in the afternoon to have a wee sleep. Ah poor old cycling people 😴

Sundays are a bit of a concern for me in Australia as many restaurants and bars don’t open. I believe it’s largely to do with wage rates that apply on a Sunday. Thankfully, I have an inbuilt beer radar and even though the hotel recommended two bars that were closed we luckily came across The Mitre pub. It transpired its actually the oldest building in Melbourne and, if you think about it, it’s really a museum that sells beer. The food was also great so next time you’re in Melbourne then please visit this ‘museum’ as part of your cultural day. 

Here’s a couple of photos of central Melbourne and the Yarra River.

Here is Flinders Street Station, a cultural icon in Melbourne.

And here’s me in the conservatory at Fitzroy Gardens. I think the photo brings out my sensitive and soft nature. 

Now a photo of the world famous cricket ground, the MCG.

To be honest I’ve just put that photo in for my pal Brian. He’s a stadium groupie and collects pictures of them. He even got a job at a national stadium just to be near one. So Brian, this photo is for you. Enjoy! 

Finally, a photo of every guys’ desire, second only to beer. 

Yes it’s a cakes. Honestly, how good is that display guys?

Sorry, no time to write anything else. We are cycling north towards Sydney tomorrow and tonight I have to revisit a certain ‘museum’ to do some carb loading. Old Lardy ass and Little Miss Perfect are back on the road again! 

I said I was tempting fate when I wrote about how lucky we have been with the rain during our cycle across Oz. Well, next morning as we prepared to leave Apollo Bay the rain was lashing down. We were a bit concerned as the Great Ocean Road hugs the steep shoreline as it winds it’s way around the coastline promontories and is regularly closed due to subsidence in wet weather. In the last week it had been closed, open, closed and was now open again. 

It wasn’t long before we were pretty well soaked through. As I tend to lie in a more reclined position I find the water runs up my sleeves and under my jacket. Susan doesn’t fare much better.

Apologies for the blurred rain spots on the photo as I couldn’t keep the camera dry. Susan isn’t actually smiling – her face is frozen in that position for it was the coldest October day for 6 years. Here is a photo of our way ahead – you can just make out the road.  

Soon we were cycling around minor landslides and rockfalls. Rivers flowed down the hills and over the road. We kept wondering whether we had passed the section that is regularly closed but soon decided the whole thing was pretty precarious in this weather. The road was littered with fallen rocks and we were glad we had our cycle helmets as we cycled under the cliffs. 

Thankfully we were only cycling 44km that day to Lorne and the lovely old Grand Pacific Hotel. By the time we arrived we were frozen, wet and walked like penguins because we couldn’t feel our feet.  That’s actually why penguins walk like that, so I’m told. 

A couple of hours after we cycled the Great Ocean Road was closed and remained that way for two days. The alternative would have been a cycle inland over the mountains. No thanks. 

Susan managed to get an extra fan heater for our room and turned the bathroom into an oven and dried our clothes. It was a great effort but the following day it was, unfortunately, still raining. Our dry clothes were soon wet clothes as we set off for Geelong 

The rain was on and off as mini storms swept across from the Southern Ocean.  The wind was either behind us (hooray) or hitting us from the side (oh no!) and several times I thought we were going over. 

Here’s a repeat of the picture of Susan sheltering under the gum trees because I just love these gum trees. Oh it’s okay I made sure the lightning had stopped before we sheltered. In case you’re wondering (you’re probably not) she is holding her seat cushion trying to keep it dry. Men don’t do that kind of thing so my seat cushion is on the bike getting wet. 

We stopped at a cafe and met Johnny Isaak (johnnyisaak.com) who was sheltering from the rain.  He is cycle touring from Hobart to Darwin or maybe Cairns – I can’t really remember because my brain was frozen. Johnny is only the fourth touring cyclist we’ve met in Australia.

I do remember we did have some nice coffee and wonderful cake. Now I know there’s lots a cake people who want more information so I had raspberry and apple tea cake whilst Susan had lemon and ricotta. You know there’s so much rubbish cake out there that it makes a pleasant surprise when you come across a small cafe in a small town that beats the rest. Here’s a picture of us smiling during a brief interlude in the rain. You just can’t keep us down when it’s a great cake day! 

We passed under the memorial arch for the Great Ocean Road that recognises the magnificent efforts of those returning WW1 soldiers who built the road. 

After 66km and a reasonable 2,500 feet ascent we reached Geelong and were made very welcome by the motel.  Goodbye Great Ocean Road. 

The following day we cycled 77km into Melbourne. I ditched the Garmin Edge for the day as the routing is so dreadfully poor despite the efforts of the Garmin help desk.  Google maps was called into action and found the Federation Trail that followed the route of an old open sewer. It’s okay the sewer isn’t used anymore but it wouldn’t have bothered us anyway – people would have actually complained about the smell of us cycling alongside the sewer. Anyway with the help of Google we avoided most of the city centre traffic.  Outstanding.  

So here we are in Melbourne for a few days sightseeing before our final push to Sydney. 

3,877 km to date.