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Published: February 11th 2005
Yes, it's cold
This is at "Lake" George, i put some long pants on after the photo - i just wanted to look tough.2005/02 Entry 2
Some of the photos didn't come out very well - bad contrast/brightness...oh well
DAY 4 : Goulburn - rest day
ODO = , DST = walked about a k, MAX = hmm 4km/h
Today was a rest day in Goulburn. Basically i just walked around town, ate a few donuts, updated the webpage, then ate some more donuts.
oh yeh, and i had a look from the lookout - twas some good lookin. And i saw the Big Merino - that's one big sheep.
Another big dinner, good sleep - i'll be getting up early in the morning, trying to make it to canberra.
DAY 5 : Goulburn --> Canberra
ODO = 337km, DST = 118km, MAX = 37km/h
I woke up at 5:30am (finally an early day) and got my stuff sorted. I was out the door by 7am.
It was cold! The first 20km saw me pushing into a gust wind. The next 30k's and i ahd a freezing cross wind. My fingers had gone numb so i put some
socks over my hands which worked better than i expected - i just couldn't change gears very
Rest my sweetie
Sorry, bad setup, but funny at the time...and still is...hehe easily.
For 20k's or so around
Lake George I had a tail wind and the road was dead flat. I was feeling good on the bike today, with flat or small rolling hills not straining at all.
I made it into
Canberra by 2pm, the weather was still pretty miserable but there were good signs early on that Canberra respects its cyclists - so i was happy.
I rode right up to
Parliament House and had a look around the outside. The bike security guards must have seen my scruffiness (especially my huge moustache) and thought i was a
terrorist because a guy quickly rode up to me to "see if you're looking for somewhere to park your bike" while looking for any exposed explosives.
We had a little chat about what i was doing and Mic (the security guard on the bicycle) said if i turn up tomorrow he'll bring some maps of where I'm thinking of going next (from Canberra to Tumut over some mountains).
I walked the bike around town for a while and had a second lunch at subway.
I eventually got hold of
Tanya and we met at a
"Lake" George
'twas a bit dry - i saw these cars towing boats pull up to where i was, i think they were given some bad information;) swanky restaurant with some of her friends - gourmet pizza was very nice (but i had a feeling that Canberra might blow my daily budget...oh well)
We all went out and saw
The Waifs that night at Tilly's (?) It was a pretty cool set - 2hours or so, including several encores. Although, i thought the guy, Josh, was a little too country for my liking (as in the way he sang...settle down my Orange country friends:P).
I eventually made it into bed at around 1am - it was a long day.
DAY 6 : Canberra - Rest day #1
DST = walked about 7km
Today was supposed to be a rest day, but it didn't really turn out that way. First off i went to have a walk and see all the
embassies - pretty cool stuff. From the good architecture - Singapore, to the bad - Germany.
I then had a walk around town and satisfied my pancake hunger at the
Pancake house - i had a stack of 4, but it wasn't anything to write home about (so why am i writing about it?...)
Anyway, i went back to see
I'm almost there
The bike lane went almost all the way to parliament house... my friend Mic at Parliament house. he didn't have any maps but he did go to the trouble of phoning up national Parks & Wildlife and talking to them about it. He suggested i tell them about what i'm doing and to get some maps off them.
That night i met Tanya's new housemate *cough*dickhead*cough*. Then Tanya showed me the "other" side of Canberra at
Toast. She managed to pull me up onto the dancefloor among the Goths and the Grunge ppl surrounding us. I think i mixed in quite nicely with my
Astro Boy t-shirt...hehe.
DAY 7 : Canberra - Rest day #2
Today was a sight seeing extravaganza. We started out by getting some maps for when i leave again tomorrow. The guy in the camping store seemed to have confidence in me that i could do it - at least there was one person i guess;P
We then stopped by the
War memorial and had a look around for an hour or two. As Tanya pointed out you could easily spend a whole day there just reading all the info.
We then drove up
Mt Ainslie and took some pic's of
Parliament house
I'm think i'm trying to show how everything is symmetrical in Canberra. the mountains i was going to cross tomorrow. It looked a bit scary.
We were going to go to Questacon next but baulked at the last minute, deciding instead to throw the "advanced"
frisbee in the park. It's no ordinary frisbee, i think you need a degree in physics before you can work out how to throw it properly. I must ahve made Tanya go up and down this one hill 30 times - and she kept on running the little trooper;P
Early night.
DAY 8 : Canberra --> Brindabella
ODO = 408km, DST = 70.5km, MAX = 47.5km/h
I said goodbye to Tanya in the morning and then waved goodbye to Canberra. I was hoping to make it to Brindabella today and Tumut tomorrow. I told Tanya to call National Parks & Wildlife if she didn't hear from me by Wednesday.
I somehow managed to get lost for 10mins as i made my way out of Canberra. There were heaps of cyclists on the roads and most of them managed to grunt hello as they went by. I was able to keep up with a couple of females on road bikes for about
2km - until we got to a hill where I slowed down so as not to make them feel bad (hehe just kidding).
The ride up the mountain was a good one - long and gradual. Some of the signs worried me a bit
"Roads not suitable for caravans" - which meant they were going to get a bit difficult up ahead. They were unsealed, and quite bumpy in parts (where water had erroded the dirt away).
I was a little pissed off after several hours of riding - the first 5 hours or so was going uphill, then in about 20mins at least half of the altitude gained was erroded (like the road) - that downhill was so steep i had my brakes on the whole time...oh well.
I arrived in Brindabella at about 2pm and just sat down by the river and listened to the cricket on my tranny.
DAY 9 : Brindabella --> Tumut
ODO = 483km, DST = 75km, MAX = 62km/h
I haven't written the next few entries in my actual journal yet, i've been lazy, so these will just be in not form i guess.
Brindabella to
Mountains ahead of me
This is on top of Mt Ainslie...looking out over the mountains i was to face the next day. tumut was rough. There was a steep climb out of brindabella. There was this guy that passed me and yelled out "you've only got a half hour to go and then it's downhill"...I thought that was good news. But i didn't really get my hopes up, 'cause you
never really can trust a motorist (sorry to basically everyone reading this page..hehe) when it comes to cycling. So yeh, he forgot to mention that his "half hour" was in fact based on me travelling 100km an hour up a mountain. Which, despite me getting fitter and feeling better going up mountains, wasn't quite achievable. So half a day later i reached the top - the logging trucks zooming by didn't help, but i could hear them coming.
Anyway, the downhill was eventually quite nice, and i had some
KFC and a cheesecake for dinner - you pig.
DAY 10 : Tumut --> Talbingo
ODO = 544km, DST = 60km, MAX = 55km/h
I opted for a short day today. The road was fairly flat, so everything was quite easy. I had my Tranny blasting from my handlebar bag. I visited the
Hydro electric scheme and even went
You're crazy
Little did Tanya know that while showing me the pose i should strike when i have my photo taken, she was to be the subject of the camera's lense..mwhaha on a tour of the place. It was pretty amazing what they've done. It was giving me a bit of a headache around some of those rooms though (lots of electricity running through them) so i was happy when it ended.
The camp site was asking $16 for me to pitch my tent - yeh right. The place was absolutely dead, no tourist in sight - you'd think they'd lower the prices in the off season, but no, $16....i went 2km out of town and pitch my tent at a free campsite, sure it didn't have a shower, but it had fast running stream😉
DAY 11 : Talbingo --> Kiandra
ODO = 607km, DST = 63km, MAX = 69km/h
I didn't feel like hitting any more of those unsealed logging roads to get to Tumbarumba (my planned destination). And i didn't want to back track to Tumut. So the only other way out of Talbingo was to go via the
Snowy Mountain Highway - so i did. It was steep, and hilly, and all things associated with mountains, but i made it to the top by the end of the day and pitched my tent in
Fire
I assume the Canberra fires a couple of years ago occured here - pretty devastating a ghost town (Kiandra used to be a mining town but there's no-one there at all anymore).
DAY 12 : Kiandra --> Cooma
ODO = 699km, DST = 92km, MAX = 55km/h
I got away early hoping to make it to Cooma. The scenery on the great dividing range was pretty scary (see photos). I got to see the
Big Trout at Adaminaby, and then went the rest of the way to
Cooma in the arvo.
So here i am in cooma! not sure where i'm going to next. I don't think i want to cross the snowy mountains for a third time, so i'll probably go south.
ok, more in a week probably!
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anonymous
non-member comment
Whoa nice errr bike
Hi Dan, you're looking very yellow and nice shave btw. its like 30+ here and you've got pants and a jacket on riding around. Good to see you enjoying your fit and well. See you when u get here. - Aylwin