Round Australia Bike Ride - Day 004 - Port Macquarie to Macksville

Day:  004

Date: Sunday, 05 July 2020

Start:  Port Macquarie

Finish:  Macksville

Daily Kilometres:  115

Total Kilometres:  474

Weather:  Very cold early with a fresh westerly breeze and sun all day

Accommodation:  Motel

Nutrition:

  Breakfast:  Vanilla slice

  Lunch:  Egg & bacon sandwich, caramel slice

  Dinner:  Chilli Con Carne, Apple & sticky toffee pies

Aches:  I was conscious of my troublesome hip today and Julie has some knee grazes (see below).  Both of us were feeling quite tired this afternoon.  My lack of starting fitness and Julie's lack of biking probably explains it.

Highlight:  Eating a scrumptious vanilla slice purchased from the Crescent Head bakery (thanks for the recommendation, Lauren) while sitting in the sun on the spectacular Crescent Head foreshore watching all of the holiday-makers enjoying themselves.

Lowlight:  Twice today, poor Julie didn't manage to disengage her right foot cleat when stopping and fell heavily on her right knee and now bears some scars.  Of course, she says it's fine.

Pictures: Click here

Map and Position: Click here for Google Map

Journal:

We pedalled out of Port Macquarie soon after 7am on a very cold (feels like 1°C) and sunny morning and caught the Settlement Point car ferry across the Hastings River to begin our journey north.

The mostly unsealed road initially passed through the dark and cold Limeburners Creek National Park, steam rising from the marshy forest floor.  There was negligible traffic as we followed the Maria River valley and we were able to ride in the middle of the road, choosing the line with the least potholes and corrugations, though most of the time the road wasn't too bad.  Further north, the road emerged firstly into some plantations (jojoba? …. wild guess) and then later into green grazing pastures interspersed with wetlands.  It was all low-lying and most houses were either on stilts or on built up earth mounds, presumably to deal with floods.

We reached the small beach town of Crescent Head at 10am and bought some vanilla slices for breakfast and adjourned to a park on the beach foreshore (see above).  The place was buzzing with school vacationers, many in the surf, though most with wetsuits.  It was warm in the sun, but probably cold in the water.  Hard to believe it is the middle of winter.

From Crescent Head we had more quiet backroads, though now sealed, and after the forested Hat Head National Park, turned inland to follow the Belmore River through more very flat green grazing country.  Although flat, the wind was generally across us, and occasionally against us, and we were both getting quite tired.  We stopped for lunch at noon in the small river village of Gladstone where we shared a very tasty, but very over-priced, toasted sandwich on the river foreshore, before continuing on.

After another hour, our route began gradually climbing until it met the Sydney-Brisbane freeway around 2:15pm.  Here we had to decide between a relatively easy 21km along the freeway direct to our destination, Macksville, or taking the suggested route (NSW Coast Cycle Route) of 32km, and probably a few good hills, via Grassy Head.  Our legs won the vote and we took the direct route, arriving in Macksville around 3:15pm.

We stopped at a supermarket on the way into town and picked up some frozen microwavable food for dinner, then pedalled the remaining 2km to our budget motel on the outskirts of town.

Both of us have some tired and sore muscles, so won't mind a shorter day tomorrow with a day off on Tuesday.  We are getting fitter, but a recovery day won't go astray.