Round Australia Bike Ride - Day 106 - Murray Bridge to Policeman Point

Day:  106

Date:  Thursday, 15 October 2020

Start:  Murray Bridge

Finish:  Policeman Point

Daily Kilometres:  133 (click for Julie's Strava and photos)

Total Kilometres:  10995

Weather:  Mild and overcast in the morning, overcast and windy with some rain in the afternoon

Accommodation:  Motel

Nutrition:

  Breakfast:  Egg & bacon rolls

  Lunch:  Ham salad roll/Chicken salad roll

  Dinner:  Pizza, chocolate pudding & cream

Aches:  Nursing a troublesome right hip flexor

Highlight:  Riding alongside The Coorong, the famous and internationally recognised 130km long lagoon system/wetland formed as part of the Murray River estuary and separated from the Southern Ocean by the long stretch of sand dunes known as the Younghusband peninsula.  In today's weather, it looked wild and unforgiving, with the shallow lagoon whipped into whitecaps, the dunes separating the ocean from The Coorong indistinct in the rain, and pelicans struggling to make headway and maintain formation as they flew overhead (it was the location for the movie, Storm Boy).  It seemed remote and inhospitable, with just a few fishing shacks in sheltered hollows, a couple of sheep stations, and the small town of Meningie, but apparently it was the most densely populated area in Australia prior to European settlement.

Lowlight:  I got stung by an unseen bee on one of my fingers while riding.

Pictures: Click here

Map and Position: Click here for Google Map

Journal:

We had a relatively easy 130km planned for today, with a couple of towns en route and a light following wind forecast, so we didn't hit the road until about 6:45am.  We started by riding through the regional town of Murray Bridge and crossing the Murray River on the long bridge which, because of its narrowness, did not make it easy to stop and take photos.  We stopped on the eastern side and Julie ran back on the narrow pedestrian path, still wearing her helmet, to take the required photos.

From Murray Bridge we had a pleasant morning ride across rolling green pastures under cloudy skies paralleling the river to the small town of Tailem Bend where we bought some breakfast at a roadhouse around 8am.  We turned off the main Adelaide to Melbourne road soon afterwards, towards The Coorong (see above) and the small holiday town of Meningie.  Shallow lakes, sand flats, and marshy areas began appearing in the lower lying areas, while the higher ground remained green pastureland.  Near Meningie, we reached the broad expanse of The Coorong with the sand dunes separating it from the ocean visible in the far distance.  When we reached the town, we found a bakery where we bought sandwiches for lunch today and for breakfast tomorrow, along with a morning snack which we ate in a pretty foreshore park.

Soon after leaving Meningie, at around 1pm, the weather took a sharp turn for the worse, with a vicious cold south-easterly headwind springing up to make cycling very hard.  Our speed dropped, but time wasn't an issue as we only had about 40km remaining for the day.  We stopped for a quick lunch at an exposed little picnic area overlooking the windblown Coorong around 1:30pm and then struggled into the wind for the last 18km to Policeman Point, our destination for the day.

Policeman Point is no more than a windswept couple of houses and a tiny hotel-motel in the middle of nowhere, but it was a welcome sight to us and we checked in at 3pm and shortly after were enjoying warm showers in our room.  The rest of the afternoon was spent trip-planning and relaxing, after which we bought dinner at the pub and had an early night.  I think we are the only people staying here.

Round Australia Bike Ride - Day 105 - Adelaide to Murray Bridge

Day:  105

Date:  Wednesday, 14 October 2020

Start:  Adelaide

Finish:  Murray Bridge

Daily Kilometres:  82 (click for Julie's Strava and photos)

Total Kilometres:  10862

Weather:  Very warm and mostly sunny

Accommodation:  Motel

Nutrition:

  Breakfast:  Huge Italian breakfast

  Lunch:  Ham, cheese & salad rolls

  Dinner:  Bangers & mash/Chicken pasta bake, ice-creams

Aches:  My hip flexor has been quite sore today 

Highlight:  Meeting up for breakfast with friends from home, Bec and Ron, who are in Adelaide for their daughter's wedding.  It was nice to see some familiar faces and we had a good chat over an exotic and huge Italian breakfast.

Lowlight:  None really.  It was a tough climb out of Adelaide, but we knew it would be and the beautiful scenery was more than adequate compensation. 

Pictures: Click here

Map and Position: Click here for Google Map

Journal:

We were meeting Central Coast friends, Bec and Ron, for breakfast near our apartment at 8am, so we got up early enough to pack our bikes ready to go before walking to the cafe for a very pleasant catch-up (see above).

After breakfast, we returned to our apartment, checked out at 10:15am and pedalled south-east out of the city on a warm and sunny morning.  Our major cycling task for the day, climbing over the shoulder of Mt Lofty on the Crafers bike trail, began after a few gradually uphill kilometres of suburbia.  The bike path followed the route of the old major road out of Adelaide to the south-east which had been superseded by a freeway that could be seen for much of the early ascent.  The climb never got steep enough to require walking, but it was long and quite warm, and we were envious of the road cyclists whizzing down from the opposite direction.  Near the top, there were some spectacular views back over Adelaide through gaps in the peaceful bush bordering the road.

Once we got to the top, we discovered that we could not join the freeway as I had hoped (for easier riding), and had to follow some old roads through the Adelaide hills instead.  They took us on a winding and undulating route through the lushly beautiful mountain scenery, past lovely homes and cosy little villages, and on some exhilarating descents.

At Hahndorf, a very touristy and busy village set in an attractive wine district, we bought some lunch which we ate at a park 5km further along the road with 45km to go to Murray Bridge, our goal for the day.

On the Google elevation profile for our day's ride, it showed a steady descent after our climb over Mt Lofty, but it was anything but.  It seemed that every little village was in a valley that was preceded by a fast descent and followed by a grinding ascent.  There was a sporadic following wind which helped, but we found the hills hard, perhaps because we were out of practice after many days of outback riding.

As the afternoon progressed, the country opened out into farming land and the hills became less frequent.  An amusing episode occurred in the last 15km when we passed a guy wearing denim jeans doing something to his road bike by the side of the road.  I said "g'day" as we passed but he was unresponsive.  Then, a few minutes later he pedalled furiously past us without saying a word and then kept looking back to see where we were.  He even took a gravel road shortcut on a sweeping bend to get further ahead.  After another 5km, and going up a steady hill, we saw him up ahead walking along the road pushing his bike.  He looked back, saw us coming, and jumped back on his bike and began pedalling hard again.  We never did catch him.

We reached the town of Murray Bridge around 3:45pm and checked into our motel on the western outskirts of town.  Later, we bought some supplies from a nearby small supermarket and microwaved our dinner back at the motel.

Round Australia Bike Ride - Day 104 - Adelaide

Day:  104

Date:  Tuesday, 13 October 2020

Start:  Adelaide

Finish:  Adelaide

Daily Kilometres:  0 (click here and for Julie's Strava and photos of today's walks)

Total Kilometres:  10780

Weather:  Warm and sunny

Accommodation:  Apartment

Nutrition:

  Breakfast:  Scrambled eggs, rissoles & bacon

  Lunch:  Egg & salad roll/Tandoori chicken roll

  Dinner:  Rissoles & vegetables/Steak & vegetables, apple crumble & ice cream

Aches:  Nothing significant

Highlight:  Nothing in particular, but a very pleasant warm sunny day wandering around Adelaide

Lowlight:  Lukewarm showers in our apartment until a maintenance man found a previous tenant had turned off a valve (or so he said).

Pictures: Click here

Map and Position: Click here for Google Map

Journal:

We had a slow start to the day and enjoyed a home-cooked breakfast, for a change, before going for a walk around the downtown area including paths along the River Torrens, the Adelaide Oval, Rundle Mall, Pilgrim Uniting Church (where my sister was minister for a number of years) and the lively and interesting Central Markets full of appetising food and fresh produce stalls (and where COVID-19 seemed to be a distant memory).

We bought some scrumptious rolls from one of the market vendors and took them to the very pleasant Victoria Square where we joined scores of office workers eating lunch on a beautiful spring day.  After lunch, we caught a tram to the city's main beachside suburb, Glenelg, and had a wander around before returning to the city and collecting our serviced bikes from the shop near our apartment.  No major problems were found, which is a testament to the quality of the bikes given the pounding they have received over the past 8,000 kilometres with virtually no maintenance.

We had another home-cooked meal for dinner and a quiet evening.  Back on the road tomorrow.

Round Australia Bike Ride - Day 103 - Auburn to Adelaide

Day:  103

Date:  Monday, 12 October 2020

Start:  Auburn

Finish:  Adelaide

Daily Kilometres:  110 (click for Julie's Strava and photos)

Total Kilometres:  10780

Weather:  Cool early, then warm and mostly overcast

Accommodation:  Apartment

Nutrition:

  Breakfast:  Egg & bacon roll

  Lunch:  Honey chicken & rice/Pad Thai

  Dinner:  Nachos, apple crumble & ice cream

Aches:  Nothing significant

Highlight:  Reaching Adelaide, another milestone on our journey.

Lowlight:  We encountered more traffic lights on our ride into Adelaide this morning than we have seen in total in the last three months, and most of them were red.  It seemed that almost every light was green as we approached from about 400 metres away, and nine out of ten turned red just before we reached them.

Pictures: Click here

Map and Position: Click here for Google Map

Journal:

We had promised the bike shop in Adelaide, where we had arranged to have our bikes serviced, that we would get them there as early today as possible because they had a heavy schedule.  With 110km to travel, we thought delivering them around lunchtime was possible if we didn't mess around.  We didn't want to start too early, because the road into Adelaide was likely to be Monday morning busy and cycle-unfriendly, making riding in the dark risky.  So, we left soon after 6am as the sky was lightening, with the goal of first riding 60km to a truckstop for breakfast.

The sunrise was again beautiful with the clouds glowing pink and creating some beautiful tree silhouettes on the horizon.  To the west, the first rays turned the trees on the top of the hill the shades of autumn while the fields below remained dark.  Very special.

There was an increasing amount of traffic and we spent a lot of our time checking our rear-view mirrors.  A few large trucks gave us warning horn blasts when oncoming traffic gave them little room to move over, and we spent some time in the dirt.  One highlight occurred when we came upon a wallaby in the grass verge between the road and a fence.  It was startled by my arrival and took off along the fence looking for an opening and travelling at the same speed as I was riding.  For a time we were travelling together just a few metres apart, but then it found a hole under the fence and was gone.

Although Google showed our ride for the day was gradually downhill, that's not the way it seemed.  We had a number of long gradual climbs that sapped our energy  despite assistance from a following breeze.  Around 9am, we reached the truckstop and bought some breakfast which we ate sitting on a kerb in the adjacent carwash.  Soon after, as we continued south, we passed through the large town of Gawler and from that point on were mainly riding through suburbia on the Main North Road into Adelaide.  There was a lot of traffic (and traffic lights), but it wasn't too bad and we made good time, arriving at the Torrens River on the northern edge of the city at 11:30am.

We needed to get our bikes to the bike shop as quickly as possible and suspected we were too early to check in to our booked apartment, so we stopped at a toilet block and did a quick change out of our cycling gear then rode a kilometre to the apartment block hoping we could leave our bags in storage there while we took our bikes to the shop which was nearby.  As it turned out, they let us check in at noon, so we dropped our bags in the apartment and delivered the bikes by 12:30pm, satisfied we had done our best.

After leaving the bikes, we walked a kilometre to the Rundle Mall, Adelaide's main shopping strip, and found a food court for lunch.  Afterwards, we did some supermarket shopping with the intent of using the apartment cooking facilities to cook our meals for the next couple of nights (for a change), and then returned to the apartment.

Later we cooked dinner and relaxed enjoying the excellent view we have over the city to the south and east.

Round Australia Bike Ride - Day 102 - Orroroo to Auburn

Day:  102

Date:  Sunday, 11 October 2020

Start:  Orroroo

Finish:  Auburn

Daily Kilometres:  156 (click for Julie's Strava and photos)

Total Kilometres:  10670

Weather:  Cold early, then sunny and warm

Accommodation:  Motel

Nutrition:

  Breakfast:  Pies

  Lunch:  Toasted lamb, cheese & tomato roll/Hot lamb roll with gravy

  Dinner:  Fish, chips & salad/Hamburger & chips, ice cream

Aches:  Nothing to speak of

Highlight:  Yet again, a beautiful dawn.  As we rode out of Orroroo on a very quiet road, the sun turned high clouds pink on the horizon ahead and then slowly lit up the gentle rural landscape around us..

Lowlight:  An aggrieved magpie swooped on me a couple of times, just missing my helmet, as we rode down a stretch of road bordered by magnificent old eucalypts.  Julie, who was riding behind, enjoyed the show, but failed to get any pictures.

Pictures: Click here

Map and Position: Click here for Google Map

Journal:

We left a sleeping Orroroo and headed south on a very quiet road into a magnificent sunrise (see above).  Our target for the day was the small town of Auburn in the Clare Valley wine district, 156km  away.  The weather forecast was for a following/cross breeze, but nobody had told the weather gods, and a light head-breeze and very gradual uphill made the first few hours relatively hard work, but the beautiful rural scenery compensated.  The rolling hills gradually changed from sheep grazing to crops, the road was often lined with eucalypts, and there were more farms and houses along the way, some of them very old.

After 56km, we stopped for breakfast in the town of Jamestown, whose signage proudly claimed it to be the birthplace of the iconic Australian, R.M. Williams.  Little was open in the old town, but there was a small supermarket on the fringe with hot pies, so we bought a couple and ate them in warming sunshine on a cold morning at an old wooden picnic table outside the shire offices.

As we continued on, the road was more tree-lined and the surrounding fields more verdant.  Thirty kilometres after a morning break in the little town of Spalding, we entered the attractive Clare Valley and began to see vineyards and wineries as the hills closed in on the road. The regional town of Clare was busy with visitors, many no doubt from Adelaide  enjoying a beautiful warm sunny Sunday in the country.

We bought some lunch from a very popular bakery and ate it in a small nearby park before buying a few things from the adjacent supermarket and setting out to ride the last 24km to Auburn.  To Julie's disgust, there was yet another long hill (there had been a few earlier in the day), but soon we were rolling down the other side and reached the very small town of Auburn about 3:30pm.  We found our motel, where the proprietor had left our room unlocked as he was going to Adelaide, and settled in.

After lazing around for a few hours, we phone-ordered take-out for dinner from the only such shop open in town and later Julie walked a few hundred metres to collect it.  There followed another quiet evening and another early night.

Round Australia Bike Ride - Day 101 - Wilpena Pound to Orroroo

Day:  101

Date:  Saturday, 10 October 2020

Start:  Wilpena Pound

Finish:  Orroroo

Daily Kilometres:  163 (click for Julie's Strava and photos)

Total Kilometres:  10514

Weather:  Cold early, then sunny and mild

Accommodation:  Cabin

Nutrition:

  Breakfast:  Pie/Chicken & lettuce sandwich

  Lunch:  Ham, cheese & tomato sandwich/Ham, cheese & pickle sandwich 

  Dinner:  Pizza/Beef schnitzel, salad & chips, lemon tart & ice cream/chocolate lava cake & ice cream

Aches:  Nothing significant.

Highlight:  For the first hour of the day, we were treated to a beautiful sunrise, with the rays lighting up the bluffs of Wilpena Pound in a deep orange as we pedalled below through the dark cypress pine forest on a road with no other traffic.

Lowlight:  For the first hour the day it was absolutely freezing.  Hands and feet were numb, and we relished every sliver of sunlight the forest and mountains allowed through until it was high enough to warm us without interference.

Pictures: Click here

Map and Position: Click here for Google Map

Journal:

It was very cold when we woke, and that might explain the hour and a half it took us to pack up camp before we left at 6:45am.  The sun had not yet cleared the horizon and we steeled ourselves against the cold as we pedalled out across the plain and turned south down the eastern side of the Wilpena Pound.  Compensation for the cold was the magnificent sunrise we were treated to on the walls of the Pound, and the serenity of the cypress pine forest.

Eventually, the sun rose high enough to begin thawing us out making the rest of the first 56km to Hawker even more enjoyable.  At Hawker, where we had stayed on our way north four days ago, we called in at the service station and bought breakfast and supplies for later in the day as we did not expect to see any more stores.  As we pulled into the service station, two couples came over for a chat about our trip and we learned the males were about to start a ride along the 900km Mawson Trail that runs south from the Flinders Ranges to the coast.  Another one on the bucket list.

From Hawker we continued south with the aid of a nice tail breeze and entered an area of rolling red soil hills, with a light covering of new grass, perhaps courtesy of the recent rain, flanked by the mountains of the southern Flinders Ranges to the wast.  There were old crumbling farmhouses here and there, perhaps a sign that the land was not particularly fertile. We passed through the tiny hamlet of Cradock and, after one break en route, reached the slightly larger town of Carrieton where we stopped for lunch in a well-kept picnic area.  The whole of the tiny town looked well-kept, but most businesses were shuttered and keeping the place alive looked likely to require a big effort.

After Carrieton, the roadside fields became more lush and the farms looked more prosperous as we rode the last 36km of the day to the regional town of Orroroo where we arrived at 3:45pm.  It looked pretty quiet too, though the lady at the caravan park where we had booked a cabin insisted that it was a very busy and lively town, just not on Saturday afternoons on the final weekend of the school vacation.  She may have been biased, having lived here for 35 years and having two sons each owning one of the two pubs in town.

After checking in, we spent thirty minutes washing our very muddy bikes using a hose in the campground, conscious that we were taking them in for a service on Monday in Adelaide.  We then showered and did some trip-planning before wandering down to the closest pub for a very filling dinner.  Then it was back to the cabin to watch my team win a finals match on the TV, the icing on top of another very good day.

Round Australia Bike Ride - Day 100 - Wilpena Pound

Day:  100

Date:  Friday, 09 October 2020

Start:  Wilpena Pound

Finish:  Wilpena Pound

Daily Kilometres:  0 (click here for Julie's Strava and photos from our walk)

Total Kilometres:  10351

Weather:  Cold early, then sunny and mild

Accommodation:  Tent

Nutrition:

  Breakfast:  Muesli

  Lunch:  Trail mix

  Dinner:  Chicken schnitzel, salad & chips, Tim Tams

Aches:  I am going to be very sore tomorrow after our hike.  Bike fit isn't hiking fit at my age, and although the cardiovascular system coped fine, my lower back and hips are aching tonight.

Highlight:  The 360° view from the top of St Mary's Peak (1168m) was superb.  You could see the unique Wilpena Pound, a huge 30 square kilometre basin surrounded by uplifted mountains, the folds of ranges running north, distant mountains, and dry arid plains stretching to the horizon.  The sky was cloudless, the temperatures mild and visibility excellent.  We were up there by ourselves for 20 minutes and felt like king and queen of the world.

Lowlight:  None today

Pictures: Click here

Map and Position: Click here for Google Map

Journal:

We emerged from our tent around 7am to a cold and clear windless morning and had a leisurely breakfast before setting off to hike the outside track to the summit of St Mary's Peak, the high point of the mountains surrounding Wilpena Pound, and the highest peak in the Flinders Ranges.

The trail notes called the hike strenuous, and they are not kidding.  After a few kilometres warming us up with some relatively gentle hills through groves of cypress pines, the track ascended steeply, with a lot of rock scrambling, up to the rim of the Pound.  Although we were constantly watching our footing and grip, we still had plenty of time to stop and admire the ever-expanding scene below us.

From the rim, there is a very slow out-and-back couple of kilometres to the peak, involving almost non-stop boulder-scrambling, testing both our strength and flexibility (neither of us have much of the latter).  It was hard work, but the view from the top, which we reached around noon, was superb (see above).  There was nobody else there and we savoured the grandeur in isolation.  Twenty minutes later, another couple arrived and we set off back down the mountain, meeting a number of other groups on their way up, some of whom seemed to be struggling, and another well off the track (we called out to them and set them right).

Back at the junction where the outside track reached the rim, we took the inside track, a long gradual very rocky descent along the side of a mountain, down into the Pound itself.  We only met one other group on the descent, and otherwise had to ourselves the stunning views, birdsong and sounds of a creek rushing unseen below.

When we reached the Pound floor which, with the mountains as a natural barrier, had been used for sheep grazing from the mid-19th century until the mid-20th century, we found shady groves of cypress pines interspersed with some large clearings.  The walking was mostly flat, the air temperature perfect for hiking and the sky above a cloudless blue.  We couldn't think of anywhere we would rather be.

Near the gorge exit from the Pound we passed the beautifully restored stone cottage built around 1900 by the farming family who then lived in the Pound.  From there it was just a few more kilometres back through the gorge to the campground where we arrived at 4:30pm after our 21km journey.

After showers, we had an early dinner at the bistro, followed by an early night.  Back on our bikes tomorrow.