Saturday April 5, 2014

A very grey start to the day.  It started to rain shortly after starting our ride so we put our jackets on.  We got too warm, we took the jackets off, it started to drizzle we put the jackets back on again etc. etc.  It was a very muggy morning.  I really wish that someone could invent a breathable and waterproof rain jacket.

It was a very undulating ride today with some good hills thrown in for good measure – over 1009 metres elevation gain.

A lot of traffic today on the A1 from Orbost, I lost count of the campers, caravans, cars and trailers, cars and boats. We must have been passed by over a hundred of the things.  It is the start of the Easter school holidays and we were warned we might have to book into some of the campsites.  With the amount of traffic on the roads today, yes I can see why – everyone and his dog is going camping.

Cyclists often talk about not having the legs for the ride, implying they have a pair that they can use for hills and another pair for flats and another pair for sprints.  I think I had the wrong pair on today, or maybe I had one for flats and one for sprints, which is why I couldn’t get the rhythm going.  When I finally did get the right rhythm, disaster struck.

We were coming down the final hill into our destination (Cann River) when I ran over a piece of metal (road debris), it flew up and sliced a cut into my back tyre about 2 inches (5 cms) long. My tube burst with such a loud noise I thought I had completely wrecked my bike.  We fixed the tube and put a piece of the old tube on the inside of the tire to give it a bit of protection. I definitely need a new tire.  Therein lies the problem, no bike shops for 135 kms.  We are hoping to get a bus tomorrow to Merimbula.  Again like New Zealand it is dependent on the bus driver whether he takes the bikes or not. Hopefully the bike shop has a tire that will fit and hopefully the bike shop will be open tomorrow.

If the bus won’t take the bikes we will have to take it very carefully and cycle the 135 ks to Merimbula.  It will take us about 3 days to get there.

Tonight we are staying at the Cann Valley motel and the lady who runs it has been absolutely wonderful and helpful.  She told us about the buses, the bike shop in Merimbula, and she is trying to find out if she knows anyone going to Merimbula who can take us.

Fingers crossed we can get the bus and get the tire fixed, quickly.

Cann River seems to be the place everyone stops for a break and a coffee.  It is a lovely little village.

Friday April 4, 2014

It wasn’t raining when we got up, and had breakfast.  Ralf and I both managed to have a hot shower before the power went out in the shower room.  Sally has had the batteries for the solar panels for over six years and wasn’t sure whether it was the two overcast days that had sapped the energy or maybe the batteries needed to be replaced.  I hope we didn’t use up all her power.

We loaded our panniers on to her boat and motored back to the jetty in the Town of Lakes Entrance.  When we got to the jetty, I realized we had forgotten our water bottles.  Ralf suggested we find a camp store and buy new ones, Sally turned the boat around and we went back for the water bottles.  What a lovely, generous person.  We offered to contribute for some gas for the boat, but she wouldn’t hear of it.  We bought her a coffee instead – not much of a contribution.  Hopefully Sally will come to Canada and we will be able to offer her the hospitality that she gave us.

We left Lakes Entrance at about 10:30 am.  It had started to drizzle as we left and then it started to rain.  It continued raining on and off until we got to Orbost, where we decided on a cabin.

As we cycle along the major roads we often come across signs warning drivers to take a rest if they are feeling sleepy, some of them, like this one are a little confusing to me.  Take a power nap – I think that would be very dangerous at this point, as there was no pull in to do it.  That’s all we need drivers taking power naps while they are driving!!

Today we had two instances where café owners were not very nice to touring cyclists.  The first instance we were at Lakes Entrance and were going to have a coffee with Sally before leaving, the owner of the café told us not to lean our bikes near his café as he needed to put his tables and chairs out.  Fine, we went to the café next door.

The second was at Nowa Nowa, there was a café and on his door there was a sign that said use of toilets $4.50 – free coffee.  Funny sign, but I didn’t need a coffee, I needed a toilet.  I asked the owner where there was a public toilet, as I didn’t need a “free” coffee.  He said I could use his toilet, I thanked him very kindly and when I was leaving he asked if I wanted the coffee, I said no.  He told me rather nastily that the public toilet were another 100 metres down the road.  This is only the 3^rd time in 4 months that we have had café owners being snippy with us.  Not bad really.

Nowa Nowa is also where we could connect to the Gippsland Rail Trail – it really should be bike friendly.

We decided against the bike trail, because of the rain.  It would really have messed up the bikes with the sand and gravel.  Awesome steam engine at Nowa Nowa.

At Orbost the very garrulous volunteer at the Information Centre told us that the two hotels in the Town were very reasonably priced, actually cheaper than the cabins at the camp site.  Noel (the volunteer) gave us information on the route we are going to take tomorrow, the route we should take to Canberra or Sydney depending which we go and told us about the cycle race he won 30 odd years ago.  Fortunately there was a roaring fire in the Slab Hut (Information Centre) so we didn’t get too cold.  Noel also told us about the bricks that were called convict bricks.  Apparently the bricks were made by the convicts and had a thumb print in them, usually in the corner.  When a convict had made 100 bricks he had done his work for the day.  After he had made and stacked 10 bricks he would put a thumb print in the brick, when he had stacked 10 x 10 bricks he knew he had made 100.

Tonight we ate in the pub.  Probably be a little over budget today, but at least we are warm and dry.

Thursday April 3, 2014

Sally very generously said we could stay another day in this idyllic location.  It was raining when we got up, so we took Sally up on her offer and took another rest day.

As we were eating breakfast, these Crimson Rosellas also enjoyed their breakfast.

I love the colour of these birds.

I spent the morning updating the blog and had a really interesting conversation with Sally.  We discussed resilience, how do we become resilient? Are we taught to be resilient or is it inherent within us? Are we doing a disservice to our young people by not allowing them to win or lose at team games, like hockey, soccer, netball, as scores are no longer being kept in ‘fun’ games.

Sally and I also discussed cycling unaccompanied.  When she cycled through Europe, although enjoying her own company, she felt that at times it would have been nice to have someone to share the decisions.  I am so glad that Ralf and I are so compatible and are sharing this Grand Adventure together.

While Sally and I were happily inside the house, Ralf went for a walk.

A great photo of funghi on a tree.

Later on in the evening there was no power to our bedroom and Sally decided we should conserve energy in the main house just to be on the safe side.  We ate our evening meal by lantern light.  We saw both sides of being off-grid.  I still think it is a good idea and we should seriously look into it when we get back.

Wednesday April 2, 2014

A lovely ride today to Lakes Entrance.  We had to take the A1 (Princes Highway) all the way, it was a little busy but for the most part we had a good shoulder to ride on.  I have decided we need hills to really enjoy the rides.

We left Bairnsdale at 9:40 am and arrived in Lakes Entrance at 11:30, where we met up with our warm showers host (Sally).  We had a coffee and then did a bit of shopping.  After the shopping Sally loaded our bikes on to her boat and we came across the lake to her wonderful house.

The house is designed to be similar in style to Thai houses – a main living area, then bedrooms along walkways and another walkway to the shower and toilet areas.

Sally is completely self-sufficient, the house has solar panels, rainwater tanks, grey water tanks, and a composting toilet.  She may decide to add a couple of extra solar panels so that she can change her gas fridge to an electric one as the gas fridge is expensive to run.  Again our warm showers host provided us with a lovely evening meal.

Ralf and I love to meet these different people, Sally has given us some great advice on being off-grid. May be we will buy a piece of land when we get back to Canada and live off-grid, I think that would be awesome.

After dinner Sally took Ralf along the beach for a walk, I updated part of the blog and missed out on seeing a mob of kangaroos.

Tuesday April 1, 2014

Gerard gave us an alternative route to take to Bairnsdale.  It meant going an extra 5 – 10 kms but kept us away from the busy A1 (Princes Highway).  The route was very flat going through primarily farmland and rural pasture.  I think I need hills on my rides.  I never thought I would say this but hills, although they can be hard work, are much better than 70 kms of flat road.  Even a little bump in the road would have been good.

Of course what often happens on straight, flat roads is you also end up with a head wind, or maybe that is just a coincidence.  The last 20 kms we had a full-on head wind, and it was a very warm day – up to 30 degrees.  Fortunately the road did have some shade.

Along this very straight road we spotted this fire bunker.  This is a high bushfire area, not at the moment as they have received some rain.

We arrived in Sale at 12:00, just in time for the lunch hour rush at the cafés.  We went to the Information Centre to find out about a camp site and then had lunch.  The campsite was just on the edge of the main downtown core.  A lovely, clean campsite with a swimming pool.

We haven’t always taken advantage of all the facilities at campsites, but the pool was so inviting.  As soon as we got the tent up, we were in the pool for a swim.  A rather large lady was struggling with her swimming costume (bathing suit) (cossie) actually she was struggling to keep everything inside her cossie, but she didn’t care she was laughing as she got out and told Ralf not to look just incase they fell out!!  A very lovely, funny lady.

After the cool swim, we had our showers and then walked to downtown for some groceries.  Bairnsdale is another large commercial centre in this part of Gippsland.  I had decided I needed a new pair of trousers as my others are about two sizes too big now. I found a nice pair that fit me, although I thought I was going to struggle with the legs being too tight.

We have two choices tomorrow, follow the rail trail all the way to Oborst or go to Lakes Entrance.  We have a response from a warm showers host so we are going to Lakes Entrance.

Monday March 31, 2014

We got up about 8:30 and had a nice relaxing morning.  I caught up a little with the blog and then we went for a walk in to the Town.  Sale is quite a large Town it is the commercial centre for this area of Gippsland.

Sale had some lovely old buildings.

This building reminded me of Napier in New Zealand.

Our warm showers host were out for the day and would be late home, so we made dinner for them.  Gerard and Jen lead busy lives but were very kind to open up their home to us and allow us to have a rest day.  This is a view from Gerard and Jen\’s house.  A small lake with a nice walking path around it.

Ralf took this great photo, of a bridge on the pathway around the lake.

Sunday March 30, 2014

An early start from Yarram (8:30) we were up before it was light and had a good breakfast.

The route was fairly flat with a couple of minor hills, and we arrived in Sale at around 1:30 pm.

It was quite a warm day by the time we arrived in Sale. Gerard was already having a coffee at the local coffee shop and approached us.  He had just finished a Tri and was heading back to his house.  He gave us directions and we got to his house shortly thereafter.

Warm showers host are very generous, he allowed us to do our washing and made us a lovely Thai curry meal for dinner.  He also asked if we would like to stay an extra night, which we did.

Saturday March 29, 2013

Due to our late night we got up a little later, expecting to still be on the road by 9:30.  No, we lingered over breakfast and had more great conversations, we eventually got on the road at 11:30 – great breakfast lots of good conversation.

After hurtling down the hill from David and Deb’s house we followed a lovely road to Yarram.  We met another couple of touring cyclists from Germany who told us Yarram has two campsites.

The route was fairly flat with some very gentle hills we arrived in Yarram at 2:30.  Yarram was a nice sized Town with a good cafe, with nobody around. Most of the stores were all closed apart from the bakery and the Info Centre.  When Ralf commented that the Town was very quiet he was told that Yarram Footy Club were playing and that was where everyone was.

We went into the Information Centre and they had a really interesting art exhibition – the exhibition used ceramics and most of the pieces were related to global warming.

We stayed in a quiet camp site.  Now we are no longer on the Great Ocean Road the prices for the camp-sites have come down.

Friday March 28, 2014

We followed Ken’s route to the rail trail and joined the trail in the small Village of Buffalo.  It was a great trail and we were riding quickly doing a comfortable speed of 20 kph.  Doing 20 kph on a rail trail is quite unusual, usually you have to deal with odd surfaces and generally have to go a little slower.

We caught up with two cyclists and discussed where we were going, well unfortunately we were going in the wrong direction.  We had cycled 10 ks in the wrong direction.  No idea why, Ken had given us good directions, it felt as if we were going the right way!!  The cyclists had a good map of the trail and told us if we turned around we would get to Foster (25 ks).  Or if we continued we could pick up the South Gippsland Highway (16 ks).  I wanted to turn around because I knew the highway would be hillier.

It was shorter on the highway, so we carried on along the road.  It was hillier, much hillier, but beautiful views and great downhills.

We called our warm showers host, who said he lived up another big hill and if we liked he would pick us up.  Yes please, we would like that option.  David and Deb picked us up.  The bikes went in the back of David’s car and I went in the car with Deb, who is not cycling.  It would have been a very steep climb.

We had a wonderful evening with them and stayed up very late chatting until 11:30 pm.

David and Deb have a beautiful house in the hills with stunning scenery.  David built it himself absolutely beautiful.

Thursday March 27, 2014

A late start this morning and it was raining.  The first time we have had to fold up the tent in the rain.  We had decided to stop at the Koala Conservation Centre.  It had stopped raining when we got there so we stopped and spent about an hour and a half looking for koalas.  The Conservation Centre is a managed area where the koalas are allowed to do what koalas do, which is not very much.  They sleep 20 hours a day, then eat and groom for the remaining hours.  The centre has put up boardwalks and information signs near where they think the koalas might be.

We saw about 20 and Ralf got a good \”movie\” of one that had just woken up,  she had a little scratch of her backside yawned, then went back to sleep.  It is exhausting being a Koala. They were so cute.

We also saw a couple of black-faced wallabies.

We left Phillip’s Island across the bridge at San Remo and had lunch at about 12:30.  The route to Inverloch was quite pretty, undulating with the best kind of hills, go down one side and get up the other side without having to pedal very much.

We arrived in Inverloch at about 2:30.  The Information Centre was very helpful and centrally located.  As we were checking the map for the camp site we got chatting to a fella who told us about the Victorian Bike Ride that happens in November every year and we told him about GOBA.  Two very similar bike rides.  He went straight home and checked on GOBA and is going to sign up for next years ride.  He also came out to the camp site to tell us about a rail trail we could take which would keep us off the main Gippsland Highway and avoid the hills.

While we were setting up the tent there were a group of campers opposite who invited us over for tea, coffee and cookies.  They were a church group who got together twice a year at various campgrounds around the Melbourne area.  This time there were 46 couples getting together.  We were also invited over for dinner, but I needed to give Joy and Dad a call.

Ralf once again went into Town to get the meal for the evening.

Inverloch is a very nice seaside area with really nice friendly people.