It was a crisp, clear, beautiful morning when I woke up for day 15, and I lay there and appreciated it for a while before I dragged myself out of bed. When I finally did I surprised to realise that it wasn’t even particularly cold – I concluded that the night before I had basically just been scared, and looking for any half-way reasonable excuse to pull over. Today, though, I figured that everyone who had survived the night would be busy sleeping off their hangovers for at least half the day, making it a good time to get on my bike and enjoy the quiet roads!
Sadly, I had finished off the last of my Pizza Burgers the previous night, so I was left eating various bars and left-overs that seemed to have accumulated over the trip so far, but pretty quickly got on the bike.
It was only about 25km to Bairnsdale so I headed in there for a proper breakfast. There’s a great little place on the edge of town that is well set up for the breakfast rush, with a veritable production line in place. I guess in that way it’s kind of similar to McDonalds, but it tastes a lot better and still meant I could get breakfast in pretty quick order.
Leaving Bairnsdale the road undulated for about 25km before starting to climb. The Big Creek climb wasn’t too tough, at 8km long but only about 4%, and then there was a decent descent, but next came about 55km of mainly false-flat – not steep enough to look like a climb, but plenty steep enough to make you wonder why you were going so slow while working so hard. And by this time, it wasn’t cold any more. The road was mostly very exposed, and the sun was beating down so my Garmin was reading well over 30o. Oh, and the traffic was terrible.
Now at this stage I’d like to clarify that I grew up on a little place outside of town. I spent my youth riding horses and working with sheep and cattle, and although I can see that there are some aspects of rodeos that aren’t so great, I’ve enjoyed many of them in my time. And basically, I’ve always thought that rodeo people were “my kind of people”. I still think that holds true as a general rule, but I’m going to make an exception for the 18 year-old boys who spend Easter Saturday driving up to the Omeo Rodeo in the jacked-up Ford Ranger that daddy bought them. Those guys are, in general, dicks. Small ones. The road was pretty straight and open, with very little traffic coming the other way and plenty of room to pass, but still I had to put up with a constant string of close-passes, shouted insults, and rubbish being thrown at me. Pathetic.
It didn’t stop when I pulled over to apply sunscreen – literally just on the rocky shoulder because there was no shade to stop in. I was glad I did though, because even though a ridiculously high proportion of the passers by were demonstrating their immaturity, there was actually one guy who pulled over to check if I was ok. It was a nice reminder that even though you tend to only notice the noisy and aggressive ones there are still plenty of good people on the roads too, they just don’t stand out until you need some help.
Anyway, I continued on up the road, reaching Omeo at about half past four in the afternoon. I ducked in to the local shop for some food, and came out to eat it and pack my bag, when a very drunk kid (was he 18? I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt and assume he was 18) with an aggressive tone came up and started asking questions. When I told him I’d come from Freemantle, he didn’t believe it. He clarified his question, asking instead where I had ridden from. I clarified my answer, explaining that I had ridden from Freemantle. He asked how it was possible to ride from Freemantle. I told him it was the Eyre Highway to start with, and then it pretty much became the Princes Highway from Port Augusta, with a few name changes and detours along the way. He asked if I was joking. I told him I wasn’t. He asked if he was being set up. I told him he wasn’t. He asked if there was a hidden camera somewhere. I told him that I didn’t know of any. He asked his ever-so-slightly less drunk mate over, and repeated what I had told him, and then asked his mate if it was a set-up. His mate said it had to be, because no-one could ride that far. They both asked all the details like where I slept and what I ate, and I told them and showed them. Eventually they almost accepted it – they clearly weren’t fully convinced but couldn’t think of a way to disprove it, and I was getting bored so I bid them farewell. They said they still thought they were being set-up, but that they hoped I had a good ride anyway.
Now I have had that conversation a lot, and I generally don’t mind it, but the thing that got me was that these guys were pretty clearly from the portion of drivers who will harass a cyclist on the road, and they’ll justify it by telling themselves that bikes are just toys. Now in this case yes, I was riding for enjoyment, just like they had driven to Omeo for enjoyment, but that doesn’t give me any less right to be on the road. Just because they can’t conceive actually travelling a long distance by bike, it doesn’t mean it can’t be done, but they are happy to limit themselves as well as limiting their world-view, even with the proof right in front of their eyes.
Anyway, I was heading out of town feeling annoyed when I went past the showground, and as I did I spotted the guy who had stopped to check I was ok on the way up. He looked up from pitching his tent to give me a wave and exclaim about how far I had come, so I waved back and felt much better. It didn’t hurt that it’s beautiful country around that area.
I rode out of Omeo, and there was not a single car on my side of the road. That continued all the way to WTF Climb (Way To Falls, obviously), which is a left-hand turn followed by a 500m ramp at around 14%, before it settles into a 8% for almost 9km, before easing back a bit but continuing to climb even more. To be honest, I got to that steep bit and I thought to myself “I’ve got a huge lead, I’ve got nothing to prove, there will be no harm at all if I get off and walk this bit.”
And then I thought of Denise, who I had met the day before. Denise told me she watched my tracker up every climb. Now the tracker only pings every 5 minutes, so in fact I could have stopped and walked for a minute or two and it would barely show up (I wasn’t riding much faster than walking pace anyway, truth be told) but that hardly seemed to be in the spirit, so I kept riding.
I reached the Bogong High Plains by moonlight, and let me tell you that is a magical experience. Since turning off the Omeo Highway I literally hadn’t seen or heard a single car, and it was just me, the beautiful countryside, and the moonlight. Of course, that couldn’t last, and soon enough I heard a car coming up behind me. They slowed a little as the approached, just enough that I could hear the shout of “Go Rowan” as they went by. From there I was totally on my own again until reaching Falls Creek.
Now in Falls Creek there was a wonderful IPWR rider by the name of Jaye, and at the time she was running a wonderful café by the name of Milch. It was pretty late, but I figured if I was going to get food anywhere it would be Milch. I wasn’t disappointed.
The plains had been magical, but also pretty chilly, and the contrast to the warmth and bustle inside Milch was enormous. They looked after me wonderfully and I was soon feeling refreshed and well fed. I have to admit that when Jaye came over to tell me that her staff had asked if they should make up a bed for me and she had explained that I was a hardcore rider and there’s no way I would stop that early there was a little bit of me that wanted to say “Oh yes I would!”, but I knew that would mean getting up when it was really cold to ride down the other side of the mountain, and basically that was something for which I wanted every bit of warmth I could get. I wrapped up in all my clothes, went outside, gave Jaye one last big sweaty hug, and got on my bike.
The good news was that from that point it was very easy to cover some more km – basically the next 31km was down-hill. It wasn’t the easiest of descents mind you – it was cold enough to warrant thick gloves and a lot of layers which always makes me feel less agile and less like hooking around the corners fast – adding in the fact that it was pitch dark and I knew there are occasionally deer on that road I was happy to keep the speed down pretty low and just focus on getting to the bottom safely.
At this stage I was feeling pretty good – considering. What that means is that nothing was hurting so much that I was thinking of quitting, but plenty of things hurt and I was spending about an hour every evening on massaging, medicating, strapping and bandaging to keep things like knees and ankles in workable condition.
Ultra-cycling doesn’t tend to introduce people to the most salubrious of accommodation. Although I’ve yet to actually try and sleep in a public toilet I am certainly not above using them as a warm dry spot in which I can strip down, clean up, and treat my various injuries, so on spotting an open toilet in Mt Beauty that is exactly what I did. I got cleaned up and changed into some clean (everything is relative) clothes ready for bed, and then set off down the road to find somewhere to sleep. The only problem was that the road from where I was basically went about 4km through the town of Mt Beauty and the built-up area surrounding it, and turned to climb up to Tawonga Gap. Having just got into my clean(er) and dry(er) clothes, I really didn’t want to climb up to Tawonga – it’s a solid climb where I would be guaranteed to get a good sweat up. The alternative was to sleep at the foot of the climb, so that’s what I did. I found a space that was big enough, but as a sheltered corner on a busy road it seemed to be a natural spot for the type of person who runs around saying how much they love Australia to litter it, so I basically had to make space amongst the rubbish to lie down. I would say it was one of the least pleasant spots I found to sleep across the country, but it was still somewhere to sleep, so that’s what I did!
Haha, I love the Demise inspiration!