Month: August 2023

I woke up from a great night of sleep on the banks of the Lake Hume in the Murray River Valley, and it was a glorious day. After the headwinds across the Nullarbor I was now really getting lucky with the weather – it was cold and crisp but the sun was shining through the mist and the sky above was blue. It promised good things.

I got up and got packed, shaking the dew off my bivy bag. I knew I had a way to go up the valley so I put on some warm clothes and loaded up my bike. The day was glorious, but the mist was quite thick, and the sun was just coming up which meant I would be riding into the rising sun, and more importantly, the people coming from behind me would be driving into the rising sun. I certainly didn’t want anything stupid to happen at this late stage.

It was the sixteenth day, and I woke up feeling rubbish. Specifically, I woke up feeling rubbish poking into my back – my choice of sleeping location the previous night hadn’t been ideal, and I’d spent the night shifting around trying to find the most comfy spot, but fundamentally I was sleeping just down the bank from a busy road where decades worth of cretins had been chucking their rubbish. It wasn’t ideal, and it had also been freezing cold.

But – the morning was beautiful, and I knew things would get good as soon as I got on the bike. I was in country I knew fairly well – at the foot of Tawonga Gap, in Bright. Bright is home of the Tour of Bright, one of the best road races in the country, and is also an excellent destination for a cycling holiday, so I’d been in the area a lot and knew this climb well. The cold weather and poor night of sleep had me moving very slowly, but once I actually dragged myself out of my sleeping bag and started moving things quickly started looking up. The sun was shining, the sky was blue, the air was crisp, and the day was looking great. I was still cold, but I knew the climb would soon have me warmed up. I got on my bike.