It’s been a while. I have decided to start recording our adventures again. As much for my own sake as for wider reading. Perhaps I can inspire adventures closer to home. And there is so much adventure to be had. All it requires is a little shift in thinking and some curiosity.
Many people ask if we will do a big bike trip again. The answer is a resounding YES. It is possible, if our circumstances were different, that we’d be on the road again now. Perhaps with Clo in Canada. We don’t know what our life would look like if our family situation was different.
What I do know is even if things are a little hard, and we don’t have the freedom we necessarily had before, the best thing has been to actively choose to be here. It has helped us make a life here – we know we will one day pedal the world again but for now we are (mostly) embracing settled life.
How does that look for two freedom loving cyclists?
Mostly barefooted, with dirt on our hands, chickens in our laps and books of permaculture and poetry scattered around the porch. Our aim is simple – to learn how to grow organic food and lessen our impact on this earth. To make rather than buy, swap rather than sell and to create community resilience rather than self sufficiency. It’s a messy work in progress but will keep our souls fulfilled until the open road is an option once again.
Barbara chicken loves a lap plus cauliflower growing joy
In the mean time there are always micro adventures to be had and that brings me back to the actual purpose of this post: The Great Dividing Trail.
This is a walking/biking track that runs from Bendigo in Central Victoria to either Bacchus Marsh, or Mount Buninyong. It essentially joins a network of different trails to form one continuous track. We had already ridden most of the northern section on a previous trip, so chose to ride Castlemaine to Bacchus Marsh. Initially we had planned to ride the Otway Rip, but with 7mm of rain forecast for that part of Victoria, we decided on the much drier region of Central Vic.
I like to think that all good bike trips start with a train journey these days. The deal is sweetened by Vline’s $10 to anywhere in the state. We squeezed the bikes into the allocated bike space, sneakily opened a craft beer and relaxed for the hour and a half it took to be deposited in Castlemaine. Upon leaving the train we had the good fortune of running into Huw from Commuter Cycles. Commuter has been our bike shop since the very beginning and Huw now lives in Castlemaine and gave us great info on where we could wild camp and the trail ahead.
First however, we needed to check out the brewery. It was a lovely balmy spring evening and tacos and sour beers were the perfect way to begin our adventure. As the light faded we cycled through the outskirts of Castlemaine and into the bush. We navigated the single track for as long as possible until it got too dark and then made camp.
The trail up this end is called the Dry Diggings Track and is part of the Gold Fields Track/Great Dividing Trail. It winds its way through the bush, from the dry plains and remnants of gold diggings around Castlemaine to the temperate forests closer to Daylesford. There is much single track, which is stunning to ride, when its rideable. I went from pedalling along, enjoying the scenery to slipping on rocks and pushing. A lot. It’s harder riding than we are used to: more technically demanding, which is difficult at best with loaded bikes. While I have changed my set up a bit, Astrid was still riding with 4 panniers, which made the narrow tracks look even more difficult. Luckily she is a lot more skilled than me! There were times when we had to take all our bags off, and times when one of us had to push the others bike in order to drag it up a dry river embankment. It was tough going, but what we gained from our sweating and pushing was remote bush riding with no people and no cars. It was delightful. This is what I am looking for more now. I have ridden on enough highways to know that it’s not what I fancy, especially on these shorter trips. These days I really long for wildness even more than before.
The first few hours; single track, ruins, forest and cute old buildings.
Our first day of riding gave us a mix of single track and small roads, rain and sun. We ate lunch at some mineral springs and hid from a storm under a pergoda. We saw almost no-one and in the afternoon we made camp beside the track, miles from anyone. It was truly peaceful. I built us a fire and we cooked our homemade dehydrated meal on it and went to bed just after dark. The rhythm of the old life does not take long to return.
Forest riding and pushing, flap jack snacks and a campfire to end the day. Perfect.
We woke to moody skies and continued on the single track towards Hepburn. It was hard going because unlike a lot of the riding we had done, your thoughts can’t wonder as freely and you cannot relax because the trail demands you pay attention. Otherwise the next annoyingly placed rock might take you out. Eventually we rolled into Hepburn for coffee and toast with one of Astrid’s friends, which was wonderful. Revitalised we rode the back roads into Daylesford just in time for the weather to really come in. Sheets of rain fell and the clouds hung low in the sky. We resupplied and then went and hid in a bougie cafe and had batch brews and fancy toasties. The joys of having a more relaxed budget.
Batch brew and damp trail riding
With a break in the rain we decided to make a run for it and head south and east on the Lerderderg Track. Somehow we ended up on something that was much more a walking track which culminated in some steep steps we had to awkwardly manoeuvre our bicycles down. For a while we persisted on the walking/mountain bike track through the forest as fronts of rain greeted us, then passed onwards. However, something I haven’t yet mentioned was that the dirty salmon (Astrid’s trusted bike) which had probably travelled in excess of 50,000km was on her last outing. She had unfortunately sustained rust damage and had been deemed unsafe in the long run. Especially on bumpy, rocky single track which just happened to be the medium I had chosen. So we compromised and chose a dirt road which more or less paralleled much of the track through the Wombat State Forest. The riding was quite delightful, especially after all the bouts of walking and pushing.
Muddy trails, then dirt roads through Wombat State forest
By the early evening we had reached the Lerderderg River and decided to call a well placed pergoda home for the night. It was supposed to be a day use area but we couldn’t pass up the prospect of a shelter in the rainy weather. So we pitched our tent under the shelter and cracked a whiskey for happy hour. Later I was able to build us a fire and we had another super evening in the bush.
This is luxury on the road – a dry place to pitch a tent on a wet day, a fire and whiskey.
Sadly our peace was ruined by the arrival of a group of people at around 4am. It took us a while to figure out what they were doing – prospecting for gold. This involved lots of banging and was pretty annoying. We conceded defeat and rose early and watched them attempt to light a fire about 5 times which included pouring a heap of petrol on said fire. Leaving our unwanted neighbours we rode through the beautiful Lerderderg state forest and gorge. It was really stunning riding and the environment had markedly changed from the dry plains we had come from. At Blackwood we indulged in more toasties before briefly hitting the bitchumen and then the last of the Lerdergerg track.
Through Lederderg, Blackwood and beyond.
This section of the track sits high above Bacchus Marsh and consists of mostly rideable 4WD track (some is impossibly steep). It’s a wonderful ride through dry forest, with some sweeping views. The last part comprised of an epic descent into Bacchus on sealed road. We were flying! All good bike trips preferably end with a brewery and we were lucky enough to find such a place, not far from the railway station. It sold craft beer and was having a jam session. So we settled in for a few beverages and some great tunes (which we sang along to).
The last part of the trail, more rideable with some great views down to Bacchus Marsh.
While this is not the first bike trip we’ve done since we’ve returned, I hope it’s the beginning of more frequent small adventurous outings in our state. There really is so much to see.
Beers to finish the ride
Since returning from our long adventure, there are a few things Astrid and I are changing. Our set up is becoming slightly more towards a bike packing one – that is less reliance on just panniers and more bags lashed onto our frame. This is to make the rougher tracks we want to ride a bit easier. We also don’t need to carry as much gear, so being slightly more light weight makes sense too. We’ve also gone plastic free. We want to eventually go completely waste free but we’re not set up enough for this yet. Also this is something that probably couldn’t be done on a prolonged tour. But on a few days to a few weeks, it’s totally possible. We dehydrate all our own meals and resupply only with items not wrapped in plastic. Sadly lots of our old favourites are out. But it feels right to us and the challenge is exciting. A bit like switching to a mainly plant based diet a few years ago – it requires some mental arithmetics and creativity. And the occasional need to compromise. Finishing up a trip carrying no rubbish is pretty liberating.
Other than these few things, we travel more or less the same; we value tasty food over being light weight, meandering trails over the highways, sipping craft brews, meeting locals, great chats and really good coffee.
Till our next small adventure.
love
jude