Dulwich Hill Bicycle Club

The ride is over. Here's my day by day summary

Day 1: Brisbane to Caloundra, 100.8 km averaged 26.5 kmh. Very slow first 40km out of Brisbane as we were required to bunch to slowest rider behind an escort car. Managed to get some better speed once we got north of Caboolture.

Day 2: Caloundra to Gympie, 141km average 26.9kmh. That included a 10% hill out of Noosa and two 15% climbs between Kin Kin and Gympie, the climbs peaking at 22%. Ride was 15 km longer than expected as the organiser had mucked up their maps and distances.

Day 3: Gympie to Hervey Bay, 141km average 28.1. First experience of trying to ride on a narrow verge while avoiding the rumble strips that had been laid as the left hand white line on the road. Beat the rain to hotel.

Day 4 day off in Hervey Bay and went sailing

Day 5 Hervey Bay to Gaydah 180km average 26.3kmh. Lots of headwinds, dying towns and had to pick hills that hid their tops beyond another curve.

Day 6 Gayndah to Monto, 143km average 25.2, using some smaller and rather rough back roads for part of the route. Was getting some sore muscles at this point, partly fixed by putting my seat up the next day. Monto was a bit of a dying town.

Day 7 Monto to Biloela, 95km avg 25.7 kmh. 350m climb in 5km to start day after which my average was only 18.8. Lots of downhills and flats got the average up. A whiz!

Day 8 Biloela to Rochampton 143km avg 29.2 kmh. Two long flat runs separated by Mt Morgan climb and descent.

Day 9 Rockhampton to Marlborough 106km avg 28.6 kmh. Rolling run along the Bruce Highway. Over half way now! The road between Rochampton and Mackay is pretty empty of towns. This night we stayed in dongas, pre-fabricated buildings with three small rooms. This was a luxury donga with its own on-suite!

Day 10 Marlborough to Carmilla 133km avg 28.7 kmh. Relatively flat run but still on Bruce Highway. We started organising the pack with someone at the back with a mirror looking for the trucks. Night in the Carmila hotel with much less luxurious dongas.

Day 11 Carmilla to Mackay 102km at 25.4 kmh. Flat road but headwinds and bad traffic all day. Not very pleasant. Hotel in Mackay was dubbed Fawlty Towers on account of the odd owners.

Day 12 Mackay to Airlie Beach, 152km avg 28.5 kmh. Great ride, wonderful scenery, fast roads. Some rain and an overcast skies earlier, but it became hotter and humid once the sun came out. Terrific hotel.

Day 13: Touristy things in the Whitsundays

Day 14: Airlie Beach to Ayr 187km at average 30 kmh. Long flat ride, hard work. Crossing the Burdekin River Bridge was made terrifying by some odd grates that could catch your wheels. Having a support car behind us allowed our little pack to bunny hop across grates.

Day 15: Ayr to Townsville, 91 km average 29.2 kmh. Rode up Castle Hill after finishing. Very steep, but discovered the locals run a time trial up it. Being an outsider, I was silly enough to ride up in the middle of the day, not dawn or dusk like the lcoals.

Day 16 Townsville to Ingham 113km averaging 28.7 kmh. Bad cross wind early but ride good. Ingham was very quiet on a sunday. Stayed in a fascinating converted lodge house that had been made into a boutique hotel. A change from normal hotels in most towns.

Day 17 Ingham to Innisfail 148km average 29.1 kmh. Morning tea by the sea at Cardwell. I recommend the Tully pie shop where we had lunch.

Day 18: Innisfail to Cairns, 94 km average 28.2 kmh, the average cut by a KMH by the pack parade to and through the esplanade.

Overall 2,067 km averaging 27.8 kmh.

Here's a pic from the trip. Waving the DHBC jersey amongst the palm trees. A very pleasant morning tea stop at Cardwell, between Ingham and Innisfail. That's Hinchibrook Island in the background.

nice pic!
good to have ya back

That's pretty epic! Don't forget to clear out the beach sand from your cleats.

That was easy. The sand was mainly ground up coral, not very fine at all.

wow, an impressive distance. how many riders were there?

Twenty riders. I did it as a 50th birthday challenge and I was the youngest male on the ride!! But there were a few guys well my senior who were very strong riders.

Sounds fantastic. I must do that, or a sub-section of it, one of these years, waiting for the depths of the Sydney winter before heading north to recharge the batteries. What would you recommend for a one-week tour, averaging 100-120km a day, with an airport at either end?

I like doing this rides with a company that can look after the logistics. I just want to ride, not worry about where the bags, food and accomodation are. My ride was with Alltrails, but they are moving their focus for the next few years to overseas tours rather than Australia.

Rides are always much easier when you can get off the major highways. This one spent a lot of time on the Bruce Highway, and with all the trucks, that can take a bit of organisation and co-operation with other riders, like having someone with a rear vision m irror and a loud voice at the back of the line.

The fact that a lot of riding was going to be on busy highway was one of the reasons I wasn't that keen on this particular ride.

But I do agree with you about just having to worry about riding. All Trails do a fantastic job of organising everything.

James