Snowy Mountains Ride Part 1

In November we had our annual Victorian Alps & Snowy Mountains ride on again. Rick and recently moved Dave had ridden down from Queensland to meet us at the starting point in Sydney an extra 2-3 day trip for them on top of the 6 Day trip that the alpine ride is.

We had a couple of potential meet up points, Stu's house at 7am or Trappers Bakery Goulburn  at 9am. I decided on meeting everyone in Goulburn, so put on some tunes and headed off.

The pie and coffee was nice as usual and we were back on the road just after 10am. Yeah it takes awhile on big group rides.

The group split up in Braidwood where the road bikes went down Clyde Mountain to Batemans Bay and the south coast, whilst the adventure bikes went down via the Araluen road to Moruya.

The Araluen road was surprisingly good. Fairly easy gravel road riding with spectacular viewing over river gorges and surrounding mountains.

Somewhere along here on one of the slower gravel corners Rick dropped his new Guzzi, lost the front end. Nothing damaged but his pride.

Scottay

Braidwood to Moruya via the Araluen Road is only 85km and there's probably only 50km of gravel so was easy going. We arrived in Narooma very early so decided to have an early lunch as the others would probably have lunch in Nelligen. The typical stop at the Hotel with the Million dollar views.

I wasn't super hungry so Joffrey and I decided to share a Nacho bowl. Everything else on the menu looked big and at nearly $30 so the Nachos were good and easy.

From here we took the back road into Central Tilba where we stopped at the Dromedary for a beer. We haven't been here for many a year so was good for a quick stop and reminisce. They sure do have a steep slope outside the pub, gotta be careful parking here or one could easily take a tumble.

Joffrey was in his element!

After a quick beer and chat it was time to head off. Remember that steep slope out the front of the pub I mentioned that could be hazardous? So for the second time today Rick had dropped his bike this time right outside the pub. Lucky a couple of the boys were still there to help him pick it up as it went over down the hill. Picking it up would have been a struggle against the slope.

From here we went down via Bermagui and on into Tathra where we were staying at the Tathra Hotel for the night. I decided to have a quick shower and then head up to the bottlo and get a 4 pack of Jamesons before we went to diner. Standing on the balcony with an Icey cold Jamesons I notice a couple of whales swimming by only about 100m offshore.  

Day 2 and I was feeling ok despite turning in after 11:30pm and I'd forgotten to pack the power lead for my cpap machine. The look of disappointment on Joffrey's face was priceless. Opening the door and I was greeted by Skip and his mates. He wouldn't come any closer the to Africa Twin, the kanga killer.

We headed down to the bakery for breakfast, I decided to take a look at the Tathra wharf. There were a few people out fishing this morning.

After demolishing a toasted ham/cheese/tomato sammich for breaky we headed out the normal route towards Bega then down through Wyndham and Cathcart on our way to Bombala where we refueled. We grabbed some lunch to go here as we would be turning down McKillops Bridge Road up into the high country. Plan was to stop at McKillops Bridge for lunch and then keep going via Limestone road to Benambra. The road bikes would continue down the Bonang to Orbost and then head back up to Omeo and meet us there.

I stopped just out by the pine forests outside of Bombala just after a kamikaze magpie dived across the road only to hit me in the left boot. He would have been fine if he just stayed where he was. I stopped for a photo of the bikes from a hilltop in between the forests. 

Heading down the Bonang you could feel the temperature starting to rise. Then we turned off down towards McKillops bridge. It wasn't far probably about 50kms or so, it took about an hour and we arrived around 1pm. Stopping at the foot of the bridge we had some lunch, standing under whatever shade we could find. The temp had risen to 35°C and was getting quite uncomfortable in all our gear, I could feel the heat sapping my energy, I'd been unwell in the lead up to this ride.

A group of kayakers had stopped underneath the bridge for some lunch. It's a beautiful spot for a lunch stop here along the shore of the Snowy River. A couple of cars crossed the bridge. It made the whole bridge rattle and shake.

We discussed  heading down to Buchan and around as riding in the 35°C heat at 50kmh wasn't ideal. Stu decided no matter what he was doing limestone road to Benambra. As we ascended the hill out of McKillops bridge and got to the top of the range the temp had dropped back down to 28°C and was quite tolerable again. We stopped at the Barry way intersection waiting for everyone where we decided that it would actually be better to ride to Benabara in the cool rather than go back down into the heat towards Buchan. It was 200km to Omeo that way and only 110km via Limestone Rd. Stu had already blasted off not to be seen again like he tends to do.

As we went along Limestone road it crested the range at 4500ft and the temp had dropped to a pleasant 23°C, felt like the AC was turned on, so good. I didn't stop along here at all keeping the pace up trying to see if I could catch Stu if possible at Benambra pub but wasn't to be as he blasted along to Omeo.

I stopped at Benambra pub as I was definitely going to have a beer. Then got a call from Joffrey. Looking at my phone I thought that's odd, why would he be calling? Turns out he got a flat rear tyre about 30km out of town. He rode it into town and parked up at the pub where we proceeded to change the tube. The tube had a little cut in it but couldn't see anything wrong with the tyre. Lucky I had a spare tube. Then we had a well earned beer or two.

It was only a short 20km ride into Omeo from here so was over with pretty quickly. We were the last in due to the extra time it took to change the tyre. So we relaxed into an evening of beers and good company. Life doesn't get much better than this.

The Omeo Hotel was again busy for dinner but it emptied quickly after that and we relaxed into beers out the front for the next couple of hours until they closed at 10pm. It made for a hangover free day the next day which was a win.