On Saturday afternoon, caught the train to Moss Vale with Matt, Eugen, Julian, Peter and Lindsay. In Moss Vale it was quite cool, with mist that got deeper as we rode to the hotel in Bundanoon.
Just arrived in Bundanoon; Julian and Eugen in the fog
Matt
Bundanoon Hotel, our lodging for the night. With the swirling mist and Tudor-style architecture, half of us were expecting to have to solve a Cluedo-style murder sometime in the wee morning hours!
Fog swirling around the trees and hedges
Everyone had a great big dinner, washed down with a couple of glasses of their favourite drink. Lightning flashed outside the window, and we all crossed our fingers that tomorrow's weather report (for showers) would be wrong. After a few tall stories, and some decent calorie loading, we hit the sack and drifted off to sleep.
This morning we got up at 7 and hung around in various states of consciousness until breakfast. I didn't bother with the ordinary old weet-bix; I went straight for the greasy stuff: raisin toast, coffee, scrambled eggs and hash browns.
Thirteen of us milled around in the parking area of the hotel, giving our bikes a check-over, getting tyre pressures just right, squinting into the morning sun, telling more tall stories. It was windy, not just gusty, but good and windy, ... but no sign of rain at all! Even better, that wind would be a tail wind! How good could it get?
Thirteen - an unlucky number? READ ON and judge for yourself!
Julian making one-last check
Then, off we went!
Lindsay gave the morning a hearty thumbs-up
Peter (aka fixedgear) enjoying the morning on his impressive veteran Falcon Black-Diamond
Here and there we stopped; checking directions or waiting for others to regroup.
Grant; our fearless organiser and leader
Simon, Ross, Lindsay
Peter, headed for Bowral
We hit Bowral (km 40) and stopped for coffee. It was a really beautiful day, and everyone knew it.
Yes, Simon, I am gonna take a photo
Ross
We set off again. After Bowral, the hills got a bit bigger - and the descents a bit faster.
Descent outside of Bowral
More map checkin'
Steve, a ring-in from outside the club, was not having a good day with his saddle. He padded it out with a semi-inflated old tube and wrapped it up tight with masking tape.
Lindsay rolling along
Heading under the freeway
Grant, on the way to lunch in Picton
We stopped in Picton for lunch. Some opted for the greasiest thing they could find, while other, perhaps wiser folk went for something a bit lighter on the stomach. After all, in the back of everyone's mind was the fact that, just out of town, lay RAZORBACK, the big climb of the day. A half-kilo burger-n-chips combo probably isn't going to help anyone up any climb in a hurry!
Lunch stop, Picton (km 90)
Some charming young men of the peleton
RAZORBACK. Yes, it's actually called that! The road-signs say so! When I first heard the name I figured it was a nickname for probably the most hellish climb this side of the Gibraltar Range. After Picton, the road headed up, then down for a fair stretch. Four kilometres out of town, heading along Old Razorback Road, we hit the climb. On dirt. It was every man for himself.
Some succeeded with the slow grind. Others succeeded with a direct and aggressive high-energy frontal attack. Still others used more novel methods, like Eugen who reduced the gradient by riding zig-zags across the road. It was hot and dusty and steep, but everyone succeeded.
Looking down the Old Razorback Road dirt climb
Lindsay, grinding up RAZORBACK like a cheap pole dancer...
... and enjoying every last inch of it!!
View from the top of RAZORBACK
Having conquered RAZORBACK (and the challenging descent), the group rolled along, satisfied that nothing could stand in the way of its quest to reach Tempe.
Soon enough, we found ourselves riding through bigger and bigger towns. The number of cars (especially those driven by annoying teenagers screaming barnyard noises out their borrowed cars windows) started to really increase. We'd left the country behind, and were now in a rolling pattern of shops, industrial estates, suburbs.
There was also a sharp increase in the amount of broken glass and other roadside nasties. Here's Grant and Lindsay stopped to fix a puncture.
We hit the M5 motorway. Aside from the shattered glass, and soul-shattering traffic, the road was smooth as glass. And who notices the traffic when you're surrounded by your cycling buddies? Actually, after 140 km of fixed-gear madness, everyone was feeling fatigued at this point.
Approaching the M5 toll-gates
Then, my trusted machine succumbed to the constant onslaught of roadside debris. I punctured hard - the air rushing out, and I felt the rim within a couple of wheel rotations. I was very grateful to Grant who stuck around and lent a hand. Pretty much everyone else had disappeared off the front, so we rode on together, when another tube punctured - this time on Grant's bike. It was worth a laugh as we stopped, fixed it, and got on our way again. By now, everyone was a good five minutes in front.
But wait, what was that noise? Another bloody puncture! Not even five minutes since the last one! Things were looking serious as I fished out my last of two new tubes and Grant fixed his wheel. As he did, a quick inspection of my wheel revealed a huge sidewall cut, with the tube bulging out. This was just the icing on a very sarcastic cake, I thought, as I began fishing in my pockets for a wrapper or something to make a boot from. As Grant began inflating his new-fixed tyre and I settled on an old Cookies-n-cream Powerbar wrapper, my tube exploded, and we were left stranded. Neither of us had anymore patches or tubes, and we were stuffed. Stranded on the M5. km ~160?
Grant, calling to ask Gillian to come and pick us up
We'd lost a lot of time. It was now pushing 5 o'clock as we waited for Gill to save us. We were lucky to have stopped right in an emergency stopping bay, so we had some space from the constant traffic. Grant pulled out the jelly snakes and we chatted away, until we realised where we'd stopped. We didn't believe it. Emergency stopping bay number 13!
Grant, "looking on the bright-side"; at least we had Gill to save us!
So that was it. Gill picked us up. We loaded the bikes into the car. We drove to Tempe velodrome. A less than ideal (but still pretty good) end to a ripper of a day on fixies!
The mythical Tempe velodrome
