Glorious Mee

A little late on this entry, but one hopes it might have been worth waiting for. Saturday was the day, one of my main goals for the year had been to do this ride in temperatures below 30 degrees Celcius. That aspect of it complied pretty well. The start was in temperatures of (incredibly) just 8 degrees, compared with 32 last year. The first act on this ride is the climb of Mt Nebo, with a small descent at the pass (which, contrary to the signs, is only about 440 metres above sea level), before the final assault of Mt Glorious (742 at it's highest point).





Following the ridge along for a while, the climbing and descending at various points on the range actually yield over 1,400 metres of climbing in total before the descent into the valley below.



It was here that the terrain changed to rolling hills rather than mountains, with much drier vegetation. It's also prime magpie territory.



The Hills rolled all the way to Kilcoy (another 50km away), with a couple of short sharp climbs just to make the legs do some work. In fact, those 50km yielded another 600 metres of climbing. The views of Lake Somerset were the reward.





After lunch in Kilcoy, the terrain became flatter and less interesting. It was also the scene of (surprisingly) the only magpie attack of the day. The temperature continued warming up through Woodforde and beyond, reaching 28 degrees C on the climb of Mt Mee. This climb is a killer. Although the average gradient is only 9%, it's the first km or so that does the damage, and coming after 150km and 2200 metres of climbing, it already has plenty of soreness and fatigue to work with. However, the reward for reaching the top is special.



Eventually this climb reaches the modest height of 540 metres, hugging the ridge, but yielding suprisingly little in the way of views, before the descent into Samford Valley, and a bushfire! The smoke here made breathing difficult at times, it was a matter of survival for another 40km or so, onto the outskirts of Brisbane. A couple of short sharp climbs here made the legs wake up a little bit. However, the weren't insurmountable (the biggest being 150 metres or so), and were soon eaten up, before the return to The Gap, and the chance to share tales of the ride.

I do, however, worry a little about the future of this ride. The caterers, while being excellent once again, seemed slightly less enthusiastic than in previous years. I'm wondering how long this will continue. Having said that, doing this ride self-supported would be an interesting challenge.

The ride from the Gap back to Fortitude Valley was pleasant enough. Traffic was a little light, as I waited for the throngs charging toward the Brisbane Broncos game (they got owned by Melbourne), to finish. Waterworks Road was pretty quiet. Fortitude Valley at night is a suprisingly pleasant ride. The ups and downs yield views over the city that are very pleasant. At the end, there was 232km of riding, and 3,304 metres of climbing for the day. Leaving me with that rare combination of elation and exhaustion that can only come under very special circumstances.