Links

Audax Australia
This is the umbrella organisation running long distance cycling events in Australia Their website includes a calendar of events.

Bikejournal
A place where cyclist can keep track of their mileage and any number of other statistics, as well as an attached forum.

Bikeforums
A set of discussion forums covering almost every conceivable cycling related topic.

Cycling Adventurer
The Cycling Adventurer has tossed in the structured life of an urbanite to explore the world by bicycle. A well-written site detailing how he came to cycling, and what he learned along the way.

Crazy Guy on a Bike

Bicycle touring journals from all over the world, including a couple of my own.

Johns Cycles

This is my LBS on the Gold Coast. While they cater more to the racing market, their service, advice and workmanship is the best on the coast.

St Kilda Cycles

Importers of all manner of things hard to find in Australia, including the legendary Schmidt hub dynamo & E6 lights.

Blogs

Bicycle-eye
Wonderings and wanderings out and about in Portland, Oregon, US

The Journey
The journey begins in Perth, Western Australia.

Lance Notstrong
The "other" Lance!

Ms Mittens
The Wired Cat on-line

Iron Gambit
.

Aussie Writer and Cycletourist
A blog chronicling the writing and cycling of a seaside baby boomer.

Up in Alaska
Jill's subarctic journal about ice, bears and distant dreams of the midnight sun.

The Kin Chronicles
Taking mediocrity to a new level of ordinary.

Allez
Riding and running with a vengeance.

London Cycling Diary
Pedalling across the capital since August 2005.

CouchPilot-2-BikePilot (Zin's cycling blog)
Living an adventurous life with Type-2-Diabetes.

The adventures of Crazy Biker Chick
... Including cycling, adventuring, cooking, knitting and ranting.

Redneck Espanol
The two wheeled Spanish redneck.

Treadly and me
"Work is something I do between riding my bicycle".

Crowlie
Womanist philosophy and theology. Cycling, climbing, art, single-motherhood and fire-twirling.

Adrian Fitch's random rambling.
A bit about cycling, a bit about genealogy, a bit about radio but mostly a lot about nothing at all.

Geo's big adventure
The life and times of Geo.

It's about the bike
Musings on the cycling life.

Spinopsys
Various cycling tidbits.

Industry Outsider
A blog about bikes and stuff.

Tweed Coast Treadly
An old man's bicycle riding diary.

A cyclist's life in Tenerife
(Canary Islands).

Bike to work to live to bike
It's never too late to get back on the bike

Stupid Hurts
Just the random scribblings of a guy with a bicycle

I'm not drunk enough for this
Really, I'm not.

BikeHacks
What can I say? Just read it.

Mozam's cycling adventures
A random collection of the things I like to do most, and mostly that is to ride my bikes, bicycles that is... My musings from competitive riding, long distance endurance to puttering around the neighborhood..

More cycling blogs

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Friday, April 04, 2008

Closing the epic

Since my next major ride is just a day away, it's probably time to finish writing about last weekened. On Sunday Martin and I decided to head for the Tweed Valley once again, this time climbing on Brummies Road, a dirt road that climbs around 400 metres, with the gradient reaching 20% at one point. First of all though, we had to climb Tomewin again. From Tomewin it became apparent once again that most of this mist was clustered around the Tweed Valley, but this time it disappeared shortly after we hit the Valley floor.



Again, we had to head out through Chillingham and Tyalgum to get the ride properly started, but this time we took a short detour on a dirt road. It probably didn't add any distance, but it was prettier than the main road. More importantly, it added a few hills and an extremely refreshing creek crossing.



It was after climbing the rolling hills toward Tyalgum that the real ride started. It's a product of taking Swifts Road and Tyalgum Ridge road out of town, and into the Wollumbin National Park. Now the road climbs, varying between steady and steep over a spur of the Mt Warning range. Initially it passes through open farming country, before hitting the rainforest at the top. Much of the climb is just a long grind, it's all about continually working the mountain until it stops. However, the rewards are definitely there.



The ride across the top of the ridge offers it's own challenges, one in particular involves a creek crossing and a short but steep climb out. It's easy to have a minor crash there (I won't say anymore, lest I incriminate myself). This is then followed by a screaming decent back to the valley. This descent was made a little more troublesome by a few 4wd ruts in the road. It became fairly obvious on our return to the valley floor that someone had ignored the "road closed" sign to inflict this damage.



This road conveniently descends right into the prettiest part of the old Tweed Valley ride, and we lapped it up. There are some places that you just need to go and this is one of them. It has rainforest, creeks and streams, mountain views, just about everything a valley ride needs. The final part of the ride comes out near Mt Warning, ready for the final ride into Uki, and eventually home.



Uki is a pleasant place for a lunch stop, but we were soon on our way. With the main interest of the ride over, it was now a case of mopping up the likes of Stokers Siding, Murwillumbah, Bilambil and of course, Urliup, which always provides a pleasant diversion. I made a point of slaughtering Bilambil right at the end, in fact, I even eased up on the Urliup climb to conserve the energy to do it. Needless to say, that provided a final feeling of satisfaction to end what had been a spectacular weekend of riding.

Tomorrow I have a 300km randonee lined up north of Brisbane. Bring it on.

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