I’m still healing from a crash last week, so I have decided to avoid riding on rough trails or single tracks at the moment to let my shoulder heal.
Today I rode to Mount Pleasant in the hills behind Dayboro. This rural area is nestled in a valley created by the North Pine River between Mount Mee and Mount Byron.
What I enjoyed most was having a few hours on the bike on quiet rural roads to daydream and get in “The Zone” while covering a reasonable distance (80km). The hills were mostly gentle, although I managed to ascend a total of 1,048m during the ride.
Andrew Petrie reported a stand of Bunya Pines in this area when he visited it in the 1830’s. I’ve got some ideas about where that stand might have been. As you ride along the road, there are some quite mature specimens poking out from behind the hills about 300 metres from the road. These two Bunyas are quite young – perhaps 60 to 70 years old.
Some time in the next year I hope to come back here again and ride through the rainforest up to Toogoolawah in the Brisbane Valley. But the management roads in the rainforest are closed at the moment due to damage from a lot of the heavy rain we’ve had lately.
I’m happy to wait 🙂
Total distance: 80.65 km Total climbing: 1131 m Average temperature: NAN Total time: 04:53:22
I crashed the bike riding down the Goat Track from Mt Nebo this week. I got some pretty bad scratches, and suffered a painful shoulder injury which will need a week or two to recover.
Rather than mope around the house, Liz and the kids agreed to come for a hike through one of my favourite mountain biking places. We drove up to Mt Tibrogargan and hiked 8.8km around the Trachyte Circuit in the Glasshouse Moiuntains.
Liz and the kids walk along one of the many trails with Mount Tibrogargan hunched over pensively in the background.
We wound our way up towards the Jack Ferris Lookout which has some great views of the valley.
Liz and Beerwah – two legendary mothers.
Harrison enjoys the view of Tibrogargan from the lookout.
Lilly checks out Mount Tiberoowuccum from the lookout.
This blue healer cattle dog was sitting eagerly on the back of a ute driving past us. Suddenly the driver stopped, turned around, let the dog off, and started driving again.
The blue healer happily ran along in front of the car – rejoicing in his dogginess.
And the driver seemed pretty happy that he didn’t have to walk while his dog got some exercise.
Harrison and Lilly celebrate finishing our walk.
Well done team. 8.8km, 548m ascent, just over 2 hours. Thanks so much for a great time.
Total distance: 9.73 km Total climbing: 673 m Average temperature: NAN Total time: 02:48:15
I found a decent looking route on Garmin Connect (thanks 1aggers) that I thought was worth a try, and set off from Matthew Flinders park.
This place appeals to me from a historical perspective because it’s where Matthew Flinders camped in July 1799 while exploring the Moreton Bay area aboard the Norfolk, which makes it one of the earliest places in our region where European contact was first made. The story goes that Flinders sailed up the Pumicestone Passage and then up Glasshouse Creek before coming ashore and hiking to the base of Tibrogargan. It was too sheer for him to climb, so he took the easy option and climbed Mt Beerburrum instead.
Whenever I visit the Glasshouse Mountains, I’m always mindful of the Aboriginal Legend of the area, and the timelessness of family conflict, disappointment and forgiveness (or the lack thereof). I don’t know what it is, but when you spend the day in front of these large monoliths, the legend becomes more than a quaint story. It takes on a power of its own. I could understand Tibrogargan’s rage, Beerwah’s disappointment, and even Coonowrin’s reticence.
So all of this was going through my head while I tried to complete this difficult ride today.
I started off on the Trachyte Track – a beautiful single track around the base of Tibrogargan. But watch out – it has stairs in some places making it a challenging ride at times.
The Trachyte Track winds through the forest up the northern slopes of Mt Beerburrum to Jack Ferris Lookout, which has some great views of some of the other mountains, including Tiberoowuccum and Ngungun – two of the smaller ones.
I then bit off a bit more than I could chew when I tried riding over “The Twins”. These two pert mammarian hills seem harmless enough. But I ended up dragging the bike up the steep rutted track on one side, then carefully walking it down the steep rocky track on the other side. But I did ride some of it 🙂
I then bashed north through some narrow muddy forestry roads until I reached the main lookout which has some excellent views of the mountains.
From there I headed up to Beerwah then down some steep but picturesque tracks towards Coonowrin. All along this section, Beerwah towered over me as a rode. It was almost like she was looking over my shoulder.
Towards the end of this track, the wet weather and the 4WD’s have taken their toll. The track is terribly rutted, making it impossible to ride (or drive) through. My “Giant” bike was dwarfed by some of the ruts in the track.
Total distance: 40.92 km Total climbing: 935 m Average temperature: NAN Total time: 05:30:20
A koala gatecrashed our Friday drinks on the deck this afternoon.
He quickly scrambled up the paper-bark tree then jumped into a neighbouring eucalypt before munching on some gum leaves.
When I took this picture he was probably less than a 2 metres away.
While I was leaning out taking photos of a Koala I didn’t realize how close I was to this golden orb spider. Looking like a strange little potato with spindly legs, these little creatures can be found all over our garden
Lance invited Craig, Graham and me around to his place for a ride in the national park near his house at Upper Brookfield. He’d told me it would probably be hilly, but I started to worry when the long driveway up to his house reached gradients of over 30%.
We planned to ride to Mermaid Mountain, climb it, and loop back through the D’Aguilar National Park.
Mermaid Mountain is the highest peak in the southern section of the D’Aguilar Range.
The surrounding terrain is very hilly. We ascended almost 700m in 13km on our bikes. That’s heart-breaking steepness.
But the climb to the top of the mountain is worth the wonderful view. You can see Flinders Peak off to the south (left) of the photo, and Lake Manchester off to the north-west (right).
Craig’s brake pads broke. Normally this would be a serious thing out on the trail, but he had brought some replacement pads. He and Graham knew how to replace the pads.
I wouldn’t have had a clue and don’t carry spare pads. Perhaps I should add that to the long list of items I already carry in my pack?
Secretly I rejoiced because it meant we could stop for half an hour and catch our breath.
Well done guys, for fixing the brakes.
By the way, can you make out the words on Graham’s Jersey? He didn’t look that cranky to me 🙂
Thanks Lance for a really enjoyable ride, and some delicious home made ginger beer at the end!
Total distance: 15.05 km Total climbing: 722 m Average temperature: NAN Total time: 03:31:59
“This is paradise” I gushed to Liz as we walked through this spectacular national park today.
“Kondalilla” means “Rushing Water” in the Gubbi Gubbi / Kabbi Kabbi Aboriginal Language – a reference to the amazing 80m waterfall that pours out of the rainforest down to the rocks below.
What’s also special about this rainforest are the amazing Bunya Pines (Araucaria Bidwillii) which tower above the forest on ridges and hill tops all over the place. Some of them looked to be at least 70 metres high. This is the homeland of the Bunya Pine – a majestic tree so important to the Aboriginal people who have inhabited this part of the world for thousands of years.
It’s mountainous terrain – not for the faint-hearted. We climbed 300 metres during our 6km walk. But it was well worth the effort.
As an added bonus, a friendly Lace Monitor swaggered up to me and gulped down a chicken bone while I was filiming him.
The icing on the cake was the stunning views from the lookout at Montville. We were able to see all of the Sunshine Coast, including Mount Coolum and Mount Ninderry.
Yes, this is paradise, and we’re so lucky to be living in it.
Total distance: 7.58 km Total climbing: 346 m Average temperature: NAN Total time: 02:21:07
Mount Samson was called “Buran” by the local Aborigines. In the Turrbal language it means “wind”. Unfortunately there was no wind up there today.
The aim was to ride our mountain bikes up to a flattish point at about 500m elevation, then hike the rest of the way to the 680m summit. Easier said than done. The road had been washed out in several places, covered in fallen rocks and logs. We climbed 430m in the first kilometre. With my head spinning and sweat dripping from me I was exhausted. Thankfully Derek gave me a bit of a push-along when I needed it, and we all managed to get the bikes up to the planned point.
From this vantage point, the views over Lake Samsonvale out to Moreton Bay are spectacular.
At this point we met up with some hiking friends, and started the long slog through the lantana and up the mountain. Lantana is a horrible weed with stems that can grow thicker than your thumb. The leaves and stems cut at your skin and several times blocked out way entirely. We had to smash through it with our feet (we didn’t take a Machete).
Eventually we beat the lantana and took a breather before the final push up through the rocks and the rainforest to the top.
Strangely the view from the summit isn’t panoramic. It’s covered with trees. But it’s still beautiful. Someone has erected some Tibetan Prayer Flags at the top. It took me a while to make the connection. Prayer Flags are usually flown high up in the Himalayas. But I suppose this is as high as you’re going to get around Brisbane, so it make sense to me.
You could see a few good views by peaking out through the trees, but for me the best bit about the summit was taking a well-earned rest with some really fun people. This started off, for me, as a harebrained scheme when I asked a few friends “Do you think we could ride bikes up Mount Samson”. The fantastic thing is that those friends were willing to try something difficult and silly with me – even the ones that weren’t able to ride. I’m really grateful to have friends like that.
What’s next???
If you’d like a sadistic look at the climbing-profile for this trip, here it is:
Total distance: 22.56 km Total climbing: 1002 m Average temperature: NAN Total time: 06:08:37
I just realized that I haven’t shared my WX5 videos here. I did them a while ago and posted them to Youtube but I’m guessing some of you haven’t seen them before. The WX5 is really fun to play because you configure it to sound like a variety (hundreds) of different instruments, and the voices allow you to inject your own personality and expressiveness.
If you don’t like one of the tunes, just click on the < or > buttons to the left or right of the videos to move on.
