North East Victoria Gold Towns Kickbike Tour

After wavering between multi day rides on the High Country Rail Trail and a ride in central Victoria / southern NSW starting at either Cobram or Tungamah for the weeks leading up to the ride, I checked the weather forecast for the week of the ride and it showed the possibility of rain on Wednesday afternoon and Thursday. This meant that the rides I was considering could be subject to rain on the last day or two. So I re-visited an earlier idea I had for a multi day ride that incorporated the only section of the Murray to Mountains rail trail I haven’t ridden yet – the Beechworth – Yackandandah – Osborne’s Flat section. On Friday 13th I booked all the accommodation for a ride that would start on Sunday 15th and include overnight stays at Eldorado, Yackandandah and Barnawatha before returning home.

Sun 15th September 2024: Rutherglen – Springhurst –  Eldorado Ride

The ride today had fairly strong cool headwinds most of the time, and cross winds the rest of the time. This made the ride, which was about 38km long, particularly difficult. Riding into headwinds is the equivalent of riding up hills, especially when the winds are strong. There were also some pretty steep actual hills and long climbs. By the time I arrived at Eldorado at about noon I was ready to stop. At Eldorado there is a free ‘bike repair station’, which includes a pump. I pumped my Kickbike’s tyres up as they were lower than they should be. In retrospect, this is probably partially why the ride was so hard. Hopefully having more air in the tubes will improve the rolling ability of the bike on tomorrow’s ride.

I followed route suggestions by Google Maps for today’s ride. Most of the time this worked well, with one glaring exception: Dunnes Rd near Springhurst, which by even the most broad definition couldn’t be called a ‘road’ at all, and also involved negotiating a few barbed wire fences that farmers had kindly erected across the public reserve. Note to self: don’t always believe Google Maps, and if a road on Google Maps is not a road in reality then find an alternative route.

Another road that I probably wouldn’t have chosen was Campbell Rd, Byawatha, near the Narimga Cemetery. Google Maps suggested this road, which shortened the length of the ride by quite a few KMs. It would have been better characterised as a 4 wheel drive track than a road, but at least there were no fences, barbed wire or otherwise, across it and after walking up the steepest part I was able to roll most of the way to the next road junction.

Apart from the winds, the weather on today’s ride was beautiful and sunny with clear blue skies, although it was fairly cool when I started the ride.

Once I arrived at Eldorado pub / general store, which has a proud sign outside saying ‘Australias smallest tavern’, I purchased some lunch which included a pastry, a chocolate bar and a big slice of carrot cake. After lunch I had to find a place where I had mobile service so I could upload my ride to Strava, let Rebecca know I had arrived safely, and contact the caravan park where I was staying. This involved walking up a steep nearby street and then standing where the best mobile coverage was until I had finished doing what I needed to on the phone.

After 2pm I arrived at the Camp Crusty caravan park where I had booked the Couples Shepherd Cabin, I went back to the general store to buy some food for the afternoon meal and tomorrow’s breakfast. Their food selection at the store was not that great, but I purchased a packet of flavoured rice and some noodles for carbohydrates, a can of spaghetti, and a few Kit Kats. Then I had a shower and relaxed for the rest of the day.

Mon 16th September 2024: Eldorado – Everton – Beechworth – Yackandandah Ride

I stepped outside after the sunrise, and it was rather cold. There was a real cold bite in the air and lots of frost on the grass around the caravan park. Even as late as 7:30 the air was cold and there was a very obvious frost, even on parts of the Kickbike. The plan was to leave Eldorado around 8am, hoping that the air temperature had risen a bit by then. 

This ride was Eldorado – Everton – Beechworth – Yackandandah and was planned to be the longest ride for this tour. I got to Beechworth via a ride southwards, then turning north east to Beechworth, Wooragee and Yackandandah. This ride included the Everton – Beechworth – Yackandandah section of the Murray to Mountains rail trail. I had never ridden the Beechworth to Yackandandah section before, or the road between Eldorado and Tarrawingee, so a lot of it was quite new to me. The climb from Everton to Beechworth was about as hard as I expected, although it would have been a lot harder if I hadn’t added more air to the Kickbike’s tyres after yesterday’s ride. 

It’s always a pleasure riding through the countryside especially on rail trails and when the weather is pleasant like it was today. 

I had expected the Beechworth – Yackandandah section to be downhill almost the whole way, but after consulting the rail trail gradient chart at Beechworth I realised there was at least 7km of climbs in the 25km section. While the trail followed the railway formation it tended to be downhill, but there was quite a lot of the trail that didn’t follow the railway formation at all. 

In planning for this tour, I calculated that the ride today would be 62km. By the time I got to Yackandandah 56km after leaving Eldorado my legs were pretty fatigued, so I was glad the ride wasn’t as long as I had calculated! 

Upon arrival at Yackandandah I purchased an Omelette Sourdough Toastie and a Bavarian dessert. I stayed at Yackandandah Central Motel, which as the name suggests is very central in Yackandandah – it’s literally in the middle of the main street.

Tue 17th September 2024: Yackandandah – Osborne’s Flat – Yackandandah Ride

My muscles, even after their rest overnight, were still a bit sore this morning. This is probably partly because they are not accustomed to doing long Kickbike rides so many days in a row without a rest day. So the plan was to ride the Yackandandah – Osborne’s Flat section of the trail with a lighter backpack before booking out of my accommodation, then riding Yackandandah to Barnawartha where I had accommodation booked for the night. This mean’t the total riding distance would be about 45km for the day, but I was hoping that for the ride to Barnawartha the ride would be either be downhill or fairly level after the initial 5kms or so of climbing out of Yackandandah. The weather forecast was for SW winds slowly swinging around to Westerlies, which might mean some tailwinds to help push me along.

After a breakfast of muesli bars and bite size mars bars, I rode the Yackandandah to Osborne’s Flat trail, so that I could complete the Murray to Mountains rail trail on the Kickbike. I’m not sure whether this trail is actually part of the rail trail, but according to the signage along yesterday’s ride it is. There was a particularly vicious magpie about 1km along trail, but interestingly it didn’t swoop or squark when I was returning to Yackandandah. This section of trail follows a creek, is about 7km one way, and has a lot of up and down sections, some of them quite steep. I completed the 14km return ride in just over an hour.

Yackandandah – Barnawartha Ride

This ride was a fairly hard slog for the first 7km, to near the turn off onto Indigo Creek Rd. In that first 7km section the trail was either on the old railway formation or very close to it so I stopped often to take photos of the old railway formations – at least that’s my excuse for stopping!

After the hard slog, there was some very very welcome downhills, and then the gently undulating Indigo Creek Rd all the remainder of the way to Barnawartha. In a little over 2 hours I rode the 29km to arrive at Barnawartha. Along the way I had to negotiate a temporary bridge and traffic lights, saw some stationery bikes that weren’t going to go anywhere in any hurry, and was overtaken by a 4 rider peloton.

The scenery included lots of green fields, rolling hills, the odd dilapidated shed or house, and a piggy mailbox. Thankfully there were not many swooping Magpies to contend with. I did have what seemed to be a headwind in the Indigo Creek valley but this wasn’t as bad as those I encountered on Sunday’s ride.

The combined total distance of the rides on 16th & 17th September were 100km.

Upon arrival at Barnawartha I purchased some food for lunch, then waited for someone to arrive at the hotel so I could book into my accommodation for the night. After a later than usual large afternoon meal of nachos, I spent the next few hours relaxing before going to sleep for the night.

Wed 18th September 2024: Barnawatha – Rutherglen Ride

As I am an early riser, I was up by about 5am and had finished breakfast by 6am, but I didn’t want to leave on today’s ride that early due to how cold it was. So I went for a walk around Barnawartha to fill in some time.

Then a bit after 8am, I commenced my last ride for this Kickbike tour – riding from Barnawartha to Rutherglen. This 23km ride completed the multi-day tour I had planned. Most of this ride was on roads I had ridden at least once before, about 10km of them being gravel, so no real surprises or awe-inducing moments. The weather was good – sunny and a little windy, sometimes I even seemed to have a tailwind. I set a new Personal Record on one Strava segment – Mt Pleasant Rd in the Chiltern Mt Pilot National Park – beating my previous best by a bit more than 3 minutes. This ride completed a loop: Rutherglen – Eldorado – Everton – Beechworth – Yackandandah – Barnawartha – Rutherglen.

After the 3 previous days of riding, my muscles were feeling a bit sore and fatigued, but overall I made good time on this ride and was home about 1.5 hours after starting the ride.

Tour statistics:

• Total number of rides: 5.
• Total distance ridden: 162km.
• Total climbing ridden: 1488 metres.
• AVG distance ridden per day: 40.5km.
• AVG ride length: 32.4km.