Rumbalara Hell-Bunnies

The Ride
23rd may 2009

This ride was going to be a cruisy ride,
pre-named the east-west-gosford loop, taking on a few hills and a little un-explored (but seemingly straightforward) territory through the Rumbalara reserve. Maps ready and eager to ride, 2 of the Biker Bunnies, Lou and Annette, met up at 9am in Adcock park. We had braved the weather(storms forecast, heavy showers minutes
before set off, torrential rain through the night etc..) and were excited to say the least!

Note the bit about unexplored territory above...

We set off and managed to get close to the Rumbalara reserve area with only 1 wrong turn (which still landed us in the same spot, so no drama there). In search of Marana Road, we rode up Tulip street, had a look at Lilac street (all very hilly around here), scratched our heads and accepted that Google maps are fraudulent & basically all we needed to do was follow our noses... :)

The next hour and a half of our ride involved lifting bikes over gates, dredging through mud, clambering up REALLY steep cliff faces (OK bit of an exaggeration, but they were steep and they
were slippery... A few swearing sessions and lots of laughing got us further into the mountain maze - by which time we’d both admitted to having a lousy sense of
direction.

BUT we were feeling CONFIDENT and part of the trecking was possible on bike, which obviously made us feel we were going in the right direction...

A wee stop near a big rock, and then hoiking our bikes over yet another gate - this one had barbed wire extensions running on either side, the type designed to in Lou’s words "Keep BIG animals out". After Lou's safety check (which involved bravely clambering over the fence to see if anything BIG would come charging at her!), we
continued deeper into the Rumbalara unknowns.

Finally we heard the sounds of distant traffic noise & breathed sighs of relief! We weren't going to need to call for emergency back-up from Tor, Bo or Paul "HELP HELP COME AND GET US" "where are you?" "WE DON’T KNOOOOOOW!!!!" We rode on expecting signs of civilization to manifest themselves around the next corner...

Traffic noises faded, and the track started winding further up the mountain. By this time one of our maps (thanks to Annette's generously open pocket) had left us for some other mountain trecker to find, so we consulted the remaining one and agreed that we were definitely not far off Henry Parry Drive in North Gosford now, this was simply a last little turn before the descent to the way out...

At last we found the very, very steep track down the mountain, we had to get off our bikes again because we were laughing too hard to safely use the brakes - there were HOUSES in sight, and even a road! Marvelling at the lovely houses in North
Gosford "You never see this when you zoom past in a car..." Lou suddenly pipes up: "Ehhmm I think that building over there is the Erina Heights Grammar School..."
We had indeed taken a few completely wrong turns - adding 7 kms to the ride and a surprise exit from the mountain, finding ourselves with very muddy bikes and happy smiles - in Erina Heights instead of North Gosford!

The rest of the ride back to Adcock park was smooth sailing, we even bumped into Biker Bunny Janine, fresh from Yoga (at the Erina Heights round-about)! All up, a great adventure with lots of laughs and great weather (only a few drops of rain fell during the whole ride)!

Looking forward to the next adventure already!


The Stats

Riding time 2 hours 55 min
Calories 1100 +
Heart rate 126 bpm (average) 169 BPM (max)
Riding distance 28km (planned 21)
Maps 2 (1 lost on way)
Saviour Lou's Tofu treat

The Map