August 23, 2010

Loop the Lake

The Ride in Stats...
Loop the Lake - Long Jetty - Toukley - Tuggerah - Long Jetty

Bunnies on Board - Amanda & Annette
Distance cycled - 45km
Time cycling - 2 hours 34 min
Time it actually took to loop the lake - 3 hours 55 min!
Calories burnt - 1363
Heart rate - Max: 173 Average: 110
Speed - Max: 38.5 km/h Average: 17.2 km/h

Back in the Southern part of the world, after 5 weeks of sneaking away from the winter chills, it was a treat to embark on a new riding adventure with bunny Amanda. As we've just registered to go in the 90km Newcastle to Dungog ride (in less than 3 weeks time) we decided, on this fine sunny Friday morning, to do a slightly longer ride than the Gosford to WoyWoy cruise to help us 'get ready for the big one...'

We met in the carpark at Long Jetty and unloaded our bikes. I showed Amanda a new mad gadget I found online... the Dog-Off.. This funny little thing is a training device, completely harmless to both humans and animals, designed to train pet dogs who bark (I know, I know - I don't have a dog!)... Anyway, the gadget features an ultrasonic beeper (inaudible to humans, but dogs can hear it) and a loud alarm to alert people (help) and scare off an attacking dog - this was the bit got my attention, as I have nightmares about being chased by dogs whilst cycling through semi-isolated areas on my own... The online description said it was particularly useful for cyclists, meter-readers & early morning walkers... So as we laughed our heads off and pondered how this novel thing would work, I stuffed it in my bag and we got ready to leave the carpark.
Amanda showing of her iPhone case at the start

Our first pitstop was just up the road where we tried to pump Amanda's tyres with a service station pump designed for anything but Black Beauty's skinny wheels.Failing to put even a smidgeon of air in her tyres, she decided to brave the land of softish wheels, and so we continued towards The Entrance and beyond. It actually was truly wonderful, the weather was perfect and the undulating terrain toward Toukley is blissful to cycle, it really is...

There's a big bridge at Toukley (with amazing, windy views from the top...), but this bunny decided the ultimate photo opportunity was before the bridge and the ultimate views... this meant that we had two photo stops with very little space in between. Getting a bit too excited about taking photos, we almost ended up with a drowned camera, but luckily Amanda stopped me from placing the camera on the bridge railing to take a 'group photo' - it would most definitely have blown off and landed in the drink!
Pre-bridge photo opportunity...

 
Amanda near Toukley bridge

Two bunnies ON the bridge...

... and the view from the now famous bridge

Cycling through Toukley was exciting; water was clearly visible on both sides between the houses on either side of the main street which made the scenery quite spectacular! We cruised on up a steep hill where poor Amanda was pushed to the limit as she didn't want to stop half way up the hill in full view of a domestic argument taking place on the other side of the road. Time to catch that breath and find a cycle shop where Amanda finally got some air in her tyres. She will tell you she gained a foot in height, as she zoomed down the road towards H.C. Anderson land and Wyong.

Along the cycleway (an absolutely lovely stretch of separate cycleway between Wyong and Tuggerah) we almost collided with a car - parked, doors open, right in the middle of the pathway - I made some comment as I swerved around the car, only to get past the car... and see a dad with a kid that obviously had brought the car to a stop with a session of unpredicted projectile vomiting! Oh dear I thought, let's hope they didn't hear me as it was clear they had well enough on their plate already.

Amanda found an unexpected helper coming up onto Wyong road, where the hilly finish had a supportive passenger in a car wind down their window and yell: "You can do it! You can do it!" We continued in happy spirits all the way to the cycle path along the lake at Chittaway bay, where we parked our bums on a bench for a quick snack and a breather.... There were a couple of dogs barking and just out of curiosity I aimed the Dog-off gadget in their general direction and pushed the silent button to see what would happen - they stopped barking! We decided we'd leave while we could still believe it was the gadget that did it (Amanda already seeing her furry friend at home wearing this little gem around her neck...). We gritted down and cruised the last 10 or so km back to the Long Jetty carpark to make it a 45k ride with a delicious coffee waiting around the corner (where we seriously thought we would fall asleep and have to be carried off the premises).

Pelicans posing along the cycleway

Cruising along the last bit of cycleway

On the way home I dropped my bike in for a service (a mysterious clunking sound in the pedals...) and it looks as though I (in my not so clear-headed state) asked the helpful bike shop man to fit some cleats as well... oh dear, next post may well be more adventurous than I care to think of...

Fabulous to be back riding and hope to have more bunnies back on board too!
Annette :)

... and from bunny Amanda's saddle:

What a morning … Annette has covered most things but I shall just add my tuppence worth

I was so looking forward to this ride as I hadn’t seen or ridden with Netti for over 6 weeks and I was itching for an adventure..

First photo of the day...

Whilst we were trying to pump up my tyres I noticed that my back wheel was out of alignment so Annette and I clashed bicycle helmets on numerous occasions whilst we try to realign the wheel – this means that I had been cycling with a dodgy wheel for two weeks how funny!

A few things that caught my notice – mainly the ride through Toukley was one of the scariest cycling moments I have experienced and of all places to happen it had to be on a hill when I was tired. Annette was already up the top of the hill before I had got a quarter of the way up and as I looked up I saw this young lad running across the road and head towards a young girl who screamed about 4-5 times – you f**** C*** - unfortunately for me I had just stopped pedaling out of sheer exhaustion but this certainly got me going again. There were old ladies lined up on their balconies watching and one old lady walking looked at me and tutted as if to say “here we go again”. Sad that that was part of their daily life!

Safely out of Toukley we headed along the freeway (I think) and pulled up to some traffic lights – Annette ahead and me close behind. On the side of the road was the black guy from the herbal essence ad (well that’s who he reminded me of) and he was cruising down the road with his headphones in. He looked up and saw Annette, stopped and mumbled mmmmmmm and then looked at me stopped and mumbled mmmmmmmmmmmmm. What a pleasant young man I thought.

My final point is when I was cycling in the wrong gear up the underpass and I was pulling an atrocious face full of agony when a young lad wound his window down and shouted ‘ you can do – a little bit harder and you will be there” – he could quite easily have taken the mick out of me in a nasty way.

Anyway that is the end of our 45km ride, we are still preparing for our big 90km one from Newcastle to Dungog and even thinking about cleats and bike shoes. Gosh we do take this seriously!!!!!

Amanda :)