Peats Ridge 49km

The Ride Stats 

Bunnies on board - Janine and Annette

Meeting place - Kariong servo

Set off time - 8:15 am

Weather - Beautiful sunny day :)

Distance cycled - 49km

Active riding time - 4 hours and 6 minutes

Calories burnt - 1555

Heart rate - 120 (average) 228* (max) see more on that one later

With only a week left until our Sydney cycle adventure, Janine and I set off on a hell-bunny ride to conquer hills and clock up the kms - all in the flavour of happy Sunday riding.

The first part of the ride took us up the back of Somersby, down the old Pacific hwy. This is a really lovely part of the ride as you're surrounded by the bush and the air feels ohhh so crisp and clean. It's funny but when on a bicycle you really notice how plants give oxygen to the air... riding through dense greenery lets you BREATHE :) We flew downhill, down and further down along the winding road - the only sound to break up the bellbirds singing was the frequent VROOOOOOOAAAMs of motorbikes swishing past us. I don't think I'm exaggerating to say that at least 200 motorbikes passed us today! So with swishing motor bikes and the sound of bell-birds, we got to the bottom of the hill and crossed Mooney Mooney creek (stopping for a few photos :) )...

Back on our bikes we embarked on our next hill of the day - as Janine says: "What goes down must go up" All the way to the top, where we left the Pacific hwy and worked our way around an exit and turnstile with lots of lanes and roads in every confusing direction, to get to Peats Ridge Rd, where we unceremoniously dropped our bikes by the side of the road while Janine sorted a logistical leather-jacket drama on her phone :) Having just climbed a pretty long hill, and hoping that we'd covered more distance than we in fact had, poor Janine's wish for a longer road-side stop was demolished in an instant as she was demanded back on her bike by yours truly acting as the slave driver of the day... :)

A group of friendly road-bike riders passed us while we were stopped. They all said hi and several of them asked if we were alright... Shortly after, their 'support' car slowed right down next to us, and the lady in the passenger seat hollered out to us - checking if we needed assistance. Very friendly indeed :) We met the happy group again just before we got to the end of Peats Ridge road (where they'd obviously been to the end and turned around somewhere to double back the same way), naturally we waved like old buddies, while trying to look very much in 'non-need' of assistance :D

Somehow I remembered Peats Ridge road as long and flat - this isn't quite true as the road undulates and is anything but straight. It was however a pleasant ride (apart from the odd smelly farm with chickens and manure), and we were very tempted by the roadside stalls selling fresh fruit: Strawberries, Nectarines, Oranges... mmmmmmmmm :) We also saw a not so alive red-belly black snake on the side of the road and screeched to a stop to take a photo... Janine thought about enhancing the photo but decided not to wrap the snake around her shoulders... On the road again... we pushed on, climbing the meandering hills and keeping our eye out for the perfect roadside rest stop. At Peats Ridge pizza road café, we (finally) took a break and refuelled on, not pizza - but on our packed fresh fruit and nut mixes :)

We reached the 'top' of the map on our ride (which mentally meant we were on the home stretch), and we were well past the half-way mark as we swung onto Wisemans Ferry road. The sun was shining and lucky, lucky - we'd brought enough water to last us the whole way...(better to carry that extra weight and know that at least you're not going to die of thirst :D ) A caravan of old Holdens passed us - some pretty groovy cars, even though some chose to pass us unnecessarily close, maybe they wanted to share the sparkle of their newly polished cars... Wisemans Ferry road is in parts a pretty crappy road to ride... the shoulder is eaten away by potholes and sloping bumps, which means you feel safer riding (especially going downhill) further onto the road, but obviously that has it's own set of safety issues. We scrambled on - bumping our way down hills and climbing back up again, stopping here and there to take on more water and stretch those aching muscles.

We made it all the way back to Kariong, with the last stretch of road smooth and very swishy - almost rewarding us for all the effort we'd put in :) A lovely ride - hard work, but really beautiful and varied terrain to explore on a sunny Sunday. We caught our breath and checked our stats where today's maximum heart rate (228!!!!) screamed of near heart failure and medical assistance required immediately, but rest assured - actual heart rate wouldn't have been more than 180 absolute max :) Sometimes riding under power-lines causes the monitor to go a bit mental... :)

Thank you for lovely company, laughs and lots of fun!

The Photo evidence

Janine after climbing hill #1

Top of Old Pacific Hwy

Sunny Sunday rider

Arriving on Mooney creek bridge

Inviting water views :)

Going up the Pacific hwy

A logistical rode-side stop

Watch out for biker bunnies!

Here comes a champion bunny!

The not so alive snake

The view from our fuel stop :)

Still going strong :)

Water stop outside Somersby store

We made it, but can barely stand up ;)

Somerby falls on Saturday

The Ride
9th August 2009
Bunnies on bikes - Janine & Annette
Meeting place - Kariong servo
Meeting time - 8:00 am (!)

Bright and early on this sunny, chilly Saturday morning, Janine and I met up at the service station ready for an adventure. One bunny very awake and the other bunny practically asleep... Just before set-off we delved into some serious tyre pushing, discovering that Janine's tyres were soft and cuddly - perhaps not the ideal state for a ride, but still quite cute. So we wheeled bikes over to the air pump and managed to reform her tyres to super-duper hard tyres (close to 60psi), creating a whole new riding experience!

We rode down the main road and turned into Kangoo road, passing the new industrial area and some bushland. The sun was up, but it was still quite cold, so I had gloves and Janine wore a scarf to keep the chill out.

There's a seriously bumpy part of the road that runs off Debenham road, where you go under the F3 dodging a myriad of potholes on a downhill stretch, bit like a washboard with the sunlight playing visual tricks for good measure :) Apart from the bumps, most of the back roads through Somersby are lovely to ride, a few hills here and there - but you get the down hills as well so there's plenty of variation.

By the time we'd climbed a few hills (one biggish one) Janine took off her jumper, which I strapped to my bike... This is where we have a silent minute for the stripey green & black jumper, that went off on its own adventure..., sadly not to be found again. Hopefully it found excitement along the way, and I have made a note to myself to strap adventurous jumpers more securely in the future...

Our ride took us across to Somersby falls, where we had a short break in the sun. By now we'd warmed up properly and Janine excelled in some serious 'standing' hill climbing on the way back up from the falls. We rode back the same way we'd come, thinking we might spot the adventurous jumper & so we had our eyes peeled on the opposite side of the road.

When we got to Kangoo road we sent a car of unlikely brides on a wild-goose-chase looking for "Bridal Collections". Giving directions seems to come with the territory of donning bright yellow flouro-vests. Enthusiastically we did our best even though neither of us had a clue where the brides should be heading :)

We took a detour through Mt Penang gardens, and discovered a very changed place. The grates to keep cows and horses in (or out) were gone, and several new roads had appeared zig-zagging their way across what used to be a grazing area for the animals. It took us some time to find the way out, and a slight hesitation to find that the way out was blocked by a large pad-locked gate. Janine rode up and found a way around the gate, which had big signs (on the other side) warning trespassers to keep out and alerting everyone about guard dogs on the constuction site!! Oh well, as the more level-headed bunny pointed out; if we could wheel our bikes out, the dogs could get out as well, so there wouldn't have been any left :)

The last bit of our happy Saturday tour, took us back up to the service station, completing a nice sunny bike ride :)

Look forward to the next ride and hope you're all well and happy!




The Stats
Distance - 24km
Riding time - 2 hours 20min
Heart rate - 110 (average) 163 (max)
Calories burnt - 738

The Map

Saturday morning country ride

The Ride
13th June 2009

Biker bunnies: Lou and Annette
Meeting place: Kariong (Annette's place) 7:30am
Biking weather: Sun coming out after a freezing night (gloves a must!)

We set off in various styles - Lou dressed in biking gloves and "Skins"(long fitted biking pants), looking a million dollars on this freezing morning. Annette sporting the multi-layered look and totally convinced that all is allowed when preventing death from frost-bite... ;)

Early on we were stopped by a pair of frantic (lost) runners, who demanded to know where the Pacific Hwy was. We offered what help we could ("Just keep on running down to the left there and you'll be fine"). We believe that the woman (who did get a little hysterical) must have decided we were plainly not trust-worthy, after seeing the bunny on our hi-vis vests... We left them to their merry ways and continued on ours :)

All went very well up Wisemans ferry road, if you ignore the fact that poor
Lou left a lung somewhere along this part of the ride, due to intense coughing... a few nose-blowing stops and a chance to catch breath did seem to help.

We continued along Wisemans ferry road past the Peats Ridge road crossing and shortly after turned into Dog trap road. This leg of our journey dished up an excellent opportunity to test bike-acceleration... Halfway down the road Annette spots a moving dark shadow on her left. An anxious look later confirms 3 dogs, and a further quick look alerted to the lack of fence between biking bunnies and dogs with lots and lots of teeth! Miss Lou did have some assuring words and even offered up her own body as a barrier between dogs and Annette. This information and re-assurance did sadly land on deaf ears, as Annette darted hell-for-leather down the road without a single thought beyond "GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!"
Acceleration = instant
Leg speed = 100miles an hour
Brain activity and ability to check team bunny is ok = zero!
Luckily the dogs were (according to Lou) 'all bark and no trousers' and the whole debarcle only left us reeling over our handlebars in fits and tears of laughter.

We then spent the ride across the F3 Bridge and down steep Mangrove road talking about phobias and enjoying the scenery. This would be a gruelling hill to ride up, but it would still be fun to try it one day... Once we got to the bottom we had a mandarin, banana stop before cruising on to Narara Valley road towards West Gosford and Manns road. This was the first bit of real traffic we came across - but the bike lane gave us plenty of room to ride happily and safely :)

Our ride finished with Kariong Hill, and after a slightly close shave (during an Annette solo-ride on Thursday) it was lovely to get to the top without any worrying moments from passing traffic (read trucks). 30kms in beautiful country scenery - what a lovely way to start a weekend :)



The Stats

Riding distance - 30.6km
Active riding time - 2 hours 30 minutes
Calories burnt - 937
Average heartrate - 123 bpm
Maximum heartrate - 161


The Map