Lady Rubicon

Visiting : Lady Talbot Drive, McFadyen Track, Rubicon Valley
Distance : 97km
When : Saturday 29th October 2016, 5:45am @ Marysville

(Note: This is another solo ride from my backlog. Bear with me as I’m writing this well after the fact and my memory may be hazy.)

Wow. I can’t believe it’s been almost a year since I did this ride. Time gets away. From memory, this ride was intended to be a nice cruise through familiar territory. A few old roads, a few new roads and my first time through the area on a geared bike.

I started out of Marysville about 6am. Suitably chilly. Lady Talbot Road was still closed for winter beyond a certain point but I don’t mind jumping the odd gate or two.

I had the place to myself of course, which is just how I like it.

I noticed some bike tracks in the mud and I tried to work out who I was following. One MTB, one fatbike by the look of it. Idly wondered if it was that Riding For The Great Forest dude…

Don’t think I saw any deer but I did see some tracks.

The trees which come down on this road are ridiculous. No wonder it’s closed more often than open. This one has squashed half the road – proper earthworks needed before this is driveable by granny’s Corolla again.

If a tree falls in the bush and there’s no-one there to hear it… I reckon you’d still feel the shockwave from when this one came down.

Bloody hell, what a behemoth. Pictures would have jumped off the wall back in Marysville when this one fell. And length-ways down the road too – no vehicles getting through here in a hurry.

This guy will be busy, that’s for sure.

Keppel Hut Track was nice and dry this time. Beautiful day for a ride. And then I saw Steve!

Great minds think alike. Steve was out bikepacking, had just spent the night in Keppels Hut and was starting the HAB up that link track to Lake Mountain. I guess that accounted for the MTB tracks that I saw. Still dunno about the fatbike though.

Steve and I had a little chat before we let each other go off on our own adventures. Oh, I seem to remember I returned his roll of toilet paper that I’d found on the road a little ways back?!

Keppels was empty now. Obligatory photos…

I kept going up past Keppels Hut and onto McFadyen Track.

Love that place.

I got caught up for quite a while trying to get a decent photo of a couple of Spotted Pardalotes playing in the bushes. I failed dismally of course but, at the time, it felt like I was doing Great Work.

Yeah, they’re in there somewhere. I’ll leave the bird photos to Leigh. Shots like this are more my style :

McFadyen Track. My kind of road.

Soon I was down the other side and into the logging regrowth.

The more I learn about it, the more I hate it. This area will be a plantation forever if we allow it.

Highest point in that last photo is Mt Torbreck, I reckon.

Next point of interest on this ride was Rubicon Valley. Cute little hydro electricity infrastructure, steep hills, rough road.

I had a poke around the top of Rubicon Falls but there’s only so much rock hopping I’m willing to do while wearing cleats.

Glamour shots.

Love this little corner of Rubicon River Road.

I’m going to hike straight up the side of that thing one day.

The road’s a real bone-shaker unfortunately. I was glad to reach the end of it. Well, glad/not glad, if you know what I mean.

Rubicon Power Station was a welcome sight but I kept rolling, roadways this time.

I’d originally planned to get back to Marysville via Blue Range Road but I didn’t feel like another long climb so I stayed on the main road.

And that was it.

It didn’t feel like the most adventurous ride, to be honest. Great area, great day for it, um… yeah. That was definitely a ride that I did.

Funny how that happens sometimes.

Too much familiar terrain? Suboptimal headspace? No eyes to see the adventure that surrounds us? Chalk it up to experience.