This was published 8 years ago
The Great Victorian Bike Ride: When mythical adventure becomes reality
By Jayne D'Arcy
The "mobile village" aka the Great Victorian Bike Ride campsite.
"It's like a mobile village!" a man tells me as he loosens his bike pedals with a wrench. It's early morning and I'm at Southern Cross Station with my 9-year-old son, Miles, and we're also partially dismantling our bikes. In all my preparation for the Great Victorian Bike Ride I hadn't really thought about the fact that we'll be travelling with thousands of others. I've just been fixated on the actual bike riding.
The ride has had mythical status for me; just as skiing did until I finally tried it. I remember my neighbours training for it with their kids. They'd ride up and down the country roads near us for weeks, then suddenly disappear for what seemed like forever.
Now it's our turn, albeit on the short version. We're doing the five-day option beginning in Albury and averaging 83 kilometres a day until we reach Mansfield. Most other riders will keep going until Lilydale, 540 km, and nine days, away from the start.
Riders make their way up the Hopkins Point Road Hill, as they head towards Port Campbell, on day four of the Great Victorian Bike Ride.Credit: Rob Gunstone
Hundreds of us gather at Southern Cross, forming an orderly queue of pedal- and handlebar-less bikes. We descend into the bowels of the station, and I crack a smile when I see how our bikes are travelling to Albury: stacked on massive, still stinky, cattle trucks. While we have to get our luggage (tents, sleeping mats and a lot of cycling paraphernalia) to the event start, huge trucks will take it from campsite to campsite each day while we ride.
We've had a month of preparation. My son's swapped his usual ride – a cool kids fffixie – for a more practical (yet still cool) Melbourne-designed Byk 540 with 16 gears. Like my former neighbours, we've been hitting the road whenever we can, and we've clocked up 208 kilometres in 30 days. But is it enough?
I've bought "butt cream" (yeah, I never thought I'd be buying that) for chafing, knicks (padded cycling pants) and pretty much everything else listed on the provided GVBR list. My local bike store has given us lessons in tube changing and pedal removal, and I've checked out YouTube tutorials, but glaze over when things get technical.
Cyclists head to Port Campbell on the fourth day of the Great Victorian Bike Ride. Credit: Dave Langley
Night one in Albury is great. Miles and I fight over whether we'll watch the live band or the movie at the open-air cinema. We've already lined up at the portable kitchen with our camping cutlery, made new friends as we've eaten, and Miles has already told me that he doesn't like the food. We're camped right by the Murray River with thousands of others, and there's a bit of electricity in the air. Tomorrow it begins.
We're up at the crack of dawn – it's hard not to be when people are unzipping tents and murmuring around us. We emerge from our too small pop-up tent (two man? More like two toddlers!) and see that people are already zooming out of the campsite. We join the breakfast queue, I stuff the muffins and fruit into my pannier, we chuck our bags onto the truck and I cross my fingers that I've reattached the pedals and handlebars correctly. At 7.30am, we begin. It's 67km to Yackandandah.
It's thrilling to be travelling with so many others. When I get a flat, people stop to help. We find reassurance and get lots of help from the "WARBY's" (We Are Right Behind You), who are cycling amongst us, wearing bright yellow T-shirts and fixing bikes with a smile. We count down the kilometres from one rest break to the next. They're long days for us: we don't get into the towns until the late afternoon. There's just enough time to line up for dinner, watch the kids movie and crash (not literally, thankfully we don't).
Time for a pit stop at Allansford Football Oval on the fourth day of the Great Victorian Bike Ride.Credit: Dave Langley
We discover that Miles is one of the youngest cyclists, and people spur him on with encouragement. I decide that all he needs to do on this huge adventure, apart from eat and cycle, is put up and take down the tent. We get on well. We sleep well. We meet and ride with so many lovely people. We take on dreaded Tawonga Gap (7.6 km with an average 6.3 per cent gradient) with barely a break. It rains, it thunders, it hails, it gets too hot to cycle, but we cope. We relish the "mobile village" that gets set up in a new town every day and the community we've quickly become a part of. Long before we're on the coach back to Melbourne I realise that this mythical adventure is going to become our annual reality.
Jayne and Miles were guests of the Great Victorian Bike Ride.
THE FACTS:
When:
The Great Victorian Bike Ride explores the Goldfields from Saturday 28 November to Sunday 6 December 2015. See https://www.bicyclenetwork.com.au/racv-great-victorian-bike-ride/ Early bird registrations for this year's ride close August 5.
Getting There:
There's coach travel to the start (Ballarat) and finish locations for an extra cost.
Cost:
Choose from 3 Days (218km; adult/child $495/$195), 5 Days (322km; $655/$250) or 9 Days (540km; $955/$360).
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