Following the scent

For 20 years I've lived in Darwin NT. I came there by accident, needed a change of scene from life in Melbourne and decided it was as good a place as any to make a space for living.

One thing led to another, l set down roots, took on social responsibilities, studied, fell in love, got married, had a couple of beautiful children, and before I knew it I had become a long term resident. I have a very strong feeling for the Top End, the environment and the people, particularly those I've met and worked with in Arnhem Land... But something keeps calling me 'Home'. 

What is Home? Well like they say it's '...where the Heart is.' My home is with my family, my wife and kids. But I still have a strong connection to the place of my birth and, where I grew up. My extended family, the Landscape, places I spent my youth, these memories keep calling me back. The places.  The narrow stretch of land, remnant bushland between housing developments which follows the course of the Plenty River, the smell of dry grass in summer, the potent oily resin of eucalyptus, magpies, the coast, Port Philip Bay. 

Whenever I come back to this place I like to find connection with the land, as I get older I am searching for those friends who managed to survive our youth and lost years in between. I see my family, siblings, nieces, nephews and my parents. I try to help them with the manual stuff around the house which they are finding too difficult to manage on their own.

The ticket says 'REAR STANDING' But with the Bos on stage it was UpFront Dancing!

 

I made this trip with one specific thing in mind. To see the Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band concert! Due to lack of finances in 1985 I missed out on the concert, which I believe 'Went Off!'. I have been a devoted listener to Springsteen's music ever since that time so when I found out he was coming to Australia this year I made the snap decision (with approval from my wife) to get down to Melbourne and see him. This could very well be the last chance. He is 67 years old! 

(No offense to my religious friends but for me this was a 'spiritual experience')

THE HEAR OF A LION!

So now that I'm here in between catching up with family and helping my parents around the house, I'm trying to squeeze in as many adventures as I can before I return to Darwin.

So far I have been blessed to spend half a day with my nephews on the day the eldest started his first day of school. I rode my bike along a section of the Maribyrnong River and visited Ceres without falling off my bike and breaking my neck (again)!

Overlooking the Maribyrnong River valley after a hard climb

Fixing bikes with George and some handy kids at Ceres

 I wove my way through the inner urban heartland of Melbourne, enjoying the strange fusion of old neighborhoods transformed by inflated property prices and wealthy investors, yuppies and those odd looking marvels of cultural appropriation... pseudo-craft flogging Hipsters!

St George's Rd bike path... (They were in the process of cutting down trees)

Blackberries (Not cultivated but left to grow)

A pear, too woody to eat but there were plenty of other fruits hanging from trees

Somewhere among mess of people and groovy new development I found a few remaining thresholds of first generation European immigrant Australians (mostly Italian and Greek I reckon) who still maintained their beautiful front yard  veggie gardens and bountiful fruit trees which in some places, hang over the fence into the street.

Had dinner with my little brother and spent some quiet time with mum and dad... (occasional rants at the TV news aside)  

Front yard food

Sat in my favorite spot on the Plenty river, where time stands still and the spirit of my youth and ghost of a lost friend reside.

I felt he was speaking to me.... "You Shall Not Pass!

My new secondhand travel rig. Love this bike!

A glimpse of my special place

 

Unfortunately attended the funeral of a member of our extended family who was taken far too soon, then went and visited my aunt at Indented Heads, cherishing the lives of those still with us. I sat a while at Port Pier contemplating time and purpose on this earth and how to best honor it.

Fish'n off the pier at Port

When my ship comes in

Visited a couple of lifelong friends in Ballarat, it was so great to re-connect after so many years. One of them, my cuz has cancer, it has caused her a lot of suffering over the past couple of years. I was so grateful for the brief reunion that I was oblivious to the fact that they'd just sat down to watch the first televised game of Women's football! Woops!

The following day I caught the train back to Geelong and cycled the Bellarine rail trail from Geelong to Queenscliff

 

Bike on a path (bracken and hay behind)

Bike beside rails

Cruised across the bay on a ferry

Big boat that opens up and cars drive in! (only $11 to cross with a bicycle)

Toured the bay side of the Mornington Peninsula from Sorento to Rosebud and yesterday spent a day with my oldest mate and his family in Rosebud before cycling on to Frankston station just in time to beat the flooding rain! 

Laughing Kookaburra in an enormous ancient coastal Banksia tree @ Rosebud foreshore

Bike in the foreground Swans to the rear

Regatta - Safety Beach, Mount Martha

Dudes jumping in the sea

So far it's been great except for one major detail, I have left my family at home in Darwin and I miss them.

Graphic wall art Bundoora Concord

Homeland calling

Yolngu friends tell me without hesitation; “The place your mother carried you, the place of your gestation and birth is your home”. (There are other lands you can belong to but that place has a special primacy) I have no idea where my mum went while she was carrying me but for sure I was born in the old Hospital at Greensborough On Wurundjeri land in Victoria, I lived in that area the first 26 years of my life, it is part of me. I grew up on that land and always wondered about the people who belonged there but in all that time I don't believe I'd ever been introduced to a Wurundjeri person. It's possible I've met some but with the shame put on Aboriginal people when I was growing up who would dare say!

My folks place... Once an outpost of native shrubs they now prefer the cottage garden. No lawn for 30 years!

When I was a kid I spent a lot of time playing in the earth around my family home, must have eaten my share too! Grass bomb wars with neighborhood kids in the paddock across the road were a regular event in primary school days, much soil and some stones were absorbed one way or another. Plucking raw food from my parents garden all that stuff.

As I grew I hit the dirt slightly further afield, sometimes literally (rough play and bike crashes), eating cherry plums from derelict fruit trees, cow pat mushroom picking along the old aqueduct, camping in local bush-land, eating roasted rabbit, greasy fried eel, swimming in the swollen Plenty Rive and swallowing too much of it’s muddy brown wash… 

Plenty River below Western Ring Road bridge

Whenever I return to my childhood home all those memories engulf me in a homecoming melancholic delight that is sometimes overwhelming, the angle of the sun, the scent of foliage in the heat or the rain, the wild grassy weeds, everyting! I want to share it all with my kids!

So regardless of how it happens, I have a very strong connection with my childhood home and I believe ‘it’ is quite literally in my blood. 

Roos in the Janefield paddocks, Plenty River

Visiting my parents last week was the perfect opportunity to share my ‘homeland’ with my kids, who were born on Larrakia land in the North. 

As I write this I know I must have told the same story before, here, maybe the same, maybe slightly different but most likely retelling the same basic narrative of my origins. I tend to tell over the story, as I recall it maybe as a way of affirming some kind of identity, belonging to somewhere....

 

Riding across the Partington Flat Swing Bridge

This visit was perfect, we cycled a lot of my old haunts and visited many of the special places. We breathed in the cool dry air, took note of all the different animals and birds, Rosellas, sparrows, roos, maggies, hover flies and bees... Rainbow lorikeets and starlings.

Invasive species trashing Feijoa flowers

Mum's Feijoa tree is in full bloom but has fallen victim to the latest wave of invasive species. The otherwise beautiful Rainbow Lorrikeet who appears to have replaced the Starlings and Minahs as usurper and thief of breeding hollows from the local species such as Red-rumped parrots and Eastern Rosellas.


Mid week we traveled down to Barwon Heads (Wadawurrung country), somewhere I'd always wanted to spend time. When I was young I used to pass through this way often, seeking excitement on my motorbike along the Great Ocean Road. I did happen to sleep in a cave on the bluff one New Years Eave but left at dawn. This was my first stay at Barwon Heads, during the off peak season it's a beautiful quiet place. We had a great time here and the kids got to chill out with their grandparents.

Barwon Bluff

Returning to Melbourne we had a wonderful day with my Nieces and Nephews celebrating three birthdays in one. 

Fishing off the jetty at Barwon Heads - Ship entering Port Philip Bay in the distance

Now I'm back in the NT and back at work. It's hot and feeling kind of foreign to me. I have a few connections here and have become fairly familiar with the land and environment. This place has it's own rhythm and pace, The bush is alive and Yolngu know it's seasons and ways intimately. I have learned only a little about these things but it equates to a lot more that what I know about my own country, yet somehow. Regardless of my ignorance, my heart and blood remains tied to the land where I grew up. 

Maybe one day I will live there again?

Southern state shuffle

We have just returned from our annual pilgrimage to Victoria to visit family and once again we've exhausted the budget and worn out our shoes trying to squeeze as much as possible into our 8 day excursion. 

Departure this year was marred by the loss of a loved pet and as usual my nonchalant attitude and chaotic approach to preparing inspired no confidence from the rest of the family. My bike ride a few days earlier left me with severe sunburn which resulted in blisters and the destruction of one or two layers of skin. Wearing shoes to ride must have burst a few blood vessels under the nail of my left big toe which created swelling and a bloody sore toe until the bruising finally appeared! I'd already lost the big toenail on my right foot from the same problem while on the Great Vic Bike Ride! I hate wearing shoes!

At least on this trip I did managed to pack my case (7 kg carry on luggage) more than an hour before departure... Quite prudent preparation time for me.

Gross Eh?

Although the main purpose of our trips down South is to visit family we always try to fit in some tourist stuff. After all, our options are fairly limited in Darwin. This particular trip was action packed and left little time for sitting around. While in Victoria we managed to visit the Children's farm at Bundoora Park, Melbourne Aquarium and the Werribee open range Zoo but the highlights for me this year  (besides seeing our families) were Trees Adventure in Belgrave and Sovereign Hill, Ballarat.

Trees Adventure

A fraction of the course including Mountain Ash in the background

The Great Oak Home Tree

Trees Adventure at Glen Harrow Park was a great bonding experience with my daughter. Climbing on a network of cables right up in the tree tops of high above the ground! It was awesome and felt quite safe. The carabiner locking system ensured we were locked on to a safety cable at all times. Actually once you allow the harness to take your weight a few times the whole fear of being so far above the ground seemed to disappear and we just got into moving along the obstacle course and riding the awesome flying fox zip lines! Unfortunately we forgot to bring the camera and I didn't want to take my camera phone up so high so we only got photos at ground level. 

Ballarat - Sovereign Hill

The trip to Ballarat turned out to be jam packed! It's a long story but a trip to meet some friends of Bill W for an anniversary weekend turned into two days of family reunion and exploring the 1850's goldfields reconstruction at Sovereign Hill.

We left Melbourne early and were in Ballarat by 10am. It turned out that the gathering just happened to be in a hall opposite the Eureaka Stockade memorial right by the Museum of Australian Democracy.

Unfortunately we didn't have the time to explore the museum but I was beginning to feel inspired by the sense of rebellion which radiated out of the Ballarat Goldfields and spurred the beginnings of democracy in Australia. (Once again another long story which I'd love to look more deeply into, i.e. the 'Australian' national identity, how we identify with rebellious characters but tend toward the bureaucratic and authoritarian colonial authority model of governance... etc... etc...)

Sovereign Hill

Two days in Sovereign hill was a real treat! It's a working replica of an 1850s gold town and an opportunity to see some of the crafts, technologies and social conditions of that era. I didn't notice any mention of the Aboriginal history of the area and I do intend to look into it, but will have to leave that for another time. There was a very Eurocentric theme to the place, I wondered how accurate this was but I accepted the narrative for the sake of soaking up the atmosphere they had gone to so much trouble to create. It was a peculiar setting, there were quite a few references and examples of the Chinese presence on the gold fields but very few opportunities to hear about the Chinese experience from Chinese guides who seemed to work exclusively with the Chinese tourists. It was like an apartheid tour experience. I wonder what the Chinese guides were telling their tour groups? 

I may have had a slight error of judgement when I booed the Redcoats. Who'd of thunk they'd have so many keen supporters? If ever there were a time and place for rebellion against imperialism I woulda thought This was a good one. Just goes to show how complicit Australians have become! Some even swore allegiance to the Queen! Don't they know it's satire!?!

 

Coming from Darwin where everything is new and made of concrete I was spellbound by the woodwork, the old brick and timber buildings, the craftsmanship and the beauty of natural materials and the use of old techniques for constructing everything from wagon wheels to gold ingots! 

Gold! Yep we had a go at panning for gold in the creek. Unfortunately for the rest of the family, as soon as I got a pan in my hand, my obsessive nature took over and I wouldn't leave until I'd gathered enough specks of gold in my collector jar to leave no doubt what I'd come for! (The jar, property of my daughter, was left on the plane home!) 

Dinner on Saturday night turned into an unexpected gathering and a reunion with friends and family, some of whom I was once very close with and haven't seen for at least 15 years! Too many experiences to describe! 

Our last 3 days were spent in Geelong and actually by then we were pooped! We've found an amazing place to stay down there, not too far from family, spacious and with a playground and a pond full of ducks to sit and watch while we unwind! After so much running around the duck pond was our favorite retreat, we could have stayed there another few days.

We are now finally back home in Darwin. We arrived at midnight on the day that cyclone Lam hit the Arnhem coast. 

One of the kids lost an expensive electronic device in transit... 

Friends at Elcho are stranded with no running water, no sewerage and no electricity...

The house smells of mold, our bank balance is in the red...

We missed our home but have no extended family here, there's a sense of loss emanating from most quarters, it's often that way.

Slowly we ease back into the jagged rhythm of Darwin life.

Great Vic. A bike ride... Part V

Plans, Mice and Men!

To Melbourne on the plane:

No Problemo! One bag of carry on luggage. One bike stuffed into a cardboard box. My sister even came and picked me up from the airport, and gave me a bed for the night and even cooked me a delicious omelet in the morning. It was great to see her and my two nephews again.

Mulwala - 24km south of Moyhu (Sunday 30th Nov. - Wednesday 3rd Dec.)

Before I left Darwin I attended a talk by the author Arnold Zable who mentioned the two archetype story tellers (and so I presume 2 basic stories), one is the role of the great law/lore keepers which we have depended on throughout time to keep our aural history and record happenings in our society, maintain relations, family connections, interesting events, the law and what we call lore etc... the other which we are most familiar with these days is The Hero's Journey. Zabel told the story well, I'm not going to try and recount it for you but it was great to listen to... Fundamentally though my reason for mentioning this is that my posts lately have been around a journey... The Great Victorian Bike Ride 2014. Since the story is about my journey you won't find much in the way of heroics, but out of the two story modes I don't have many options.

A good story usually has a bit of drama. It's probably the drama which makes the difference between an ordinary travel log and an adventure story. Now I believe the great and Internationally infamous traveler Kris Larsen loathes to be called and adventurer, since that implies he is reckless and does not take precautions. I am not he, or like to him much at all, and if I had to live through his 'travels' my hair would have dropped out from fear, struggle or suffering (or before it even came to that fear of the struggle and suffering)! So I will take caution in the use of the word adventure, especially since this was a very well organized trip, but I must say.... as I began, like most road trips this one did not go exactly to plan.

The Journey

Change of plan: Instead of catching the train to Shepparton my parents decided to take a road trip with me to Yarrawongah / Mulwala which saved me 1 day of riding and gave us some time together.

Ride Day 1. 

Mulwala - Albury 99km

Route day one: I intended to ride through Victoria and to see Rutherglen but decided there wouldn't be time

Club Mulwala... It's huge.

Had breakfast at Club Mulwala (the most enormous RSL club I've ever, ever seen!) with Mum and Dad, then headed off on the NSW side of the border, following a cycle path along the lake through Kyffins Reserve where there was free camps right at the waters edge. (I'm still struggling with the idea that you can walk right into the rivers and lakes here with not a thought of crocodiles)

Me before the big ride. The bike is all painted up with anti fracking stuff... and #Freethechildren !

The reserve soon ended and I was cycling along Spring Drive which after Corowa became the Riverina Highway. There's a lot of wheat and sheep in this country. It's fairly dry but close to the rive so they have water for irrigation.

Basically after Corowa I had head winds most of the rest of the way to Howlong. Yes by the time I'd reached Howlong I was asking myself the same question!
It was about 1:30pm, I was dehydrated and tired, sculled a 750ml bottle of some fancy energy drink from the shop and pushed off into the wind and now hills to try and make Albury by 3pm.

Tough ride! Met up with Mum and Dad again at Wonga wetlands and they gave me a ride to the Base Camp for the GVBR2014.

Staggered into camp at around 3:30 and the sight nearly floored me! I can't remember having seen so many people in one place before and they were all there for the bike ride, the magnitude stunned me. What have I gotten myself into?

This is only a fraction of the tents on site in Albury. The camp went a lot further back than you can see here.

Great Vic. A bike ride... Part IV

Getting there and away... reality hits... and if only it were that easy

What ya don't know surely can't hurt you... But I had to go and read more of that email this morning and I came to the bit that said THIS! 'Limited V/Line transport to Albury'

Full message HERE

The bottom line, there's gonna be a lot of cyclists headed to Albury and the Railway isn't prepared to accommodate the influx of customers!

"If a V/Line conductor determines that there is not sufficient room to carry a bicycle on a V/Line train, it will not be able to be carried on that train" 

(Thanks for nothing V/Line! How I wish you could operate at the standard of British Rail back in 1955! See HERE for some pointers!)



I've had all day to think about it and I've decided that this situation could actually be an opportunity for me to make a longer trip. I've checked the maps and the railway timetables and there is another line through central Victoria to a town which is a rural hub for agriculture. Shepparton (or Shep as we like to call it). This appears to be the closest I can get to Albury by rail without boarding the Albury train. The problem is that Shepparton is about a 165km bicycle ride from Albury! That's more than I'm comfortable doing in a day so I've got some more planning to do.

Getting there and away. PLAN B.

Melbourne to Albury:

pt 1.  Catch train Melbourne - Shepparton.

Melb - Shep V/Rail about 2.5 hours

According to Google Maps the shortest distance from Shepparton to Albury is 163km with a few twists and turns along the way. That's too far so I've decided on another rout which is only about 10 km longer and will take me to some places I've never been before.
Here's the plan:

pt 2. Day 1. Ride Shepparton - Yarrawonga cross border into NSW and the tourist town of Mulwala

Approx 81km, estimated time 4 hours if I don't miss any back roads or short cuts. Find a free camp somewhere near the lake.

Shep - Mulwala cycling about 4.5 hours.

pt 3. Day 2. Ride Mulwala - Albury (via Rutherglen)

Approx 96km and about 5 hours straight pedaling if I don't get lost on any of those back roads I mentioned earlier. I'm thinking I'll give myself a whole day for this part of the journey as I'll be passing through some interesting country and may make some stops along the way.

Mulwala - Albury 5 hours, probably more it looks interesting

OK, I admit it, until now I've been treating the whole planning thing like a bit of a joke, but it's finally starting to dawn on me that if I don't do a bit of strategic planning I'm going to be standing at the station with my bike in pieces, none of the gear I need, no idea where to go next and probably (if past performance is an indication) no air in my tyres!

 Play around with the map if you'd like to find a better rout.

I suppose I should also be thinking about what time I roll into camp on Saturday. I'm sure there will be some important information about the actual ride that I'll need to hear.

Great Vic... A bike ride. Part III

Getting there and away

Plan:

Darwin to Melbourne: 
Fly to Melbourne in a stinking fosil fuel burning airplane! Arrive very late at night. Hang out at airport for a while, put bike together then ride on to family. Spend a couple of days getting my gear together. Tubes, tools, torch, tent, that kind of stuff.

Melbourne to Albury: Catch train to Albury on Friday, enjoy a 3 or 4 hour train ride through scenic country Victoria, MAGIC! Arrive in Albury find somewhere to camp before the riders gather.

 Cycle Albury to Mansfield 4 days yeh!

Return Mansfield to Melbourne:

Catch 'organized transport' bus from Mansfield to Melbourne

Ride train or cycle Melbourne - Watsonia.