Old School Road -vs- Neil

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Clear Mountain is about a 15km ride from my front door. All of the roads up it are pretty steep, but today I thought I’d try giving one of the more difficult dirt roads a try. It was pretty good going most of the way until I was about 100m from the top. Then the gradient increased quite markedly. I was determined not to give up, and kept pushing, but the wheels stopped turning. As you can see from the video, when your wheels stop turning, you end up kissing dirt

I’ll be trying this one regularly over the next few weeks until I beat it.

My mate Steve has ridden up it a few times. And there’s no way I’m going to let him own that hill by himself!





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Around the Glasshouse Mountains

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The Glasshouse Mountains are beautiful. We thought the best way to see them was up close, under our own power, on bike.

We started the 50km loop at Wamuran, and proceeded in a large clockwise loop along fire trails, logging tracks, and finished via the route of an old railway line, now converted into a recreational “rail trail”.

Here’s a bridge over one of the many small creeks we crossed in the forest.

Heading down one of the many trails that cut through the pine forests.

Simon checks out the damage done by 4wd vehicles to one of the trails. We think the huge mud bowl looks a bit like a lake of chocolate, which fits in well with the Easter theme.

Simon demonstrates why I try to let him go first through most flooded tracks:

The best bits:

Picturesque views,

pine forests,

secluded roads,

quiet creeks.

The worst bits:

Motor cyclists / Trail bike riders illegally riding on state forest trails.

Dirt roads ripped up by 4wd’s and turned into mud bowls.

Piles of rubbish left by morons in the middle of the forest.


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Redcliffe Easter Ride

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Ken and I rode out to Redcliffe to meet everyone else for a picnic. It was a perfect day for it.

For someone who hasn’t ridden more than 10-15km at a time, Ken handled this 60km ride really well.

I think all the nice food at the picnic might have helped too!




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Quick and Dirty

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Where do you take a friend who hasn’t been on a bike for a long time?

I wanted to have a fun ride this morning, but didn’t want to do anything too hardcore because I like my friends, and don’t want to scare them off. After some poring over Google Maps (I do that a lot), I came up with a compromise that was mostly off-road, had a couple of good hills, and got us back home within two hours.

And we all survived to ride again!



I’m amazed at Glen’s quick eyes. We’d only just got off the bikes at this river crossing and he spotted a 30cm (1 foot) catfish swimming around in the mirky water.

It had a few skin marks which Glen reckons might have been from being swept over the dam wall in recent flooding.

Well spotted!



This causeway had a nasty 50cm drop at one end, which is ok for hardcore riders, but not much for everyone else.

We found a few stray rocks and put them near the drop to make it easier to traverse.

I think Harrison was a bit skeptical at my handiwork. Although you can’t see it, he did finally manage to ride over it.

All up 22km in 1 hour 45 minutes, 300m total climbing, 1500 calories.

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Bells and Whips

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Well Bellbirds and Whipbirds, actually.

I stopped along Bunya Road while cycling this morning so I could record some of the sounds of the birds singing in the forest.

I think they sound great, and I’m really glad I took the time to stop and listen.

The actual ride was great too – up the side of Clear Mountain along a dirt track, down Bunya Road, and through the state forest trails that run off the Jinker track.

A really enjoyable morning ride!




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Down the big hill

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In the last post I told you about our ride down the Lepidozamia track. Here’s the video from my helmet cam. It’s bumpy, but as you can see, it was a lot of fun.

Down the Lepidozamia Track

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Last week I explained our quest to find a track from Mount Glorious down to Kobble Creek. This week we found it, thanks to some advice from the guys at MTBDirt.com.

It was a difficult ride climbing the D’Aguilar Range to its summit of almost 800m at Mount Tension Woods, and then an exhilarating ride down some very steep rocky fire trails (The Lepidozamia Track) as we followed Kobble Creek back to civilization.

The Lepidozamia Track is named after all the Cycads (Lepidozamia peroffskyana) that grow there.

All up we rode about 66km with a total ascent / descent of about 1550m. The total ride was about 10 hours because we had to keep stopping – Simon got half a dozen punctures and we went through three spare tubes and half a roll of duct tape before we fixed it.

I shudder to think what would have happened if I hadn’t taken 4 spare tubes and three rolls of duct tape. If ever I needed justification for carrying so much “Stuff” on my rides, this is it. We were in some pretty remote country, and getting out on foot would have taken a long time.

This ride covers some beautiful scenery. Normally we’d be able to do it in about 5 hours, and it’s worth the effort if you don’t mind getting your feet wet!

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The Mailmans Track

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Hoop Pine

I rode out to Samford this morning via Winn Road, and came back via the Mailman’s Track and Bunya Road.

The Mailman’s Track is wonderfully hilly (just the thing for a Saturday morning bike ride), and leads into some beautiful state forest along Bunya Road.

Although the area is called “Bunya” I had a hard time finding any Bunya Pines (Araucaria Bidwilli). So I was delighted to find a couple of majestic specimens by the side of the road.

The aborigines used to harvest the nuts from these trees for food. They drop their huge 5-10kg cones in abundance every three years, so you have to be careful standing under them in late summer!











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Hoop Pine at John Oxley Reserve

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Hoop Pine – Oxley Reserve, Murrumba Downs

This is the only remaining Hoop Pine (Araucaria Cunninghamii) at John Oxley Reserve, Murrumba Downs, on the north bank of the North Pine River about 2km west of Petrie.

John Oxley came ashore here on 1 December 1823. He was impressed with many “fine cypresses” he saw there referring to the Hoop Pines. This was the first reference to the species, which was later cataloged by English botanist and explorer, Allan Cunningham.

The first settlers loved these huge trees for their long straight trunks which were ideal for ship masts or any buildings which required large quantities of long straight timber.

Today if you drive down Gympie Road, Strathpine, you’ll see the road lined with dozens of Hoop Pines on either side – a fitting tribute to this majestic tree, native to this area.





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Kobble Creek

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The purpose of this ride was to find a route from Kobble Creek up to Mt Glorious. There’s a road visible on Google Maps, but as we found out, it disappears into private property.

Due to recent rain, we had to cross a few flooded creeks. The bikes held up really well until the last crossing, when the current snapped my read derailleur off.

The area around Kobble Creek is beautiful. In drier weather it would be a really pleasant ride, with some challenging hills greater than 17% gradient. When they’re not swollen, some of those creeks look like they’d be really fun to swim in too.

But to be honest, crossing flooded creeks is a pretty stupid thing to do. If you slip, it would be easy to be washed away or lose your bike. And even if you do make it across, there’s a good chance you’ll damage your bike.

So I’m going to be a bit more sensible in future.

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