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Life on the Mountain
15 years ago
Monday, March 9, 2009
Sunday, March 8, 2009
Cairns, Cape Tribulation and LEECHES!!!
Hey all,
I've been having a great time in Northern Queensland after saying bye to my bike and spewing carbon dioxide from the flight I took up here. Spent one night exploring Cairns (super pretty) and tried to go for a run, but heat + humidity + the middle of the afternoon made for a really sick Candice who had to turn around and walk back from her ambitious run. (Almost pulled a Vanessa - puking on the side of the road... eep!)
Up in Cape Trib, I've been learning a ton about the rainforest that we're in (it's a complex mesophyll to notophyll vine forest!) and went on a Jungle Surfing tour and a night walk to see lots of spiders. I've been swimming in really neat places without any crocs, but I saw one on the road this morning on a bike ride I did. (I managed to find a local willing to lend me his bike - no gears and a bit big... the continuously hilly ride was quite a workout!). A couple days ago I hiked up Mount Sorrow through the rainforest - a 4 km hike, but it's through thick rainforest vegetation, through spider webs, avoiding wait-a-while branches that catch clothes and skin and pulling off hundreds of leeches that started halfway up! Ew ew ew... I almost had a mini-freakout in the middle when they crawled into my shoes via shoelace holes. At the end of the hike we had nice fat leeches inside our shoes. Ew ew ew... so gross! Definitely worth the hike though - you climb all of the elevation at the end (about 680 m) and the lookout was fantastic (after a quick deleeching).
Hope you're all well and I hope to get some pictures up soon when I get a better internet connection! On to the Whitsundays!
I've been having a great time in Northern Queensland after saying bye to my bike and spewing carbon dioxide from the flight I took up here. Spent one night exploring Cairns (super pretty) and tried to go for a run, but heat + humidity + the middle of the afternoon made for a really sick Candice who had to turn around and walk back from her ambitious run. (Almost pulled a Vanessa - puking on the side of the road... eep!)
Up in Cape Trib, I've been learning a ton about the rainforest that we're in (it's a complex mesophyll to notophyll vine forest!) and went on a Jungle Surfing tour and a night walk to see lots of spiders. I've been swimming in really neat places without any crocs, but I saw one on the road this morning on a bike ride I did. (I managed to find a local willing to lend me his bike - no gears and a bit big... the continuously hilly ride was quite a workout!). A couple days ago I hiked up Mount Sorrow through the rainforest - a 4 km hike, but it's through thick rainforest vegetation, through spider webs, avoiding wait-a-while branches that catch clothes and skin and pulling off hundreds of leeches that started halfway up! Ew ew ew... I almost had a mini-freakout in the middle when they crawled into my shoes via shoelace holes. At the end of the hike we had nice fat leeches inside our shoes. Ew ew ew... so gross! Definitely worth the hike though - you climb all of the elevation at the end (about 680 m) and the lookout was fantastic (after a quick deleeching).
Hope you're all well and I hope to get some pictures up soon when I get a better internet connection! On to the Whitsundays!
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
Bustin' outta S'Melbs
Hi all,
Wow, it's been a while since I've updated this! It's been a busy last week in Victoria and I'n set to start the second half of my Oz adventure on the east coast in Queensland and New South Wales. (From fires to floods, so it appears!)
In my couple of extra days in Melbourne waiting for those crazy Otesha kids to come cycling into town I managed to do a ton of exploring. Most exciting was a trip to the Queen Victoria Market to check out the seafood. One of the girls on tour had a very dedicated "gentleman caller" who managed to meet up with us in a few towns. He hosts a radio show every week on sustainable seafood eating so, naturally, I was pretty excited when he brought pocket-sized guides for good seafood choices in Australia! Now I can jump back into eating seafood in the rest of my travels knowing that its healthy, caught in a way that doesn't wreak havoc on the environment, and from sustainable stocks! Wheeeee! Anyway, I wandered around the market checking out all the fishes for sale with my handy little guide. It was absolutely fascinating to see great options out there for really reasonable costs - sometimes a bit more, sometimes a bit less than terrible ones! For example, a Tasmanian salmon caught a couple days ago was less expensive than icky farmed Atlantic salmon that was previously frozen! Imagine my delight! Unfortunately, I couldn't lug around kilos of fish that I could not share nor cook, so I downgraded to some organic fruit bread, local cheeses and Australian grown figs for a picnic in the park.
The crew came home all in one piece (and not a bit toasty!) full of smiles and pride at finishing up their last 100 km ride into Melbourne. We had a great three-day retreat to decompress after the tour which kicked off with a huge party and a ride in Critical Mass. The whole crew made costumes for the ride of our favourite "Eco-Heros and Villians". I went as "The Green Spirit" and we had appearances from "Clean Coal Bandit", "Water-Wise Woman", "Perma-couture", "Mellow-Yellow" and "Granny Gear". (I have pics to chare soon!) We met up with 150 other cyclists and took over the streets of downtown Melbourne for an hour on bikes. It was INSANE! Teams worked together to block traffic so that the whole group could stay together, there were people on recumbent bikes, homemade bikes, bike outfitted with stereos and salsa music blaring!, everyone in all shapes and sizes cruising around to celebrate cycling. The Critical Mass ended at our party (a great way to get people to show up!) and we danced, drank CO2-neutral beers (don't worry, not flat... just offset and solar-powered!) delivered by bicycle, and performed the "adult version" of our skit (I managed to finally throw off the crew by an outburst of "f-ing EH!" and had to cover the next section of lines). Such a great way to end the tour.
One morning in the retreat, I got up a lot earlier than the rest of the crew and went for a 10 km run along the ocean. It was such an incredible morning. The sky was overcast and just enough that the sun couldn't quite overcome the clouds and there was a soft pink sky over the bay. It was quiet and cool and the smell of the water was so fresh, it was impossible to feel tired! 5 kms away from the place we were staying brought me all the way around the boardwalk in Mentone and up into the docks where a handful of sailed boats were moored. I turned back around and ran back home, managing to get myself lost somehow in the very last km of my run. I arrived to find people just getting up to start the day! Vanessa, I'll definitely be ready to run the half with you in May! ;)
I stayed with the friend I mentioned above on Sunday night and her boyfriend made us an incredible sustainable seafood feast! Whiting (caught that day in the bay around the city) and Kingfish (the molst delicious fish I have ever had) and salads and veggies grown in the garden behind his house. (I have been so inspired to start my own garden when I get back... hopefully will do better than I did with my poor basil last year!) After that, I've been in Melbs for the last couple of days on my own in a backpackers in the downtown core. Shipping my sexy lycra bike shorts and panniers home (forgot to wash them, sorry Mom and Dad for when you open that box to get your bday prezzies!) and shipping my bike to a store in Sydney that has offered to keep it safe for me until I arrive in a few weeks to pick it up and take it on the plane.
I hope everyone is well! I'm off to Cairns!
Cheers,
Candice
PS> Tons of pictures to come soon!
Wow, it's been a while since I've updated this! It's been a busy last week in Victoria and I'n set to start the second half of my Oz adventure on the east coast in Queensland and New South Wales. (From fires to floods, so it appears!)
In my couple of extra days in Melbourne waiting for those crazy Otesha kids to come cycling into town I managed to do a ton of exploring. Most exciting was a trip to the Queen Victoria Market to check out the seafood. One of the girls on tour had a very dedicated "gentleman caller" who managed to meet up with us in a few towns. He hosts a radio show every week on sustainable seafood eating so, naturally, I was pretty excited when he brought pocket-sized guides for good seafood choices in Australia! Now I can jump back into eating seafood in the rest of my travels knowing that its healthy, caught in a way that doesn't wreak havoc on the environment, and from sustainable stocks! Wheeeee! Anyway, I wandered around the market checking out all the fishes for sale with my handy little guide. It was absolutely fascinating to see great options out there for really reasonable costs - sometimes a bit more, sometimes a bit less than terrible ones! For example, a Tasmanian salmon caught a couple days ago was less expensive than icky farmed Atlantic salmon that was previously frozen! Imagine my delight! Unfortunately, I couldn't lug around kilos of fish that I could not share nor cook, so I downgraded to some organic fruit bread, local cheeses and Australian grown figs for a picnic in the park.
The crew came home all in one piece (and not a bit toasty!) full of smiles and pride at finishing up their last 100 km ride into Melbourne. We had a great three-day retreat to decompress after the tour which kicked off with a huge party and a ride in Critical Mass. The whole crew made costumes for the ride of our favourite "Eco-Heros and Villians". I went as "The Green Spirit" and we had appearances from "Clean Coal Bandit", "Water-Wise Woman", "Perma-couture", "Mellow-Yellow" and "Granny Gear". (I have pics to chare soon!) We met up with 150 other cyclists and took over the streets of downtown Melbourne for an hour on bikes. It was INSANE! Teams worked together to block traffic so that the whole group could stay together, there were people on recumbent bikes, homemade bikes, bike outfitted with stereos and salsa music blaring!, everyone in all shapes and sizes cruising around to celebrate cycling. The Critical Mass ended at our party (a great way to get people to show up!) and we danced, drank CO2-neutral beers (don't worry, not flat... just offset and solar-powered!) delivered by bicycle, and performed the "adult version" of our skit (I managed to finally throw off the crew by an outburst of "f-ing EH!" and had to cover the next section of lines). Such a great way to end the tour.
One morning in the retreat, I got up a lot earlier than the rest of the crew and went for a 10 km run along the ocean. It was such an incredible morning. The sky was overcast and just enough that the sun couldn't quite overcome the clouds and there was a soft pink sky over the bay. It was quiet and cool and the smell of the water was so fresh, it was impossible to feel tired! 5 kms away from the place we were staying brought me all the way around the boardwalk in Mentone and up into the docks where a handful of sailed boats were moored. I turned back around and ran back home, managing to get myself lost somehow in the very last km of my run. I arrived to find people just getting up to start the day! Vanessa, I'll definitely be ready to run the half with you in May! ;)
I stayed with the friend I mentioned above on Sunday night and her boyfriend made us an incredible sustainable seafood feast! Whiting (caught that day in the bay around the city) and Kingfish (the molst delicious fish I have ever had) and salads and veggies grown in the garden behind his house. (I have been so inspired to start my own garden when I get back... hopefully will do better than I did with my poor basil last year!) After that, I've been in Melbs for the last couple of days on my own in a backpackers in the downtown core. Shipping my sexy lycra bike shorts and panniers home (forgot to wash them, sorry Mom and Dad for when you open that box to get your bday prezzies!) and shipping my bike to a store in Sydney that has offered to keep it safe for me until I arrive in a few weeks to pick it up and take it on the plane.
I hope everyone is well! I'm off to Cairns!
Cheers,
Candice
PS> Tons of pictures to come soon!
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Tapping out at 1116 kms
Hey all,
An unfortunate note to update you all with. Around 100 km from the end of our tour, I've decided to tap out and train back to Melbourne from Kyneton. We had a bushfire scare in the area last night and, while the rest of the crew is making their way to the next town and back to Melbourne on Thursday, I figured that this is venturing into 'unreasonable craziness' and made the decision to leave.
We were relaxing in a mud brick home a few kilometres out of Kyneton's town centre when someone noticed black smoke off in the distance. The radio confirmed that there were bushfires about 250 hectares big and 25 km away from Kyneton. We decided to pack up and move into the town centre and meet up with a sustainability group hosting a BBQ for us early and get more information. The locals were very unconcerned about threat of the fire, but with us being on bikes and unable to evacuate quickly if necessary it was pretty alarming for our group. We kept an ear out for the radio and had a nice meal with the community group and performed our skit for a group of scouts. At the end of the evening, the fire was still far away from Kyneton and there was no alert for this town, but the group decided to ask to stay in the scout's hall for the night so that we would be closer to the town centre in case things changed over night. Towns south-west of us were on high alert and the winds were bringing the fire east, towards the town that we were planning to go to today.
We rotated team members over night to get up and check the radio updates every hour and had everything ready to go in case. The fire was downgraded from 'urgent' to an 'alert' in the area and it had slowed down its eastern movement, but by morning it had burned through 2200 ha and 300 firefighters were on location working through a cold morning to prevent it from moving further.
The crew had a meeting this morning and there were many mixed emotions as to the events of last night and everyone's perceived level of danger. I don't think that the crew is in any immediate danger on their ride today, but not being particularly comfortable with the team's ability to move or make decisions quickly in an emergency, I decided to head back to Melbourne today and will meet them when they arrive on Thursday.
So that is the end of my bike riding adventure around rural Victoria! It went really well and we had some really amazing experiences along the way. I'm really looking forward to starting the next leg of my Australian tour, but I'm definitely going to miss seeing the country from the seat of my bike. It's definitely the best way to travel!
Cheers,
Candice
An unfortunate note to update you all with. Around 100 km from the end of our tour, I've decided to tap out and train back to Melbourne from Kyneton. We had a bushfire scare in the area last night and, while the rest of the crew is making their way to the next town and back to Melbourne on Thursday, I figured that this is venturing into 'unreasonable craziness' and made the decision to leave.
We were relaxing in a mud brick home a few kilometres out of Kyneton's town centre when someone noticed black smoke off in the distance. The radio confirmed that there were bushfires about 250 hectares big and 25 km away from Kyneton. We decided to pack up and move into the town centre and meet up with a sustainability group hosting a BBQ for us early and get more information. The locals were very unconcerned about threat of the fire, but with us being on bikes and unable to evacuate quickly if necessary it was pretty alarming for our group. We kept an ear out for the radio and had a nice meal with the community group and performed our skit for a group of scouts. At the end of the evening, the fire was still far away from Kyneton and there was no alert for this town, but the group decided to ask to stay in the scout's hall for the night so that we would be closer to the town centre in case things changed over night. Towns south-west of us were on high alert and the winds were bringing the fire east, towards the town that we were planning to go to today.
We rotated team members over night to get up and check the radio updates every hour and had everything ready to go in case. The fire was downgraded from 'urgent' to an 'alert' in the area and it had slowed down its eastern movement, but by morning it had burned through 2200 ha and 300 firefighters were on location working through a cold morning to prevent it from moving further.
The crew had a meeting this morning and there were many mixed emotions as to the events of last night and everyone's perceived level of danger. I don't think that the crew is in any immediate danger on their ride today, but not being particularly comfortable with the team's ability to move or make decisions quickly in an emergency, I decided to head back to Melbourne today and will meet them when they arrive on Thursday.
So that is the end of my bike riding adventure around rural Victoria! It went really well and we had some really amazing experiences along the way. I'm really looking forward to starting the next leg of my Australian tour, but I'm definitely going to miss seeing the country from the seat of my bike. It's definitely the best way to travel!
Cheers,
Candice
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
Over 1000 kms!
Bush fire sunrise
Picnic in the park with a sustainability group in MaryboroughWe're over 1000 km on our tour route and making our way back around to Melbourne. We're in the lovely town of Castlemaine at the moment and on to Bendigo tomorrow. Castlemaine is Melbourne's "weekender" town, so it is full of sidewalk cafes, kitschy shops and beautiful historic brick buildings.
Cheers,
Candice
Cheers,
Candice
Fire fighting in Victoria
We've been seeing this image a lot in the media in the coverage of the bushfires and I wanted to share it - the CFA in Victoria is really something spectacular. Almost all fire fighters in Victoria are volunteers. Only in big cities like Melbourne are there paid positions. All rural towns have a completely voluntary team. It's unbelievable how much they are expected to do though! They can be called at anytime and whisked away from their hometowns to help with fires anywhere in the state. Depending on their day jobs, a primary school might have a shortage of teachers because they are out fighting fires. I think that it's amazing that people are so committed to keeping their towns safe and providing members of the community to fight fires anywhere in the state. CFA is one of the world’s largest volunteer-based emergency services. There are around 58,000 volunteer members supported by over 400 career fire fighters and officers and more than 700 career support and administrative staff.
Monday, February 16, 2009
Over 900 kms so far... photo update
An update in photos from some of the tour legs. Text update below.
Me and Blue in a shovel at the gold mine in Stawell
On top of the "Big Hill" overlooking Stawell
Birthday sleepies in Halls Gap!
Midnight pancakes and jam (and wine)
Late night trailer practice in a parking lot
Dancing in the park in Warrnambool
Red sky at morn...
Bush fire sunrises have been painting the skies red and orange in the mornings lately. I've never seen a red sunrise and there is something really wuite eerie about a giant red fireball in the sky. "Red sky at night, cyclists' delight. Red sky at morn, cyclists be warned..." We were joking a few nights ago about how we've had these incredible vibrant sunrises - supposed to be a bad sign for sailors, does it transfer to cyclists?
It was just a saying until 6 am the other day when we were 10 km out into our ride from Ararat to Maryborough with the second crew group and we saw a truck racing towards us, slamming on the brakes as we approached. The driver yelled out to us that there "has been an accident with your group up ahead" and that she was checking to see where the ambulance was. In disbelief, we raced on ahead as the ambulance came up behind us and a couple kms ahead we learned that a crew member had come off her bike after getting the wobbles down a hill with a trailer. She hit her head and landed on her cheek, she was unconcious for a few seconds, but came to quickly. She had cut her face pretty badly and her hands and knees were scratched up. The ambulance took her back to Ararat and the woman who had stopped in her truck took two crew members back with their bikes to the hospital to wait for updates.
The rest of us were left with a pretty shaken up group, odds and ends from the other three that didn't get taken back to Ararat and had to organize a plan. We eventually decided to keep moving on to the first checkpoint on the way to Maryborough, 25 kms from Ararat, and wait for news before heading further away. We figured that it wouldn't help having 12 other people in the hospital waiting around and causing more confusion.
Getting updates from the two people at the hospital with our injured member really helped us keep moving on our ride. Even so, the 90 km ride to Maryborough was a long one. She's doing really well (and is apparently very charming on morphine), no fractures, no lasting damage, but one hell of a lack eye and a mandatory 5 to 7 days rest, which means we probably won't see her again until the tour is done and hopefully we all meet back in Melbourne. I'm really going to miss this crew member in particular - she's been someone I've felt an especial friendship with.
It's also been amazing to see the generosity of the woman who stopped in her truck when she saw the accident. She stayed with the group and hauled people back to Ararat with her. She put those two up in her house out of town that evening and drove them back to Ararat the next morning to visit the hospital. She drove another crew member all the way to Maryborough so that he could join us for the school presentation this morning and has offered to do more driving to make sure that the other crew member still in Ararat makes it back to the group after the girl in the accident heads home. She has really been incredible and we can't thank her enough.
Outside of all that, things are going really well. We've had a super busy schedule with tons of school performances and riding every other day to a new town. We've only got a handful left: from here on to Castlemaine, then Bendigo, Kyneton, Woodend and back to Melbourne. I can't believe how far we've come! We're staying in a really cute Scout's Hall in Maryborough and a couple people managed to do some "urban gleaning" and come back with boxes full of fresh fruit and veggies that were waiting on a pallet to be thrown out by a large supermarket just next door. If I'm going to take away one thing from this tour: it's shock at how much good food we throw out. We are so wasteful! Why is all of this food being put in a dumpster? We put so much of our energy and resources into growing, raising, watering, fertilizing, harvesting and processing all this food - wrapping it up in pretty packages, trucking it across countries, shelving, tagging, organizing it and then throwing it into a bin. There's got to be a better way than this.
It was just a saying until 6 am the other day when we were 10 km out into our ride from Ararat to Maryborough with the second crew group and we saw a truck racing towards us, slamming on the brakes as we approached. The driver yelled out to us that there "has been an accident with your group up ahead" and that she was checking to see where the ambulance was. In disbelief, we raced on ahead as the ambulance came up behind us and a couple kms ahead we learned that a crew member had come off her bike after getting the wobbles down a hill with a trailer. She hit her head and landed on her cheek, she was unconcious for a few seconds, but came to quickly. She had cut her face pretty badly and her hands and knees were scratched up. The ambulance took her back to Ararat and the woman who had stopped in her truck took two crew members back with their bikes to the hospital to wait for updates.
The rest of us were left with a pretty shaken up group, odds and ends from the other three that didn't get taken back to Ararat and had to organize a plan. We eventually decided to keep moving on to the first checkpoint on the way to Maryborough, 25 kms from Ararat, and wait for news before heading further away. We figured that it wouldn't help having 12 other people in the hospital waiting around and causing more confusion.
Getting updates from the two people at the hospital with our injured member really helped us keep moving on our ride. Even so, the 90 km ride to Maryborough was a long one. She's doing really well (and is apparently very charming on morphine), no fractures, no lasting damage, but one hell of a lack eye and a mandatory 5 to 7 days rest, which means we probably won't see her again until the tour is done and hopefully we all meet back in Melbourne. I'm really going to miss this crew member in particular - she's been someone I've felt an especial friendship with.
It's also been amazing to see the generosity of the woman who stopped in her truck when she saw the accident. She stayed with the group and hauled people back to Ararat with her. She put those two up in her house out of town that evening and drove them back to Ararat the next morning to visit the hospital. She drove another crew member all the way to Maryborough so that he could join us for the school presentation this morning and has offered to do more driving to make sure that the other crew member still in Ararat makes it back to the group after the girl in the accident heads home. She has really been incredible and we can't thank her enough.
Outside of all that, things are going really well. We've had a super busy schedule with tons of school performances and riding every other day to a new town. We've only got a handful left: from here on to Castlemaine, then Bendigo, Kyneton, Woodend and back to Melbourne. I can't believe how far we've come! We're staying in a really cute Scout's Hall in Maryborough and a couple people managed to do some "urban gleaning" and come back with boxes full of fresh fruit and veggies that were waiting on a pallet to be thrown out by a large supermarket just next door. If I'm going to take away one thing from this tour: it's shock at how much good food we throw out. We are so wasteful! Why is all of this food being put in a dumpster? We put so much of our energy and resources into growing, raising, watering, fertilizing, harvesting and processing all this food - wrapping it up in pretty packages, trucking it across countries, shelving, tagging, organizing it and then throwing it into a bin. There's got to be a better way than this.
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
A break for birthdays, the mid-tour mark and another heat wave
Hi all,
It's been a really busy time on the tour and I've been finding it tough to get time to update this, but we have a little downtime today between performances in the lovely town of Stawell. I had a really great birthday in Halls Gap - the crew made it really special with midnight pancakes and beverages to kick off the day and then hiking, swimming, kangaroo spotting and even a "Tim Tam" cake that a handful of people baked from scratch with no recipe. Tim Tams are these really strange biscuits covered in chocolate that you bite opposite corners off of, then suck tea through it and shove it in your face as the whole thing starts to melt and mush. It's a little intense, even for a chocolate lover such as myself. We had another birthday a couple days later, so we've been stuffing oursleves with cake for the last three days. Not sure if we're biking hard enough to quite work off those eating habits!
The Grampians (called Gariwerd by indigenous people) were beautiful and we spent a lot of time exploring, hiking up to "The Pinnacle" and enjoying a swim in the "Venus Baths" - natural rock pools that have formed from running water. A highlight of the weekend was visiting the Brambuk National Park and Cultural Centre and learning a lot about the geology of the area (amazing sandstone mountains that were originally coastal and now a high-elevation mountain island in the middle of a sea of farmland, home to over 50 endemic plant species and a handful of animals that occur nowhere else in the world!) and about the culture of various indigenous species that live in the area. We got to hear the "Dreamtime Creation Story" that different aborignal groups believe explain how the area formed and a lot of the artwork in the area is reflective of this story's themes. (If you want to read it, you can find it here: Gariwerd Creation Story). We had a few days to enjoy the park as we have hit the midpoint of the cycle tour and had planned extra time for the group to recharge and reflect on how the tour is going so far. It was a really great chance to gather up some of the energy I may have left behind on the hills we climbed rolling into the area!
On to Stawell yesterday where we are presenting our skit three times to different groups and giving workshops to a year 11 class at the secondary school. We are staying with a family in town which is so nice - again, enjoying the luxury of beds!
The crew has been safe from the bush fires that have been roaring through Victoria. Luckily, our path has been completely clear, though there are areas that have been hit that are in our future path. We're all keeping a close ear to the news and checking in with worried family members as often as we can. It's been really hard on everyone to have been out of touch from news and television for so long and to arrive and hear about so much devastation. Over 180 people have died in the fires, thousands are homeless and number of communities have been completely destroyed. A number of crew members are from small towns in Victoria and I think that it is especially hard on them to feel so connected to it, but so distanced by travelling in this community that is rather cut off from family and updates.
Hope all is well at home and keep in touch!
Candice
It's been a really busy time on the tour and I've been finding it tough to get time to update this, but we have a little downtime today between performances in the lovely town of Stawell. I had a really great birthday in Halls Gap - the crew made it really special with midnight pancakes and beverages to kick off the day and then hiking, swimming, kangaroo spotting and even a "Tim Tam" cake that a handful of people baked from scratch with no recipe. Tim Tams are these really strange biscuits covered in chocolate that you bite opposite corners off of, then suck tea through it and shove it in your face as the whole thing starts to melt and mush. It's a little intense, even for a chocolate lover such as myself. We had another birthday a couple days later, so we've been stuffing oursleves with cake for the last three days. Not sure if we're biking hard enough to quite work off those eating habits!
The Grampians (called Gariwerd by indigenous people) were beautiful and we spent a lot of time exploring, hiking up to "The Pinnacle" and enjoying a swim in the "Venus Baths" - natural rock pools that have formed from running water. A highlight of the weekend was visiting the Brambuk National Park and Cultural Centre and learning a lot about the geology of the area (amazing sandstone mountains that were originally coastal and now a high-elevation mountain island in the middle of a sea of farmland, home to over 50 endemic plant species and a handful of animals that occur nowhere else in the world!) and about the culture of various indigenous species that live in the area. We got to hear the "Dreamtime Creation Story" that different aborignal groups believe explain how the area formed and a lot of the artwork in the area is reflective of this story's themes. (If you want to read it, you can find it here: Gariwerd Creation Story). We had a few days to enjoy the park as we have hit the midpoint of the cycle tour and had planned extra time for the group to recharge and reflect on how the tour is going so far. It was a really great chance to gather up some of the energy I may have left behind on the hills we climbed rolling into the area!
On to Stawell yesterday where we are presenting our skit three times to different groups and giving workshops to a year 11 class at the secondary school. We are staying with a family in town which is so nice - again, enjoying the luxury of beds!
The crew has been safe from the bush fires that have been roaring through Victoria. Luckily, our path has been completely clear, though there are areas that have been hit that are in our future path. We're all keeping a close ear to the news and checking in with worried family members as often as we can. It's been really hard on everyone to have been out of touch from news and television for so long and to arrive and hear about so much devastation. Over 180 people have died in the fires, thousands are homeless and number of communities have been completely destroyed. A number of crew members are from small towns in Victoria and I think that it is especially hard on them to feel so connected to it, but so distanced by travelling in this community that is rather cut off from family and updates.
Hope all is well at home and keep in touch!
Candice
Photo update from Portland and Dunkeld
First koala sighting at the Thornbill Eco Education Centre! Wheeeeeeeee!
Arriving in Dunkeld - our first sight of mountains! (Mount Sturgeon and Mount Abrupt)
Joy, me and (a painting of) her father, the baker in the Dunkeld's history museum
Sunset in the arboretum in Dunkeld
On to the Grampians National Park (Gariwerd) after a 6 km hill climb in the dark (with the trailer). Monday, February 9, 2009
Warrnambool to Portland - 110 kms
It feels like months have passed since I've updated this - so much has been going on, so much riding and a lot of really interesting towns. I quickly mentioned earlier that we had completed the 100 km ride (on which I hauled a trailer for half the trip and got my first flat tyre in the first 30 km... oof, racing tyres are a little tricky to change, but with a little help, I think I've gotten the hang of it. I'm hoping to not get too may opportunities to practice, though!) The route was marked by wind farms, kangaroos and flat, fast riding. That day was super hot again and we ended up hitting the 80 km mark in the hottest part of the day and detouring to check out the permaculture farm. It was incredible to see though and we were given a whole trailer full of organic veggies and a laundry basket full of apricots, so the fight to get the fully-loaded road bike through a 5 km gravel road was worth it!
We pulled into Portland that night by 9 pm, taking a scenic ocean road from the farm to the Legacy Lodge where we stayed. It was such a treat to have individual beds! We gave our first school presentation to the "welcome back" assembly in a gym at a small college. The year 7 and 8s seemed to enjoy it for the most part and it is nice to see the crew feeling re-energized by putting on the performance and getting the sustainability message out. I spent a bit of time in the afternoon at a local bike store owned by Venessa and her dad, Peter. I was hoping to get a full tune-up done on my bike to make sure that I'm wearing it in alright... 450 kms may have been pushing it a bit as I had just started to notice my gears grinding more than normal and I needed to get my tyres pumped up to a higher pressure than I could do by hand. Peter was amazing and went over everything with me - checked out the whole bike and made a bunch of little adjustments totally free of charge. He spent twenty minutes explaining how all the cables worked with the derailleurs and what I can do to make sure the gears keep changing smoothly as I break in the bike. It was really cool to feel like I'm getting to know my bike better and I couldn't believe how much time and knowledge he was willing to share to some Canuck that just walked in the door. He did the same for two other girls and the guy in our group. Thank you Peter!
We did another presentation to a small class of year 7s that afternoon, which was much nicer than the gym assembly. We were able to interact a lot more with the kids and even the cool guy at the back making sarcastic faces managed to giggle a few times by the end. My character (Mother Earth's little sister) breaks out the fart jokes pretty early on in the skit... eep.
Portland to Hamilton - 88 kmsA much nicer ride in cool, crisp, misty morning weather as we turned back inland and headed to Hamilton. Our first check point was a small town called Heywood, about 30 kms away and the first group waited for the others to check in. While we were waiting, we were very awkwardly serenaded by a really old dude in a truck who insisted that we listen respectfully to some Scottish bagpipe music blasting out of his stereo at 7:30 am in the middle of the street! Aaaah, the excitement of small towns! On to a town called Branxholme, where we enjoyed a cappucino amidst hordes of persistent flies waiting for the next group to check in. Bush fires have been a problem in the area due to the heat wave, so it was good to get an update from the locals that they were under control where we are riding. We passed through an area that had been burnt through and a few kms of unsealed road made the going pretty slow. It was so good to finally get into Hamilton by 2:30 pm as the sun was zapping our energy. We stopped in the middle of the town on the side of the road, plopped our dirty, smelly, sweaty butts down on the sidewalk and devoured a litre of ice cream. (It's funny what now seems totally normal to us but probably looked really odd to passing cars - we got a few honks.)
In Hamilton, we stayed in the incredible Hamilton Institute of Rural Learning. A beautiful complex of buildings on 10 acres of developed land and another 200 acres of protected farmland for wildlife and native plant conservation. We slept in The Hall, which was a cathedral style room with butterfly netted ceilings to keep the place cool, hardwood floors and local art quilts on the walls. The place was a little obsessed with "bandicoots" a rodent-type thing that is being reintroduced in the area. They had a weird stuffed bandicoot display at the front and really pretty hardwood inlay of the little guys in the hall. Kinda weird...
Group life has been a little tougher this week... stress levels have been pretty high with everyone over the early mornings we've had, the long distances that we've been doing, the heat stroke incident in Warrnambool and a lot of emotional stuff has been coming out in the meetings. I've been feeling a little disconnected over the last week and a bit surprised in myself that I am not all that excited by all the feelings-sharing ("are you kidding me, they want to talk about their feelings again?"). I usually think of myself of a good listener and generally empathetic, but wow, I have hit my limit for feelings. Can't we just go for bike rides or runs or something? Maybe go for a beer? :)
Hamilton to Dunkeld - 33 kms
A short ride and a bit of extra sleep was a welcome break for this leg of the trip. I took the trailer again for this beautiful ride - undulating road with absolutely no wind and reasonable temperatures. We have arrived in the Grampians National Parks, for which Dunkeld is the gateway to the southern tip of the area. Just out of Hamilton rose the peaks of Mounts Sturgeon and Abrupt through a misty sunrise. The view reminds me of driving into the mountains in Banff a bit, when they're really far away. In this flat, flat land, a couple of peaks (around 700 m only) look deceivingly mountainous.
In Dunkeld (population 450), I met a woman, Joy Clarke, who has been a highlight of the entire trip. She had prepared afternoon tea for us and left it in the park across from her veranda at 9 am. We didn't end up arriving in the park until after 11 as we had lazily stopped at a cafe on the edge of town for a while. By the time we got to the park, people were hungry, so we grabbed some groceries and started making a salad just across from what we thought was someone else's picnic all set up. Suddenly, a quickly-moving aged person comes storming across the park waving a broom at us! She is demanding at the top of her lungs "Are you the bikers? The bike group that was supposed to arrive at 9 this morning?" We're happy and lazy and say hello and she asks what the hell we're sitting there for when she has hadteaandcoffeeandcakesandfoodalloutforussincethemorningitisprobablyallruinednowwhatarewethinking? All this time she is waving the broom like she is going to take someone out with it and all we can do is follow her over while she explains the spread and effusively try and thank her! She stormed off as quickly as she had come and left us wide-eyed in surprise and delight when we saw all of the food!
Joy gave Julia and I a tour of the local museum, which is a two-room church, converted into historical gem. It was amazing - she gave us an incredibly detailed account of how the place came to be and how all of the things in there were acquired. It was a pretty incredible story of how the town was settled, the different explorers that moved through the area and the connection to Scotland in the area (the town was originally called Mount Sturgeon but the Scots came and renamed it Dunkeld after the Scottish version). The museum itself is largely the result of efforts by women in the area (some with a passion for education and history, some widowed in the war wanting to preserve their town's history as they get older) to write their stories and recall all sorts of items from around the world that had originally been part of the town but had since been moved to other museums around the world. They're slowly bringing things home and building this little treasure in a disappearing town. Joy is the daughter of a baker (which meant her only problem was that she hadn't been born a boy) and worked her butt off to prove herself and finally be allowed to work alongside her dad in the bakery when she was 14. She joined the navy when she was 16 and spent four years with it. She travelled to England with a girl that she met just by advertising through a paper ("a minister's daughter responded, so obviously I wasn't going to go with HER, and luckily a hairdresser applied so I was able to have my hair done while we travelled"). She biked through Scotland on a rusty tandem bicycle with only one gear and broken brakes and got a taste for climbing hills, so she knows about biking! I loved the way she spoke, so abrupt, so factual - this is a force of a woman! At 76, I couldn't believe how with it and quick she was! No trite questions allowed! She loved that I had come all the way from Canada to see Dunkeld.
A bunch of people from the town came out and put on a fabulous barbecue for us with so much food and amazing desserts. A handful of the community had offered their homes for us to stay in, so I requested that I get matched up with Joy because I was enjoying her stories so much! She was giving me a hard time - I'm so young, no experience, what have I possibly had time to do with my life so far? I told her a bit about my family and what my sisters and I have gotten up to in school and she was so excited that I had done an engineering degree. I told her about the Iron Ring stuff and she thought it was a fantastic story. After that, she had me taking photos with her dog so she could send some mail back to my mom and let her know I was doing alright in Australia! (So Mom, look out - you're getting photos and recipes for homemade gingerbread and a 1800s recipe for shortbread in the mail!) She had me and another girl all tucked into a guest bedroom and was up before 4 am with us making us breakfast and sending us along our way. It was one of the nicest sleeps I have had - I felt so safe and looked after... it made Australia feel like home!
We were supposed to stay two days in Dunkeld, but we are being hit with another heat wave and bush fires are quite a danger in the area. We decided to take off early the next day for a 67 km route through the Grampians to Halls Gap. We left by 5 am and had a solid hour in pitch black as we picked our way through a parks highway. I had volunteered for the trailer again (thinking that I would have a day of rest between rides) but no such luck. Harder still, we climbed continuously for the first 6km of the ride. It was the toughest physical challenge I've had so far on the tour and I didn't think I would make it past 10 km if the whole ride would climb like that. Finally the road levelled for a moment before plunging downwards in the dark and we flew through the next 3 km in an eerie, dark, winding road, lit only by our headlamps and tail lights! Whew, that was a little stressful and one person clipped a wallabee that jumped across the rode as we descended! Finally, the dark grew into dawn and we had one of the most beautiful rides I could imagine. Mountains, winding roads, no cars at all, the bush on either side filling our noses with the scent of eucalyptus, tons of wallabees darting through the bush and ahead of us, cockatoos circling and screeching and even one kangaroo sighting (they are alarmingly enormous!). There was a beautiful, soft mist hanging over us, keeping us cool into the morning and we rode around cliffs and hills. The ride was definitely a challenge: we kept climbing and falling over the next 30 km (mostly climbing) until we reached a divide marking at at elevation of 424 m. It sounds so small to my Rocky Mountain mind, but considering we had been 3 m above sea level in Hamilton, it was a pretty good climb! From there on, we had a fast, fun downhill ride into Halls Gap where we are having the mid-tour retreat, my birthday!, and an extra day to explore, hike and enjoy this little tourist trap in the middle of the parks.
We spent the rest of the afternoon that heated up to 40 degrees again relaxing inside, eating ice cream and checking out the Venus Baths a couple km away from the town centre. They are some natural pools that have filled on a rock slab, cool and refreshing (how quickly the body forgets that it has been sweating like mad for the last few hours - that water is cold!) We have the luxury of air conditioning in the hall we're staying in and - while we wouldn't usually indulge in the extra power required - today the temperature has risen to 47 degrees and it is unbearable to step outside! Wind storms have picked up which will bring a cool change over the next couple of days before we ride on Tuesday. Bush fires have broken out in the north part of the park, so we'll be waiting to hear a bit more information before we head out on hikes and our next ride into Stawell. Looking so much forward to a day off on my birthday!
Cheers, Candice
It feels like months have passed since I've updated this - so much has been going on, so much riding and a lot of really interesting towns. I quickly mentioned earlier that we had completed the 100 km ride (on which I hauled a trailer for half the trip and got my first flat tyre in the first 30 km... oof, racing tyres are a little tricky to change, but with a little help, I think I've gotten the hang of it. I'm hoping to not get too may opportunities to practice, though!) The route was marked by wind farms, kangaroos and flat, fast riding. That day was super hot again and we ended up hitting the 80 km mark in the hottest part of the day and detouring to check out the permaculture farm. It was incredible to see though and we were given a whole trailer full of organic veggies and a laundry basket full of apricots, so the fight to get the fully-loaded road bike through a 5 km gravel road was worth it!
We pulled into Portland that night by 9 pm, taking a scenic ocean road from the farm to the Legacy Lodge where we stayed. It was such a treat to have individual beds! We gave our first school presentation to the "welcome back" assembly in a gym at a small college. The year 7 and 8s seemed to enjoy it for the most part and it is nice to see the crew feeling re-energized by putting on the performance and getting the sustainability message out. I spent a bit of time in the afternoon at a local bike store owned by Venessa and her dad, Peter. I was hoping to get a full tune-up done on my bike to make sure that I'm wearing it in alright... 450 kms may have been pushing it a bit as I had just started to notice my gears grinding more than normal and I needed to get my tyres pumped up to a higher pressure than I could do by hand. Peter was amazing and went over everything with me - checked out the whole bike and made a bunch of little adjustments totally free of charge. He spent twenty minutes explaining how all the cables worked with the derailleurs and what I can do to make sure the gears keep changing smoothly as I break in the bike. It was really cool to feel like I'm getting to know my bike better and I couldn't believe how much time and knowledge he was willing to share to some Canuck that just walked in the door. He did the same for two other girls and the guy in our group. Thank you Peter!
We did another presentation to a small class of year 7s that afternoon, which was much nicer than the gym assembly. We were able to interact a lot more with the kids and even the cool guy at the back making sarcastic faces managed to giggle a few times by the end. My character (Mother Earth's little sister) breaks out the fart jokes pretty early on in the skit... eep.
Portland to Hamilton - 88 kmsA much nicer ride in cool, crisp, misty morning weather as we turned back inland and headed to Hamilton. Our first check point was a small town called Heywood, about 30 kms away and the first group waited for the others to check in. While we were waiting, we were very awkwardly serenaded by a really old dude in a truck who insisted that we listen respectfully to some Scottish bagpipe music blasting out of his stereo at 7:30 am in the middle of the street! Aaaah, the excitement of small towns! On to a town called Branxholme, where we enjoyed a cappucino amidst hordes of persistent flies waiting for the next group to check in. Bush fires have been a problem in the area due to the heat wave, so it was good to get an update from the locals that they were under control where we are riding. We passed through an area that had been burnt through and a few kms of unsealed road made the going pretty slow. It was so good to finally get into Hamilton by 2:30 pm as the sun was zapping our energy. We stopped in the middle of the town on the side of the road, plopped our dirty, smelly, sweaty butts down on the sidewalk and devoured a litre of ice cream. (It's funny what now seems totally normal to us but probably looked really odd to passing cars - we got a few honks.)
In Hamilton, we stayed in the incredible Hamilton Institute of Rural Learning. A beautiful complex of buildings on 10 acres of developed land and another 200 acres of protected farmland for wildlife and native plant conservation. We slept in The Hall, which was a cathedral style room with butterfly netted ceilings to keep the place cool, hardwood floors and local art quilts on the walls. The place was a little obsessed with "bandicoots" a rodent-type thing that is being reintroduced in the area. They had a weird stuffed bandicoot display at the front and really pretty hardwood inlay of the little guys in the hall. Kinda weird...
Group life has been a little tougher this week... stress levels have been pretty high with everyone over the early mornings we've had, the long distances that we've been doing, the heat stroke incident in Warrnambool and a lot of emotional stuff has been coming out in the meetings. I've been feeling a little disconnected over the last week and a bit surprised in myself that I am not all that excited by all the feelings-sharing ("are you kidding me, they want to talk about their feelings again?"). I usually think of myself of a good listener and generally empathetic, but wow, I have hit my limit for feelings. Can't we just go for bike rides or runs or something? Maybe go for a beer? :)
Hamilton to Dunkeld - 33 kms
A short ride and a bit of extra sleep was a welcome break for this leg of the trip. I took the trailer again for this beautiful ride - undulating road with absolutely no wind and reasonable temperatures. We have arrived in the Grampians National Parks, for which Dunkeld is the gateway to the southern tip of the area. Just out of Hamilton rose the peaks of Mounts Sturgeon and Abrupt through a misty sunrise. The view reminds me of driving into the mountains in Banff a bit, when they're really far away. In this flat, flat land, a couple of peaks (around 700 m only) look deceivingly mountainous.
In Dunkeld (population 450), I met a woman, Joy Clarke, who has been a highlight of the entire trip. She had prepared afternoon tea for us and left it in the park across from her veranda at 9 am. We didn't end up arriving in the park until after 11 as we had lazily stopped at a cafe on the edge of town for a while. By the time we got to the park, people were hungry, so we grabbed some groceries and started making a salad just across from what we thought was someone else's picnic all set up. Suddenly, a quickly-moving aged person comes storming across the park waving a broom at us! She is demanding at the top of her lungs "Are you the bikers? The bike group that was supposed to arrive at 9 this morning?" We're happy and lazy and say hello and she asks what the hell we're sitting there for when she has hadteaandcoffeeandcakesandfoodalloutforussincethemorningitisprobablyallruinednowwhatarewethinking? All this time she is waving the broom like she is going to take someone out with it and all we can do is follow her over while she explains the spread and effusively try and thank her! She stormed off as quickly as she had come and left us wide-eyed in surprise and delight when we saw all of the food!
Joy gave Julia and I a tour of the local museum, which is a two-room church, converted into historical gem. It was amazing - she gave us an incredibly detailed account of how the place came to be and how all of the things in there were acquired. It was a pretty incredible story of how the town was settled, the different explorers that moved through the area and the connection to Scotland in the area (the town was originally called Mount Sturgeon but the Scots came and renamed it Dunkeld after the Scottish version). The museum itself is largely the result of efforts by women in the area (some with a passion for education and history, some widowed in the war wanting to preserve their town's history as they get older) to write their stories and recall all sorts of items from around the world that had originally been part of the town but had since been moved to other museums around the world. They're slowly bringing things home and building this little treasure in a disappearing town. Joy is the daughter of a baker (which meant her only problem was that she hadn't been born a boy) and worked her butt off to prove herself and finally be allowed to work alongside her dad in the bakery when she was 14. She joined the navy when she was 16 and spent four years with it. She travelled to England with a girl that she met just by advertising through a paper ("a minister's daughter responded, so obviously I wasn't going to go with HER, and luckily a hairdresser applied so I was able to have my hair done while we travelled"). She biked through Scotland on a rusty tandem bicycle with only one gear and broken brakes and got a taste for climbing hills, so she knows about biking! I loved the way she spoke, so abrupt, so factual - this is a force of a woman! At 76, I couldn't believe how with it and quick she was! No trite questions allowed! She loved that I had come all the way from Canada to see Dunkeld.
A bunch of people from the town came out and put on a fabulous barbecue for us with so much food and amazing desserts. A handful of the community had offered their homes for us to stay in, so I requested that I get matched up with Joy because I was enjoying her stories so much! She was giving me a hard time - I'm so young, no experience, what have I possibly had time to do with my life so far? I told her a bit about my family and what my sisters and I have gotten up to in school and she was so excited that I had done an engineering degree. I told her about the Iron Ring stuff and she thought it was a fantastic story. After that, she had me taking photos with her dog so she could send some mail back to my mom and let her know I was doing alright in Australia! (So Mom, look out - you're getting photos and recipes for homemade gingerbread and a 1800s recipe for shortbread in the mail!) She had me and another girl all tucked into a guest bedroom and was up before 4 am with us making us breakfast and sending us along our way. It was one of the nicest sleeps I have had - I felt so safe and looked after... it made Australia feel like home!
We were supposed to stay two days in Dunkeld, but we are being hit with another heat wave and bush fires are quite a danger in the area. We decided to take off early the next day for a 67 km route through the Grampians to Halls Gap. We left by 5 am and had a solid hour in pitch black as we picked our way through a parks highway. I had volunteered for the trailer again (thinking that I would have a day of rest between rides) but no such luck. Harder still, we climbed continuously for the first 6km of the ride. It was the toughest physical challenge I've had so far on the tour and I didn't think I would make it past 10 km if the whole ride would climb like that. Finally the road levelled for a moment before plunging downwards in the dark and we flew through the next 3 km in an eerie, dark, winding road, lit only by our headlamps and tail lights! Whew, that was a little stressful and one person clipped a wallabee that jumped across the rode as we descended! Finally, the dark grew into dawn and we had one of the most beautiful rides I could imagine. Mountains, winding roads, no cars at all, the bush on either side filling our noses with the scent of eucalyptus, tons of wallabees darting through the bush and ahead of us, cockatoos circling and screeching and even one kangaroo sighting (they are alarmingly enormous!). There was a beautiful, soft mist hanging over us, keeping us cool into the morning and we rode around cliffs and hills. The ride was definitely a challenge: we kept climbing and falling over the next 30 km (mostly climbing) until we reached a divide marking at at elevation of 424 m. It sounds so small to my Rocky Mountain mind, but considering we had been 3 m above sea level in Hamilton, it was a pretty good climb! From there on, we had a fast, fun downhill ride into Halls Gap where we are having the mid-tour retreat, my birthday!, and an extra day to explore, hike and enjoy this little tourist trap in the middle of the parks.
We spent the rest of the afternoon that heated up to 40 degrees again relaxing inside, eating ice cream and checking out the Venus Baths a couple km away from the town centre. They are some natural pools that have filled on a rock slab, cool and refreshing (how quickly the body forgets that it has been sweating like mad for the last few hours - that water is cold!) We have the luxury of air conditioning in the hall we're staying in and - while we wouldn't usually indulge in the extra power required - today the temperature has risen to 47 degrees and it is unbearable to step outside! Wind storms have picked up which will bring a cool change over the next couple of days before we ride on Tuesday. Bush fires have broken out in the north part of the park, so we'll be waiting to hear a bit more information before we head out on hikes and our next ride into Stawell. Looking so much forward to a day off on my birthday!
Cheers, Candice
Monday, February 2, 2009
100 km... and then some!
Hi all,
Finished the 100 km leg yesterday, though it ended up being closer to 110 as we detoured at the 80 km mark to visit a "permaculture" farm that grows its own organic food (including chickens, lamb and more than all the veggies and fruit they could eat). It was pretty incredible and we were loaded down with boxes full of fruit and veg so very generously donated. http://thornbill.com.au/
On to Hamilton tomorrow, another 89 km away and then we'll have a nice short leg and a day off in a town called Dunkeld at the foot of the Grampians National Park. Very much looking forward to the scenery!
Oh! Almost forgot... there were kangaroos bounding through fields along our ride all morning and then there were 3 koalas just hanging out in the trees on the farm. We could get within 3 feet of one that was on a tree at eye level! Crazy!
Ciao
C
Finished the 100 km leg yesterday, though it ended up being closer to 110 as we detoured at the 80 km mark to visit a "permaculture" farm that grows its own organic food (including chickens, lamb and more than all the veggies and fruit they could eat). It was pretty incredible and we were loaded down with boxes full of fruit and veg so very generously donated. http://thornbill.com.au/
On to Hamilton tomorrow, another 89 km away and then we'll have a nice short leg and a day off in a town called Dunkeld at the foot of the Grampians National Park. Very much looking forward to the scenery!
Oh! Almost forgot... there were kangaroos bounding through fields along our ride all morning and then there were 3 koalas just hanging out in the trees on the farm. We could get within 3 feet of one that was on a tree at eye level! Crazy!
Ciao
C
Saturday, January 31, 2009
Post script
Alright, enough blogging for today! :) One last thing, our Otesha website has been updated, so if you are interested in more of a diary of the whole group's tour, you can read about it at http://www.otesha.org.au/biketours/victour/blog and there is a movie of our launch (and more to come with interviews of each crew member) here http://www.allaroundyou.net/video/otesha-project-aus-victorian
Cheers,
Candice
Cheers,
Candice
Photo update!
At the port in Warrnambool, enjoying a day off to explore!
Swimming in a volcanic crater in Camperdown, 46 degrees that day!
Our tin-roofed shed that we slept in... no one complained about getting up at 4 am and getting out of this place!
On the shores of Lake Colac... or what WAS Lake Colac! The whole crew here. I'm in the middle with the white and pink tank top on.
Heat Wave Hits Victoria
Hi all,
It's been a tough few days over the last little while on the tour. A heat wave has hit Victoria (the worst in 150 years!) and my misplaced stereotype that "Australia is 40 degrees in every part of the coutnry every day at every part of the day" has actually come true. We stayed in a tin-roofed shed in Camperdown and, while grateful that there was a roof and showers, the temperature was reaching the high forties inside. We actually had +46 in town! I am surprised at how much I'm affected by the heat - it's tough to move! One of the highlights of Camperdown was joining a community lunch put on by one of the churches... they try and promote people who may not eat well very often to at least have one healthy meal a week. We put on an impromptu performane of a couple scenes from our skit. To beat the heat, a few of us rode to a couple lakes that formed in volcanic craters. One lake is freshwater and the other is salt water. It was a straight uphill ride to get to a lookout point where you could see both lakes, then we plummeted down the side of the crater to get to one of them. It was beautiful water - clear and crisp and very salty! The ride back was tough, climbing out of the crater, but totally worth it!
We woke up at 4 am on Thursday and were on the road just after 5:00 am trying to cycle as much in the coo0l, dark night as possible... it was mostly just dark though as the temperatures were above 30 degrees by 6:30 am (though it was really nice to see the sun coming up as we rounded the 25 km mark). Our 70 km ride that day was verging on unreasonable craziness. I was in a fast group, so we made it into Warrnambool by quarter after 9. A northerly wind (very hot and fast) was picking up just was we arrived and made the last 10 km quite difficult. As the other groups made their way in over the next hour and a half, signs of heat stroke were becoming apparent in a lot of the group members. Getting electrolytes and water into people became my job - I was like an eDisc fairy! It was definitely a little scary to see people so disoriented and breaking down. I did really well - I think having spent so much time running and using gels and the electrolyte discs really helped.
Unfortunately, one of our groups had major mechanical difficulties with one of the trailers and two flat tyres and getting stuck out in the hottest part of the day was pretty disastrous. Luckily, some motorists who had heard of our arrival pulled over and asked if they were the Otesha project and a few trips managed to get the last four girls back to the house we're staying at. One crew member was severly dehydrated and we ended up taking her to the hospital. It was a long long long day and hard on everyone. We all recovered pretty well and the next day was fairly productive - temperatures cooled a bit and we had a performance of our skit for the South West Sustainability Group near the Civic Centre. We also had a meeting with one of the shire councillors who wants to make this area more "bike friendly" and was hoping to get our input of the experience in Warrnambool so far.
Today is a well-earned day off for everyone - completely Otesha free. While I'm enjoying our crew so much, I am so much looking forward to some down time alone, exploring this town. It's so beautiful here! It is oceanside with a small historical fishing port that has been rebuilt from the olden days. I spent a little time this morning op shopping (checking out the thrift stores - "opportunity shopping") and decided that my new goal for when I get home is to outfit my entire new work wardrobe through op shops.
Tomorrow we're off on our 100 km ride to Portland and our first two school stops!
Gotta jet!
Cheers,
Candice
It's been a tough few days over the last little while on the tour. A heat wave has hit Victoria (the worst in 150 years!) and my misplaced stereotype that "Australia is 40 degrees in every part of the coutnry every day at every part of the day" has actually come true. We stayed in a tin-roofed shed in Camperdown and, while grateful that there was a roof and showers, the temperature was reaching the high forties inside. We actually had +46 in town! I am surprised at how much I'm affected by the heat - it's tough to move! One of the highlights of Camperdown was joining a community lunch put on by one of the churches... they try and promote people who may not eat well very often to at least have one healthy meal a week. We put on an impromptu performane of a couple scenes from our skit. To beat the heat, a few of us rode to a couple lakes that formed in volcanic craters. One lake is freshwater and the other is salt water. It was a straight uphill ride to get to a lookout point where you could see both lakes, then we plummeted down the side of the crater to get to one of them. It was beautiful water - clear and crisp and very salty! The ride back was tough, climbing out of the crater, but totally worth it!
We woke up at 4 am on Thursday and were on the road just after 5:00 am trying to cycle as much in the coo0l, dark night as possible... it was mostly just dark though as the temperatures were above 30 degrees by 6:30 am (though it was really nice to see the sun coming up as we rounded the 25 km mark). Our 70 km ride that day was verging on unreasonable craziness. I was in a fast group, so we made it into Warrnambool by quarter after 9. A northerly wind (very hot and fast) was picking up just was we arrived and made the last 10 km quite difficult. As the other groups made their way in over the next hour and a half, signs of heat stroke were becoming apparent in a lot of the group members. Getting electrolytes and water into people became my job - I was like an eDisc fairy! It was definitely a little scary to see people so disoriented and breaking down. I did really well - I think having spent so much time running and using gels and the electrolyte discs really helped.
Unfortunately, one of our groups had major mechanical difficulties with one of the trailers and two flat tyres and getting stuck out in the hottest part of the day was pretty disastrous. Luckily, some motorists who had heard of our arrival pulled over and asked if they were the Otesha project and a few trips managed to get the last four girls back to the house we're staying at. One crew member was severly dehydrated and we ended up taking her to the hospital. It was a long long long day and hard on everyone. We all recovered pretty well and the next day was fairly productive - temperatures cooled a bit and we had a performance of our skit for the South West Sustainability Group near the Civic Centre. We also had a meeting with one of the shire councillors who wants to make this area more "bike friendly" and was hoping to get our input of the experience in Warrnambool so far.
Today is a well-earned day off for everyone - completely Otesha free. While I'm enjoying our crew so much, I am so much looking forward to some down time alone, exploring this town. It's so beautiful here! It is oceanside with a small historical fishing port that has been rebuilt from the olden days. I spent a little time this morning op shopping (checking out the thrift stores - "opportunity shopping") and decided that my new goal for when I get home is to outfit my entire new work wardrobe through op shops.
Tomorrow we're off on our 100 km ride to Portland and our first two school stops!
Gotta jet!
Cheers,
Candice
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
Colac to Camperdown!
Hello all!
Made it to Camperdown this morning with the trailer... it was a lot of fun, actually, and a great workout! It was flat for most of the way and only a few hills, so I have my first 45 km logged out of the 300 km total I need to haul a trailer for. I'll have a break on the next leg and then the American girl, Kelsey, and I will split trailer duty for our mammoth 100-km ride to Portland (we hear it's uphill and into a headwind the whole timem yikes!).
We stayed in Colac for the last couple of days. We had accomodations in a scout hall on the shores of Lake Colac... though we didn't see a drop of water as the lake dried up entirely this year. The area has been in a drought for the last five years and the lake has slowly receded until, finally, this summer, it disappeared entirely. It's very sad for the town as it used to be a popular sailing area and the scouts hall was very much water focused. Derilict kayaks and canoes are parked in the basement and the piers just run off into fields. It's a scary reminder of climate change!
We had a great Australia Day in the town of Forrest yesterday, just 30 km south of Colac. A lady from the town volunteered to drive us out there, which was a nice break from riding. We sat in the sun, listened to drumming from the Sudanese community living in Forrest and even the band leader from the bush dance that we attended was there, playing an acoustic set. He gave us a big shout out from the stage when he saw our crew. We had a little hike to Lake Elizabeth in the Otways National Park. The lake was formed in the 50s when a landslide dammed the river and wasn't discovered until people finally hiked up wondering where their river had gone! It's now home to duck-billed platypus, but apparently you have to be there pretty early in the morning to catch a glimpse of one. Australia Day was our first day off from any Otesha duties and I think everyone has recharged for Week Two!
Campersown is a really cute town with a population of around 5000, I think. We're staying at the show grounds, which is has a field ring for rodeo stuff and we're staying in a little barn. It's going to be super hot for the next week (+40 ish) but up until now we have had cold nights and very cool mornings... I could even see my breath this morning!
Hope all is well! Cheers,
Candice
Made it to Camperdown this morning with the trailer... it was a lot of fun, actually, and a great workout! It was flat for most of the way and only a few hills, so I have my first 45 km logged out of the 300 km total I need to haul a trailer for. I'll have a break on the next leg and then the American girl, Kelsey, and I will split trailer duty for our mammoth 100-km ride to Portland (we hear it's uphill and into a headwind the whole timem yikes!).
We stayed in Colac for the last couple of days. We had accomodations in a scout hall on the shores of Lake Colac... though we didn't see a drop of water as the lake dried up entirely this year. The area has been in a drought for the last five years and the lake has slowly receded until, finally, this summer, it disappeared entirely. It's very sad for the town as it used to be a popular sailing area and the scouts hall was very much water focused. Derilict kayaks and canoes are parked in the basement and the piers just run off into fields. It's a scary reminder of climate change!
We had a great Australia Day in the town of Forrest yesterday, just 30 km south of Colac. A lady from the town volunteered to drive us out there, which was a nice break from riding. We sat in the sun, listened to drumming from the Sudanese community living in Forrest and even the band leader from the bush dance that we attended was there, playing an acoustic set. He gave us a big shout out from the stage when he saw our crew. We had a little hike to Lake Elizabeth in the Otways National Park. The lake was formed in the 50s when a landslide dammed the river and wasn't discovered until people finally hiked up wondering where their river had gone! It's now home to duck-billed platypus, but apparently you have to be there pretty early in the morning to catch a glimpse of one. Australia Day was our first day off from any Otesha duties and I think everyone has recharged for Week Two!
Campersown is a really cute town with a population of around 5000, I think. We're staying at the show grounds, which is has a field ring for rodeo stuff and we're staying in a little barn. It's going to be super hot for the next week (+40 ish) but up until now we have had cold nights and very cool mornings... I could even see my breath this morning!
Hope all is well! Cheers,
Candice
Sunday, January 25, 2009
Melbourne to Geelong to Winchelsea to Colac!
Hello all,
It's been a while since I've been able to update this blog, but we've completed the first few legs of our trip! We started in West Footscray (just outside of Melbourne) after a wonderful launch party on the river bank with a BBQ, a rehearsal of our skit, a fundraising raffle and auction and much well wishing from cyclists from around Melbourne. We took the train to Werribee and officially started out first 42 km ride to Geelong.
Geelong is a really relaxed beach town with a pier and swimming area on the Eastern Beach that was a great way to spend an afternoon. We stayed in a Girl Scouts' hall for two nights, rehearsing and working on our workshops. We enjoyed a wonderful evening hosted by the Geelong Sustainability Group at Beav's Bar, where we heard a lot about some of the sustainable initiatives going on in Geelong and other areas.
Our next stop was a 38 km ride to a small town called Winchelsea (population 1336!) We stayed at a Boy Scouts' Hall which was like a renovated barn... it was pretty funny to have all fourteen of us in there! It was such a cute town and the locals invited us to a "bush dance" which is very much like going to a square dance... the dance card was up at the front near the band and everyone knew the steps to each dance that was called! Little old ladies and old men where having a hilarious time teaching all of us how to dance. It was a bit hopeless, but such a fun time!
This morning, we rode on to Colac, another 36 km away. We have just arrived and are working on getting lunch together. We'll stay in another scouts' hall and enjoy Australia Day festivities tomorrow in a town called Forrest. Coming up is a 45 km trip to Camperdown, then 68 to Warrnambool and then a 100 km hill climb into the Grampians National Park! (I've already volunteered to haul a trailer for that one!)
Hope all is well!
Cheers,
Candice
Monday, January 19, 2009
Training Days
Hello all!
Just finishing up day two of training with the Otesha crew in Mentone, Victoria - a small suburb outside of Melbourne. We're lodging in a girls school with gorgeous grounds, a full kitchen and a gym with mats to sleep on (and stuff to play with!). We've been discussing the logistics of the trip, doing a lot of team-building exercises and talking about consensus decision making. We're walking the walk of living sustainability so far: letting things mellow (if you know what I mean), staggered showers (if at all) and eating mostly vegan and donated food. Something that has really been blowing my mind so far is how much totally delicious and comepletely wonderful food is being thrown out - or bakeries and grocers will gladly donate because it's going out otherwise. A lot of the people on the tour eat almost entirely for free by getting to know their local organic food shops.
The people on the crew are fabulous - everyone is very excited about the upcoming adventure and people are so welcoming and generous. It's really one of the most open groups I've ever met. We're already sharing fart jokes two days in to knowing each other, so I think we'll be quite close by the end of the trip. We're practicing a skit about sustainable living to put on at a lot of the schools and I've taken on the role of Mother Earth's lippy kid sister.
Tomorrow is a launch party and we'll put the play on for people in the Melbourne social justice/sustainable living community and stay at Ange's house for one last sleep before taking off for our first ride on Wednesday morning. We'll be heading from Melbourne to Geelong (sounds like juh-LONG, not GHEE-long like I have been saying all week, oops). It's about 75 km, but we'll be taking the train for about half of it to get out of Melbourne and on to less dangerous roads.
I'm still quite worried about the sun - I burnt my hands quite badly and they are still quite painful, but I have gloves now for them. I need to keep my knees covered (also already burnt) and ears! Outside of that, I have a couple things to pick up for my bike and I should be quite prepared for everything except actually getting out there!
Cheers,
Candice
Friday, January 16, 2009
On sunburns and being lost...
Hi all,
It's been a busy couple of days in Melbourne - got my bike, got a library card (don't ask!) and managed to get myself home on the bike... eventually. It's definitely taking some getting used to, having never ridden a road bike before, having never ridden on the left hand side of the road before and having never had to look at a map while on a bike! The good people at The Freedom Machine in Port Melbourne set me up with the beautiful Giant Avail you will soon see below. It was definitely my kind of place: they had me on the bike with a video camera so they could measure the angles my legs, feet and back were making during pedalling. It was very high tech and you all know I like to measure things!
My ride home was interesting to say the least. On the map, it looks like there are clear bike paths from where I was in Port Melbourne most of the way home to the place I'm staying in West Footscray. Not so! I was getting lost all over the place and had to stop for directions a million times! I saw many industrial things that I didn't expect to come across on my "waterfront ride" home... Getting into downtown during rush hour was a little stressful - they bike paths were wonderful through the city, but wow, there are hundreds of cyclists here who are all very competent (and wearing fluorescents!) and probably did not appreciate a slightly wobbly (very wobbly) nervous Canadian who was leaping off her bike ever 5 seconds to check the map. Managed to follow some people who looked like they knew where they were going and got into Footscray no problem... until I ended up in another industrial park with no more bike paths. Very long story short, I covered most of Footscray, Middle Footscray and West Footscray by trial and error (because at this point, I was off the map!) and eventually found my way home. Eep!
Riding today went MUCH better. I took the same path (well, the path I mostly meant to take) as yesterday down into Port Melbourne and, with only one oops into the industrial docks, I made it to the Freedom Machine to get the guys to add a bell and see if they could move my brakes in closer (my small hands were having a bit of trouble reaching them). I even tested out riding with the panniers 1/3 loaded and had no real trouble with them unless the wind picks up! Got the bike sorted and made my way further along the waterfront into St. Kilda, stopped for fish and chips and was thoroughly enjoying the ride until the bike paths ended and I was off-roading with my road bike - sand, gravel, grass, you name it! - and got myself terribly lost again. After a very frustrating walk/ride through a really trendy area, I finally made it to the tram station to head downtown... not realizing bikes aren't allowed on trams! A new adventure to find a train station and then finally made it downtown to meet with some Otesha team members at the office. Whew! At 35 km taking 3 hours, I am biking just about as fast as I can run! Eep!
All in all, it's been quite the adventure and I feel like I'm getting to know Melbourne through sheer determination - my navigating skills being horrific!
Hope you enjoy the pics!
Cheers,
Candice
PS> Yikes I am a bit sunburned! Hands, knees and calves, which I forgot to sunscreen. Oops!
The house in West Footscray, thanks Ange!
Leaving the Otesha office today
It's been a busy couple of days in Melbourne - got my bike, got a library card (don't ask!) and managed to get myself home on the bike... eventually. It's definitely taking some getting used to, having never ridden a road bike before, having never ridden on the left hand side of the road before and having never had to look at a map while on a bike! The good people at The Freedom Machine in Port Melbourne set me up with the beautiful Giant Avail you will soon see below. It was definitely my kind of place: they had me on the bike with a video camera so they could measure the angles my legs, feet and back were making during pedalling. It was very high tech and you all know I like to measure things!
My ride home was interesting to say the least. On the map, it looks like there are clear bike paths from where I was in Port Melbourne most of the way home to the place I'm staying in West Footscray. Not so! I was getting lost all over the place and had to stop for directions a million times! I saw many industrial things that I didn't expect to come across on my "waterfront ride" home... Getting into downtown during rush hour was a little stressful - they bike paths were wonderful through the city, but wow, there are hundreds of cyclists here who are all very competent (and wearing fluorescents!) and probably did not appreciate a slightly wobbly (very wobbly) nervous Canadian who was leaping off her bike ever 5 seconds to check the map. Managed to follow some people who looked like they knew where they were going and got into Footscray no problem... until I ended up in another industrial park with no more bike paths. Very long story short, I covered most of Footscray, Middle Footscray and West Footscray by trial and error (because at this point, I was off the map!) and eventually found my way home. Eep!
Riding today went MUCH better. I took the same path (well, the path I mostly meant to take) as yesterday down into Port Melbourne and, with only one oops into the industrial docks, I made it to the Freedom Machine to get the guys to add a bell and see if they could move my brakes in closer (my small hands were having a bit of trouble reaching them). I even tested out riding with the panniers 1/3 loaded and had no real trouble with them unless the wind picks up! Got the bike sorted and made my way further along the waterfront into St. Kilda, stopped for fish and chips and was thoroughly enjoying the ride until the bike paths ended and I was off-roading with my road bike - sand, gravel, grass, you name it! - and got myself terribly lost again. After a very frustrating walk/ride through a really trendy area, I finally made it to the tram station to head downtown... not realizing bikes aren't allowed on trams! A new adventure to find a train station and then finally made it downtown to meet with some Otesha team members at the office. Whew! At 35 km taking 3 hours, I am biking just about as fast as I can run! Eep!
All in all, it's been quite the adventure and I feel like I'm getting to know Melbourne through sheer determination - my navigating skills being horrific!
Hope you enjoy the pics!
Cheers,
Candice
PS> Yikes I am a bit sunburned! Hands, knees and calves, which I forgot to sunscreen. Oops!
The house in West Footscray, thanks Ange!
Leaving the Otesha office today
My ride home yesterday along the water
The new bike! Her name is Blue!
The bike shop in Port Melbourne, thanks Tyson and James!
Thursday, January 15, 2009
Keep up with Otesha
A note from out tour directors (in case you get tired of my blogging you can hear from the rest of the group!)
Cheers,
C
Hey there!
The Otesha Victorian Tour Crew (www.otesha.org.au/biketour/victour/) has setup a newsletter that will keep you updated on interesting stories, reflections, and other beautiful things along the road. If you would like to be a part of this list please follow the link below:
http://otesha.org.au/mailman/listinfo/oteshavicnewsletter_otesha.org.au- it's just that easy!
Thanks again for all your support!
With bike grease, fair-trade chocolate, and funny faces,
- The Otesha Victorian Tour
PS - Did you know that we also have a blog online - you should check it out from time to time as we will be uploading pictures and other goodies online as we go! It's at www.otesha.org.au/biketours/victour/blog
Cheers,
C
Hey there!
The Otesha Victorian Tour Crew (www.otesha.org.au/biketour/victour/) has setup a newsletter that will keep you updated on interesting stories, reflections, and other beautiful things along the road. If you would like to be a part of this list please follow the link below:
http://otesha.org.au/mailman/listinfo/oteshavicnewsletter_otesha.org.au- it's just that easy!
Thanks again for all your support!
With bike grease, fair-trade chocolate, and funny faces,
- The Otesha Victorian Tour
PS - Did you know that we also have a blog online - you should check it out from time to time as we will be uploading pictures and other goodies online as we go! It's at www.otesha.org.au/biketours/victour/blog
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
Meeting my bike: Attempt #1
Just a quick note from Day 4 in Australia. Made an unsuccessful attempt at picking up my bike today from the good people at The Freedom Machine in Port Melbourne (a train, a tram and a good hike away from where I'm staying in West Footscray at the moment). My foreign bank cards are not having very much luck, unfortunately, so I've got to figure out how to get them working and get a hold of this bike tomorrow. I did catch a glimpse of it though and it's VERY pretty! She is getting outfitted with all sorts of cool accessories for the trip and will be all set to go when I head back. Port Melbourne is a cool little area of town with a street full of cafes and little shops called Bay Street. I was back and forth from there and CBD Melbourne a couple of times today, so I am getting a feel for the city. Tomorrow, if I'm successful in paying for this bike, I'll try and bike along the ocean home!
View Larger Map
View Larger Map
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
Australia Day 3: I've arrived!
I made it to Melbourne today after the longest travelling day(s) I've ever had. Thankfully there were no issues with flights or baggage or delays of any sort, though I did get "randomly selected" for additional screening both on my way to San Francisco as well as between Sydney and Melbourne for the first time ever. (They admitted it was the bright blue hoodie - they're going to keep an eye out for me on the way back in March!) 3 hours from Edmonton to San Francisco + 6 hours in SFO + 13.5 hours from San Fran to Sydney + 1.5 hours at SYD + 1.5 hours Sydney to Melbourne = a very long trip.
So far, I've noticed the following:
- it's REALLY hot... hotter than I expected, but much less humid than I thought it would be. I may manage to get my first tan ever here! (It is supposed to cool down in the next couple of days, but not before a signal that "summer has arrived" with +39 degrees C tomorrow)
- the cars drive on the other side of the street. I knew this before I got here... but wow, I can't believe how difficult it is to remember and to look the right way while crossing the street. This may be the most dangerous part of the cycling tour - I keep looking the wrong way while cars come at me from behind. It's already hilarious for one of the crew members.
Outside of that, I'm having a pretty low key day, hiding from the sun, eating nectarines off of trees in the backyard where I'm staying, meeting roommates and burning through the rest of the books I brought. I read Jamie Clarke's "Everest to Arabia" on the planes and was inspired for my own adventure with a team of people from different cultures. Working my way through "Greasy Rider" a story of two friends' journey across the US in a used food oil-powered vehicle. I've got Kapuscinski's "Shadow of the Sun" packed to take with me on the bike - if I've recommended this as my number one travelling companion book, I really ought to read it myself on a trip! :)
All in all, things are getting exciting! (Or maybe it's just the heat!)
Cheers,
Candice
PS> If you're interested in reading more travel blogs, a fellow cyclist Lalo Porto was in touch after he heard from the people at Twisted Rider Cycle (the place where I got my solar panels) about my own cycling for sustainability effort. He's riding to promote environmental conciousness and cycling in a loop through the Americas. InfinityCycle.blogspot.com
So far, I've noticed the following:
- it's REALLY hot... hotter than I expected, but much less humid than I thought it would be. I may manage to get my first tan ever here! (It is supposed to cool down in the next couple of days, but not before a signal that "summer has arrived" with +39 degrees C tomorrow)
- the cars drive on the other side of the street. I knew this before I got here... but wow, I can't believe how difficult it is to remember and to look the right way while crossing the street. This may be the most dangerous part of the cycling tour - I keep looking the wrong way while cars come at me from behind. It's already hilarious for one of the crew members.
Outside of that, I'm having a pretty low key day, hiding from the sun, eating nectarines off of trees in the backyard where I'm staying, meeting roommates and burning through the rest of the books I brought. I read Jamie Clarke's "Everest to Arabia" on the planes and was inspired for my own adventure with a team of people from different cultures. Working my way through "Greasy Rider" a story of two friends' journey across the US in a used food oil-powered vehicle. I've got Kapuscinski's "Shadow of the Sun" packed to take with me on the bike - if I've recommended this as my number one travelling companion book, I really ought to read it myself on a trip! :)
All in all, things are getting exciting! (Or maybe it's just the heat!)
Cheers,
Candice
PS> If you're interested in reading more travel blogs, a fellow cyclist Lalo Porto was in touch after he heard from the people at Twisted Rider Cycle (the place where I got my solar panels) about my own cycling for sustainability effort. He's riding to promote environmental conciousness and cycling in a loop through the Americas. InfinityCycle.blogspot.com
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