I had decided to go to Kurnell today as part of my training for Cycle Queensland 2009. But I sill did the Saturday Morning Slowies ride with the DHBC. But unlike last week, where I pushed myself to 4 laps for the first time, I did only 1 1/2 and stopped for a coffee. I had entered the coffee shop the other times from a different direction and had not seen the fountain. One of the other riders brought a unicycle. It has quite a large wheel, but it is like a fixie. Only one speed. Though he said that there are people who make them with hub gears. He uses the unicycle to play unicycle hockey.
After coffee and sweet corn frahitas, at the Marrickville Road Cafe, I headed out to Kurnell and the Kamay Botany Bay National Park. The sprinkling of rain we had in Centennial Park turned into proper rain by the time I reach La Perouse. There was also a strong on shore wind. I headed over the Georges River, and then further than I have been before. The track was well signposted with quite a few sections off road, including a nice section through a mangrove swamp. The only issue was with one sign that had been rotated trough 90 degrees. But a quick look and it was obvious which way to go. Riding along Captain Cook Drive, I made a few stops to check out the easy access sections of Towra Point Nature Reserve. But the migratory birds appear to have not arrived yet. I will go back after October when they should have arrived from Siberia and Alaska.
I had a good lunch in Kurnell at a little cafe there. I had a chicken and salad wrap, iced coffee and a fruit flan. Strangely it seems to be absent from the internet. It is at the east end of Prince Charles Parade, and I’d definitely recommend it. Even though they have a fairly limited choice of eats. I headed along a walkway/cycle track into the national park from immediately opposite the cafe on the beach. This is much better for riding than the road entrance. Along there are some of important historical landmarks, including the place where Captain Cook’s crew first set foot in Botany Bay. I stopped at the visitor information centre and picked up some sun screen as the clouds and rain had cleared and the skies were blue. The display was of a high quality. I will have to go back another time and spend more time reading the long text descriptions on some of the displays.
I headed up to the Cape Solander Whale watching platform. On the way I stopped at the Yena Gap. This is the first time I have taken the trike on a dirt road. All went well, though I had a bit of wheel spin on the road back up. You get views of the city, though they did not work on the iphone camera.
At Cape Solander, which is a bit of a climb, I reached the Whale Watching Platform. But at the moment there are no whales to watch. I guess this place may become crowded when there are whales to watch.
I returned to Kurnell via the path I had taken and had a ice cream at the cafe. I headed down banks drive to get back into the national park. I will have to go back there with my proper camera to get some good shots of the oil refinery. Banks Drive is terrible for the trike. It has the horrible speed traps and they are every 50 meters or so. There must be more than 15. I scraped the steering on the worst, but did not seem to damage it. I will not be riding down there again in a hurry!
I then returned the way I came. The wind was behind me now for a little while, but as I came up the western border of Botany Bay it began to swing to the north. I stopped at the cafe in Brighton-Le-Sands on the beach front there. By the time I had finished my drink the wind had swung around to a hot howling gale from the west. On several occasions, riding into it I had to close my eyes as I was sandblasted by the wind. I did a little detour via the International Airport path to see where that went before returning home. All in all, according to the GPS I did 109 km. According to the speedo on the trike I did about 112.
A man speaks of an order of basil.
Man: oh dear, here we go again…
Man: that’s what you sent, useless information.
Man: is that what dqos is for?
Man: because that’s what he thought, we said, we can’t let it go further. Woman: you stuffed up this!
Man: why did you say that’s what he meant?
Man: because he police did this, they thought he was the informer.
Woman: the penthouse did
Girl: how did they know that? Woman: he asked them.
Correct man: we know he doesn’t like catching taxies.
Man: we don’t believe that they said it’s because we had the potential
Man: that’s what we know: he didn’t know any thing!
Man: he thinks that they are neurotics.
Man: the fucking headmasters still did!
Girl: we can’t believe that they thought we meant that!
Woman: then explain the Rasputin bit.
Woman: the bastards filtered that!
Many correct people say: he didn’t even know the exploding pop corn myth!