April 11, 2024
Finally the coast after 1000 kilometres
Jinung Beigelup hut to Denmark
Pete and I strategically slept in hoping that Ralph had packed up early and left. As it turned out we should have stayed in our tents for 15 minutes longer but at least there were no more rants. Having said a few days ago that we needed a few more ‘crazy shit’ people encounters to make the blog interesting, I didn’t mean ‘CRAZY SHIT’.
Today was our penultimate days riding and the day we finally hit the coast proper. Ah ‘penultimate’. One of my top 3 favourite words along with ‘petrichor’ and ‘Tsundonku’. Petrichor is that unique smell after a summer thunderstorm and Tsundonku is a Japanese word that has no direct translation in English but means the act of buying new books with the intention of reading them but never getting around to it. I might have to revise my top three as ‘Pea gravel’ is making a strong late bid for inclusion.
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The first 10 kilometre of our ride today could not have been in starker contrast to yesterdays start. After a roll downhill on a single track through the forest it was a smooth pea gravel road and then tarmac to Ducketts Mill, a winery and cheese factory with an award winning cafe and the chance for a proper cappuccino. Second breakfast was sensational, but their 6 month old cappuccino machine had broken down earlier in the morning so the best I could do was a barista made English Breakfast tea.
With more tarmac and a mostly downhill run we caught our first glimpse of the Southern Ocean not long after. A sandy corrugated Firetrail eventually led us onto the highway and our first encounter with real traffic for the entire trip. I even had to put my helmet on. There was a lot of tourist traffic as we were near Elephant Rocks and Greens Pool, all linked with a walkway teaming with families on vacation.
The final part of our ride was on single track hugging the coastline and past the 2 community owned wind towers that supply 56% of Denmarks domestic demands saving 6000 tonnes of CO2 entering the atmosphere annually.
It was spectacular riding with many short sharp pinches with views around every corner. Around one corner I had a view of a tiger snake but it clearly didn’t like the look of me and slithered away. Eventually we followed a cycle path along the Wilson inlet into Denmark. I feel like I’ve been here before, sort of like Deja vu all over again.
Denmark has got a nice feel to it further enhanced by our visit to a dairy that not only had malt but made an exceptional chocolate milkshake, best of the trip so far. Unsurprisingly the shop is owned by a local dairy farm and the milk is brought in daily.
There’s no more camping left for us now as we’ve booked into the local hotel so we can have a shower that we so desperately need. We even manage to get some washing done because, and this may surprise you, our clothes are filthy. The nice people at the Denmark Hotel gave us $50 to the cause.
Today's ride: 54 km (34 miles)
Total: 1,070 km (664 miles)
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6 months ago