Piggies Day Out

CWCT Day 6: Goonoo Forest

Out in Feral Pig Land this must be the time of year when little pigs go out alone to find their fortune. Five times, as I rode through the Goonoo Forest, I came upon a little pig wandering along doing little piggy things and thinking little piggy thoughts, only to be scared out of their pyjamas by the sudden appearance of a monster with wheels instead of legs. That's the advantage of a bicycle: you can sneak up on little pigs in the wilderness and frighten them. Mind you they were incredibly hard to photograph what with having run away by the time I stopped the bicycle, got out my phone, and readied the camera which is why I'm inordinately proud of this piggy ambush footage.

Piggy

I amused myself by chasing down a feral goat on my bicycle. Uphill. Over rocks. It was hard work! Sadly, the only animals I saw in the Goonoo forest were feral. I had all my senses tuned for a sighting of a Mallee Fowl but no such luck. The forest was hot and dry, showing scars of fires past, and any sensible Mallee fowl were tucked up in the shade well away from me.

I got the pleasure of riding through the Goonoo Forest because I had a working phone and could presumably navigate myself out of being lost should I become so, whilst Roger was still suffering from digital disconnection. The Goonoo Forest was labelled as 'adventure' cycling on the CWCT notes, which translated to 'really really rough' in the real world. But fun, too.

For once I paid attention to NavDecs and a good thing I did too because some of them had changed on the fly.

I debated going the closed way anyway given it was closed for aerial 1080 baiting and the chances of a 1080 bait actually landing on my head were pretty much nil. I was however deterred by the thought of the fine such bad behaviour could incur since ignorance would be no excuse: both the sign and the CWCT facebook page were unanimous that cyclists should detour. So being a good little cyclist, I detoured. Which led to more walking up and down steep rocky hills, proving why the CWCT avoided this route in the first place.

Finally I popped out onto Goan Rd. 'Fantastic!" thought I. "The hard bit is over."

Along Goan Rd the grids were festooned with signs warning me not to stray from the public road lest the multitude of cameras hidden in the trees should bear testament to my trespassing. Someone obviously felt quite insecure about having sinister cyclists directed through their property. I didn't have time to get up to sinister cyclist things because Goan road made me work with every inch of up and down: corrugations; sand; sand with railway ballast; deep gravel that acted like sand; potholes; ruts where trucks had once been stuck in the mud; and all sorts of combinations of the above conspired to keep me out of mischief.

I took photos to distract myself from all the hard work I was doing.

As a side note, I must say I was terribly disappointed by the lack of creativity shown by the rural mailboxes along the CWCT: everyone must have just turned up to the same sale at Bunnings and conspired to get the most boring mailboxes imaginable.

Solid C+. Pass mark just for not being from Bunnings; extra point for the slap of paint.

2km out of Ballimore I was finally rewarded with bitumen and a downhill run into town. There was no rest for the worn-out cyclist however; I popped the bike on the car and off I went to collect Roger who lolled in comfort at the Wongarbon Tavern, savouring a beer after a gentle tootle along paved roads with the wind in his favour, lambs gamboling in green fields, birds warbling in the trees, and nary a pothole in sight.

We settled in for the night in the free camp in Ballimore, just across the road from the Hair Of The Dog Pub where we had hot showers for the price of a pub meal. The showers were gratifying hot, the food was very good, and as a bonus there was an extensive swapping library where I could replenish my book stash. The Hair of The Dog was quite the place to be on a Friday night and we went to bed fully prepared for a late night listening to whatever was chosen on the juke box in the pub.

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Today's ride: 36 km (22 miles)
Total: 172 km (107 miles)

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