Vanderpants Oz Tour

65kms
1151mtrs climbed
4.5 hours in the saddle

Well then hello everyone. It’s nice to be back again and hittin those trails and feeling alive and adventurous. Especially during the Covid times. There’s been a few strange hiccups that stopped my adventure around Australia e.g 1/100 year bushfires, 1/100 year virus, fractured ankle and the the list kinda goes on – but we make lemonade don’t we? that’s what we do. During my time at home i’ve managed to work a little, help a few people in my life, exercise, socialise, research the Mawson Trail etc etc so it hasn’t been all bad. I’m certainly appreciative of the life I have and respect goes out to all the people who are going through some tougher times.



So the day has finally come – Day 1 DONE and I might say that if today is a small snippet of what’s to come (albeit I had great weather), the Mawson is going to produce some pearlers I think.

I Left home after faffing about and talking too much as I do and headed for gorge road (the start)

I was so excited to see this – it meant IT HAD BEGUN. I was aware of the huge hills at the beginning but I wasn’t prepared for how much i’ll be walking hahaha. I would say that from the start, I walked half the way from Gorge rd to Lobethal – lots of ‘kick you right in the dick’ type of loose gravel inclines. and lots of them between 15-20%.

I’m super happy I have the GPX file on my garmin, offline map plus paper maps. I do love reading the paper maps at night and looking at all the options – i’m still a paper maps kinda guy but love the navigation – it allows me to take the views in more and casually glance down to see i’m going the right way and plan the follwing day at night with the paper ones.

i can do 15%’ers on hard surfaces but anything more than that on loose and off I go and boy did my calves and achilles feel like they were about to snap off.

The ups and downs although tough, rewarded me with stellar views already so early on in the show. The minute I hit the trail I was welcomed by kookaburras, kangaroos, blue sky, blue tounge lizards and a beautiful trail in front of me. Honestly, who knew this awesome stuff was RIGHT ON OUR BACK DOORSTEP!!

I am a ‘start slow the first few days’ kind of guy so here I am in Birdwood living it up until I get more remote and campy – but I am doing it tough…see below….I don’t know which side i’m going to sleep on – some days are just rough as guts with decisions like these.

From Gorge Road (first right after corkscrew) begins the trail and from there to Birdwood you are pretty much all off road and treated with delightful views (and painful climbs) and I really enjoyed it…..mostly haha. I read that the worst climbs are done so that’s good – the only thing I really have to watch out for is rain as a lot of trail becomes unrideable to i’ll keep an eye on that. Oh, and also water hahah although it was only like 26ish today – that heat creeps up on you but I have marked on my route where I think I need to stock up more than normal for the more remote stretches so stay tuned.

side note – I have the whole Mawson Trail on RideWithGPS app and with all my research I have added a lot of POI’s from other blogs and my own maps e.g water, places to camp, good food etc etc so if anyone wants it – sing out and i’ll share it with you – it’s REALLY handy to pre research the ride with everything possible and mark the POI’s Point of Interests) and therefore allows me to be flexible depending on weather, body, attractions etc.

From a tourer’s perspective and weight – I would say I sit in the middle – i’m definitely not a burner with minimal everything to rip through the trail in 5-7 days and no cooking or camping gear. That is totally fine and yoou would cover a lot of ground and still really enjoy it but i’m a bit more slow going than that – i love to leave a lot of room for taking piccies, sight seeing, talking shit (to myself and others haha) etc etc. I’m also not overweight with gear either – for me – i’m just right. The one lesson I learned is listen to everyone, follow noone. Pack your gear how you think you like it, get on that road, adjust as you go along – don’t overthink it – This time I took about 6 days worth of Dinners which I dehydrated myself and also 6 breakfasts which is rare. I generally just grab and go especially when I was riding the Tour Artearoa in NZ. So I am a tad heavier but thanks to dehydration, it’s 1/4 of what it was :-). Pics to come soon when I actually camp – but tonight….HELLLLllllo HOTEL :-). I earned it didn’t I?

I was able to shed some weight by not taking my ipad and keyboard but I did purchase an apple keyboard and am using that to blog with right now on my phone. The keyboard weighs like 220 grams v’s 1kg (ipad and heavy keyboard) and the battery lasts 2 months. What I sacrifice is using my phone (critical device) for blogging when i’m remote but lets see how that goes.

So I booked a place in Birdwood and spoke to the guy a few hours earlier and as I was approaching Birdwood, from a car I hear “Adrian….hi there”.

It was the manager hahaha – he followed me to the place and showed me around and we had a good chat. Was a nice welcoming to the end of the day – until tomorrow peeps….time for a feed OMG i’m going to eat a whole smorgasboard 🙂

Final Checks Before Departure