3 Weeks to go!

The last 6 weeks since Garry and I finished our pre-tour ride from Adelaide seem to have flown by and now we are finally counting down till the first day of the main tour.

It's been a busy time trying to get everything organised from working out what additional gear was required, getting our new riding kit made, to sorting out all the flights, finalising route details, travel insurance, and the list goes on and on.

Behind the scenes we have also been working on our new website thanks to NewBiz Solutions in Ballarat who have very generously given allot of their time to help develop our ideas and host the new site. we have mentioned our new site a few times now, and are very close to officially launching it, it's been a long time coming but we wanted it to be right and believe the final outcome has been worth the wait.

As with much of the image and graphics I have been working on an official riding kit for the tour, the aim was to create something that would look fantastic while helping us stand out on the road as well as promote our tour, charities and sponsors at the same time, after a range of incarnations the final design was chosen and we have now received the finished product thanks to Champion System Custom Apparel and couldn't be happier with the outcome.

Day 1 of our tour will have us set off from Ballarat Cycle City in the Ballarat CBD on Saturday 21st of April and make our way to Geelong for the night, we have planned for the first day to be a ride day and welcome anyone who would like to join us on the road to come along.

If anyone is interested in coming along we plan to leave at 10am.

Following day 1 we will then spend the next four and a half weeks making our way around the east coast of Australia toward Brisbane promoting our causes along the way before heading of to the USA for leg two at the end of May.

Day 6 - Ararat to Ballarat

We woke to what felt like quite a mild morning, donned the wind vest and The Long Road polo tops and headed off to the Ararat Advertiser to meet one of their reporters and photographers for another interview about the ride, then off to one of the town cafes for breakfast before hitting the highway.

Chinese Heritage Centre in Ararat, not totally sure of the connection with Ararat but an interesting building none the less.

We headed out of Ararat full of excitement knowing that we were heading for home, (We had decide to finish the pre-tour in Ballarat rather than Melbourne as that is the start point for our main tour, so we can carry on from where we left off.) We followed a little bike track we found that followed the side of the highway (A nice change from the road shoulder for a while.) and stumbled across a local lake with a nice view of the surrounding mountains.

Green Hill lake with Langi Ghiran State Park and Mt Buangor in the background.

It didn't take long for the heat to start taking hold as we made our way to our lunch stop, the temp just seemed to be getting hotter and hotter as the week went on, but at least the wind had died down.

Old Cob & Co changing station in Buangor that has since been converted with a more modern extension.

Much like the day before we were beginning to feel better on the bikes and were moving along at a much better pace, that was until we came to the climb just outside our lunch destination, Beaufort.


Well we thought Mt Lofty in Adelaide was a tough way to start the ride, but after a week of hills, headwinds and heat this short but steep climb nearly stopped us in our tracks and the complete lack of any road shoulder just made it worse, we were very glad to put it behind us and make it to Beaufort for plenty of cold drinks and two big bowls of pasta before tackling the final stretch of the day.

The view back down the hill, it may not look to long or steep but at the time boy did it hurt.

It had been hard after each stop getting back out into the blistering heat, but we knew we only had one more stint to go and we were all done, we past Lake Burrumbeet on the western outskirts of Ballarat, not so long ago this huge lake was bone dry due to drought, we stopped at the local pub for a couple of ice cold cokes and once again headed out into the sun.

Lake Burrumbeet.

We made it in to Ballarat at around 4:30pm, our fastest day for the trip, as we rolled into town, it was good to get a few calls by friends and see some friendly faces at our finish at Ballarat Cycle City.

Seeing the Ballarat sign at the edge of town was a welcome sight.

Jason and Garry at the finish outside Cycle City in Ballarat after 650km's in 6 days.

Day 5 - Horsham to Ararat

Early-ish start today after a late night of Chinese food and some beers, as we were off to see the local paper (The Wimmera Mail-Times) to get a photo and interview done. We will post the clipping once it gets sent to us.


Breakfast was at Jason's fav pie shop. Apparently they have the best pies in the world. Apparently but that isn't confirmed as yet.


Once we hit the road we expected it to be a typical day of riding although a shorter distance. It didn't take long for it to become interesting. Jason snagged what he thought was a cable laying on the road then realised it was a baby brown snake after it slithered away. That left both of us on edge thinking every piece of cable was a potential snake.

The Grampians National Park between Horsham and Stawell.

Our first stop for the day was at The Giant Koala at Dadswells Bridge. Basically its a massive cement Koala as you can see below. That said lunch wasn't bad. As usual Jason's eyes were to big for his stomach after he ordered what looked to be a 2 foot tall sandwich and a bowl of chips. 

The next leg to Stawell was a challenge. Once back on the road we were out of the shade of the trees and into a very hot sun. At one point Jason's trip computer recorded the temp to be 42 degrees, I could have said it felt like 50. The heat just drained the energy out of you. Once we stopped at Stawell the only thing we could think of was water and something cool, so we headed to the service station then onto McDonalds for a frozen coke. A little rant here..... Personally I wish service station attendants would pay more attention. If I'm dressed in cycling gear, looking like I've just ridden a fair few km's, then the likely hood of me having filled up a car as well as buying a Poweraid, water and Redbull is fairly slim. Funny thing is Jason got the same question in a servo outside Adelaide earlier in the week.

After cooling down and rehydrating it was off to Ararat, our final destination for the day. Unfortunately the heat hadn't died down which made the last 28km's difficult even with a stop at Great Western. We couldn't wait to get to the Acacia Caravan Park in Ararat and their pool. 

In the end we covered 96km's in about 5hr's which was our quickest so far. Not bad even in 40+ degree heat.

Day 4 - Kaniva to Horsham

Today started pretty much like the last three but ended up a little more interesting as the day progressed.


Before we left the motel we were told that there was a steep hill about 20 km's outside Kaniva which made Garry really happy, due to the fact he loves hills so much, so of we headed down the road towards our lunch stop Nhill looking out for this hill, like many of the hills we have gone over, this one looked rather menacing from a distance as we approached, but turned out to not be as bad as first thought although Garry decided it should be renamed Little Mt Lofty.

Garry climbing what he named Little Mount Lofty.

Unlike the last few days the wind had died down quite considerably and we were moving along at a good pace, we made it to Nhill nice and early for lunch where we met a nice elderly gentleman named Frank who sat down with us on a park bench (the Nhill seat of Knowledge the attached plaque said) while we ate our lunch, Frank told us that if there was anything we wanted to know about the town he was the man to ask and informed us he used to run a local bike shop many years ago. Like many of the people we have talked to after arriving back in Victoria Frank was quite interested in what we were doing and very kindly donated $20 dollars to our charities.

Jason and Frank on the seat of Knowledge in Nhill.

 Before leaving Nhill Frank suggested we pay a visit to the Nhill Free Press (the local town paper). Little did we know Paula, out host from the night before in Kaniva had phoned ahead informing them that we were heading their way. We spent a few minutes talking to one of the local reporters and had a few pictures taken for the paper before heading of towards Dimboola,


It was during this section that Garry started complaining about the heat, now Jason had heard many many times from Garry (who lives in Sydney) that it is always cold in Victoria so found the complaining rather amusing.


After a short break in Dimboola, we were approached by a writer from the Dimboola Banner, their local paper, she had seen us in town and was wondering what we were doing so came over to find out more, another interview and photo session later and we were once again on our way to the end of day 4, Horsham

Tomorrow we will be making our way to Ararat but first have another press interview with the Wimmera Mail Times news paper in Horsham.

Go Fundraise - Australian Donation Pages

Garry and I have had a few people ask us about our donation pages and mention they had had problems donating.


We have since tested both the Cure Cancer Australia and Parkinson's NSW pages and found them to be working fine, if anyone else has any further problems please let either Garry or myself know.


On another note we have also removed the old links to PayPal from the donation page as we are no longer using this option for donations.

Day 3 - Tintinara to Kaniva

Day 3 was pretty uneventful. Got up at 7.30am (ish). Left Tintinara at 8.45am, heading into the wind for Keith.

The first 40km's was just hell. The head wind would gust up and almost stop you in your tracks (reported to be 30 kph). Garry almost had a melt down from the 'De-motivator' (what he nick named the head wind) and threatened to catch the train a couple of times. But he got through it. Even Jason yelled at the wind at one stage.

I guess the most interesting thing that happened in the first 40km's was the hunt for strange noises from our bikes. Jasons seat was squeaking a little but the most difficult to find was Garry's rattle. It sounded like something tapping on the spokes but do you think we could find it? In the end it was a strap that was just dangling a little on the back.

We did find out about some bloke who turned a massive amount of unfertile land into fertile land. Kind of interesting.

Lunch was had at Keith where we saw one of our sponsors, SRAM, on their way to the Mountain Bike National Champs in Adelaide.

At lunch Jason bought some oranges but decided that he didnt want both. Interest of wasting it he mounted it to his bike. Garry wasnt sure it would stay on but it did.

The next section from Keith to Bordertown went very smoothly. Another 40 odd km's but nothing really happened. Ummm... we had a break 20km's in. That was about it. Oh hang on. Jason went to the bathroom in a gaol. There you go something did happen.

From Bordertown to Kaniva was a little different. The first 20km's to the border (Yes Bordertown isnt the actual border. Go figure) went well.

But Garry didnt do so well on the next 23km's. He simply ran out of puff and struggled the rest of the way into Kaniva.

The Colonial Gardens Motor Inn was a welcome site. Paul and Paula were fantastic and shouted us a room for the night, and the food at the dinner down the road was great. Chicken schnitzel and chips with cheese on top. Yum.

That's that. Day 4 to come.

Day 2 - Wellington to Tintinara

No hills, but lots of wind, that just about sums up todays ride to Tintinara,

so we were up nice and early this morning, got the panniers packed, posted the previouse days blog and made a few tweeks to the bikes, mainly playing around with the postion of the rear panniers on the racks to see how it effected handeling, then off we headed in search of water and food for the start of the day.

Our first stop of the day came 500 meters in to the ride where we got to the Murray River on the edge of Wellington. after joining the queu we eventualy boarded the ferry and were away on our 200 meter ride across the river.

We were eventually off and riding once again, we had been tossing up between two possible routes for this second leg and in the end decided we would brave the highway, we knew it would be busy and that there were roadworks but it was the most direct route and didn't really feel like tackling more rough dirt roads just yet. Well the first 30km's or so went quire well after we started with the wind in our backs until Tailem Bend and the roadworks turned out to be a blessing in disguise, more often than not the speed limit was down to between 60 to 80 and in some cases even slower, we also found the dirt left of the shoulder was often smoother than the road, giving us a good 5 meters at times from the traffic.

We were more than happy to share the road with trucks and cars at this speed.

But after the first 30km's we began to face strong head winds and if it wasn't in our faces it was blowing us around from the side, add the heat (Jason's bike computer read over 40 degrees at one point.) to this and the rest of the day became pretty tough.

Oh and Garry had his second crash of the tour, this time pulling of an old favourite where he stopped and couldn't get his feet out of the pedals fast enough, sure enough there we was laying on the ground with the bike on top of him, a predicament that was made worse by the extra weight of the load on his bike, unfortunately Jason couldn't get the camera out fast enough for a shot.

One of the interesting traffic safety signs we saw along the way.

The long straight road to Tintinara.

South Australia is the driest state in Australia and we could see why, the roads are open and straight with little to no shelter from the wind and heat, all we could do was keep rolling along and keep the fluids up. 

We eventually made it to Coonalpyn where we simply had to get out of the heat for a while before continuing on, after a good 1/2 hour break we were back on the road and heading for Tintinara.

Garry having a little nap on the lawn at Coonalpyn.

Arriving into Tintinara, our stop for the night.

Garry and Jason would like to thank the local store in Coomandook for their hospitality and donation to our charities during our lunch stop today and also the local motel in Tintinara who generously donated a room to us for the night.

It's an early start tomorrow for our longest leg for the week, 125km's from Tintinara to Kaniva in Victoria.

Day 1 - Adelaide to Wellington

Climb, Climb, Climb. For almost 50km's out of the 102km's we did, we climbed. That was not fun and took us almost half of the 6hrs on the road just to do.

But I should start from the beginning.

8am wake up to get the bikes ready so that we could be on the road by 10am. That almost happened. We only missed our start time by one and a half hours but we were at Rymill Park when we said we would. Just had to fiddle with the bikes a little.

Then off we went.

Seems the day was destined to be eventful.

To begin with Jason got attacked by ants after he stopped on the side of the road and just happened to be standing on the nest. Then half way up Mount Lofty we met some riders from the UK who were on their final day of a Sydney to Adelaide tour, and Garry had a small accident (ran into a barricade on the way up the Adelaide hills) and scratched his pannier bag but didnt come off. Great skill on his part he thinks, mind you he was only doing about 5kph.

Then we climbed and climbed some more.

The hill we had to get to the top of.

On the way up we went through a little town called Hahndorf. A German themed town in the outer hills of Adelaide. This was our first main stop for some lunch, a German sausage sandwich. A nice place but very busy.

Then one of the worst experiances of the day. The dread dirt road. It was our intention to cut a few km's off the days ride. It started off promising and a little fun. A smooth road with a few bumps here and there. Then it got angry and seemed to never end. Bumpy, rocky and sandy. It was like that for almost 10km's if not a little longer.

When we finally hit a bit of tarmac Garry couldnt believe it so he kissed the road. That may have been a bit premature as the wind came up and wanted to stop us dead in our tracks

Finally after 102km's and many trials along the way we got to our first stop, Wellington. A bed, shower and food awaited us.

On to day 2.

The tour begins - Adelaide Launch

It has begun. The official launch of 'The Long Road'. But as normal we don't do things the way everyone else would with say our supporters and close friends having a few drinks and pulling on some party poppers. Oh no. We like to make it difficult on ourselves. Normal service has resumed some would say.

In this case we decided that a short trip from Adelaide to Melbourne, as in 760km's short, would be far more beneficial. I suppose it is considering that there are a number of pieces to 'The Long Road' puzzle that requires testing. Such as our BAUM Cycles Burke and Wills touring bikes with SRAM components (sneaky plug over for now) as well as ourselves. We are so use to riding road bikes that these tourers may take a few KM's to get use to while our legs, heart and backsides will also need to get use to being on the road for 5 or more hours at a time. Theres also camp site setup to run through, communicating with the outside world (thats you) while on the road, and working out the best way to place the 30 odd kilos of equipment we need to carry on the bikes so we don't end up either:

• going over the bars with the first hill we encounter OR
• not being able to keep the front wheel on the ground because we overloaded the rear.
• 
  
• As I said… we make it hard for ourselves.

So whats the G.O?

Starting in Adelaide on the 19th of February at 10am in Rymil Park we will snake our way up the hills and out on the highway. At this stage we may deviate a little with our route depending on the state of the highway and the likelihood of us getting squashed by a truck or blown into the bushes as they fly past.

Before long, 7 days and 760km's later, we should hit Melbourne finishing up at Central Pier in the Docklands.

Along the way we will be stopping into some of the little towns that make up the South Australian and Victorian outback with the plan on seeing some of the support groups as we go. To us a highlight as its these people we want to help.

So there you go.

If you live in Adelaide or Melbourne we would be delighted to see you so come on down and say hello. It would be great to see you all.

Custom Bikes, Part 2 - Burke & Wills.

In early 09 I began playing with the idea of bicycle touring, it was something that I had always thought would be a fantastic way to travel and see the world, but never had the chance to do.

I began looking at what options were out there in terms of bikes, the choices at the time seemed to be either road or mountain bikes adapted for the task but very few that looked like it could handle multiple tasks well from fully loaded road touring to off road touring and single-track.

I had seen people setting up old 700c road bikes with wider knobby tyres or running drop bars on fully ridged 29er mountain bikes and loved the idea of combining the two styles of bike into one, the drop bars allowing more hand positions than a standard flat bar, while also having the option and choice of 700c road tyres or 29” knobbys.

Salsa had not long began making the Fargo which I liked the idea of, sort of an adventure tourer, but I wanted something a little more personal so I began looking at custom builders to create something based around a frame I had designed.

It was then that I thought I would drop in down at Baum in Geelong not really knowing what to expect to look into having something made.

Little did I know this trip would end up with me working at Baum for a while and the touring idea would be put on hold. That is until a discussion with Garry turned into what has become The Long Road Tour.

So... It's been a little while coming, but a little over 3 years since my original idea for having a custom drop-bar 29er made, my new Baum Wills is ready to go, together with Garry’s Baum Burke, complete with a custom "The Long Road" version of Baum's GTB paint scheme, and we couldn’t have asked for a better result.



Over the last few weeks I had been making regular trips down to Geelong to help with the finishing process and final assembly of the bikes. I documented the process with a selection of images bellow.



Masking the frame to work out positioning of the graphics before polishing.

 

Darren polishing the titanium frame before masking.



Weeding out the masks for the frames graphics.



Masking the frame for sandblasting.

Sandblasting finished, graphics covered over for second blast with glass bead.

Detail under the down tube after bead blasting was finished, The Long Road Tour logos.

Frame and parts ready to build.

Building up the Wills down at the Baum workshop.



Garry's frame ready for assembly.

My Custom TLR BAUM Wills Ti drop bar 29er/tourer.



Garry's Custom TLR BAUM Burke Steel drop bar 29er/tourer.



Burke and Wills ready to go, only thing left to do now is attach the Tubus racks and Ortlieb pannier bags.

Bellow is the build specifications list for the two bikes.

FRAME: Baum Burke (steel), Baum Wills (Ti).

FORK: Salsa Fargo V2.

HEADSET: Chris King Nothreadset.

DRIVTRAIN: SRAM X9 2x10, 175mm 42-28 Crankset

11-32 cassette.

BRAKES: SRAM Apex levers, Avid BB7 Road discs.

BOTTOM BRACKET : SRAM.

STEM: Thomson Elite X4 10°.

POST: Thomson Elite.

SEAT: Brooks B17.

BAR: Salsa Woodchipper.

TAPE: Fizik.

PEDALS: Shimano XTR.

RIMS: DT Swiss TK540.

HUBS: Chris King ISO disc front, ISO 150 disc rear.

TYRES: TBD

EXTRAS : King bottle cages, Stainless/Ti

RACKS: Tubus, Duo front, Logo rear.

PANNIERS: Ortlieb, Back roller classic, Front roller classic. 

Additional images can be found on our flickr site:

Jason's Wills, Garry's Burke.

Both Garry and I would like to thank everyone that has helped contribute to the making of our two touring bikes, especially Darren and the team down at Baum Cycles in Geelong and Rob at SRAM Australia for setting us up with a couple of group sets.

The Year Ahead.

2012 is finely here and what a year it’s going to be for us, a year full of adventure and excitement, visiting new countries and experiencing new cultures as we embark on our journey half way around the world, but most importantly doing what we can to help raise awareness and funds for both Parkinson’s Disease and Cancer.

There are now only 3 months to go before we head of on our first leg up the east coast of Australia and our preparations are moving along nicely.

Over the past few weeks we have added two more charities that we will be supporting for our UK/EU leg of our trip, CHILDREN with CANCER UK and PARKINSON'S UK joining Cure Cancer Australia, Parkinson’s NSW, Livestrong and Michael J Fox Foundation for the Australian and US legs respectively.

 

In the next few weeks we will be making way to Adelaide, South Australia to begin our pre-tour ride to Melbourne, Victoria at the end of January.

It is during this time that we will be officially launching The Long Road Tour together with our all new website where you will be able to follow us as we roll down the road, The new site will also include information and online donation pages for all the charities involved throughout our tour.

Our bikes are also now coming together and will be ready to go in the next week or two, stay tuned for the forthcoming post where we will show our Burke and Wills touring bikes in greater detail.