Spring Days

On Friday we rode out to the “wilderness zone” of the Narooma mountain bike trails. The parking area was hopping, with vehicles in and out doing the ubiquitous (and never not annoying) shuttling, but, once on the trails, I saw one rider on the way to the wilderness zone and no-one else (excluding the shuttle driver) until I got back to the trail head. You never need to go far and the distance you need to go is decreasing exponentially!

Saturday we arrived at Bittangabee Bay just as a group of kayakers were leaving for Green Cape. Doug and I helped Stu – who was roving about the country with his kayak – carry his kayak down to the beach before we made breakfast and then carried our own gear down. NSW National Parks has renovated the campground, and, while it is very nice, the carry to Bittangabee Bay to launch a kayak is 250 metres each way, so Doug and I walked 1.5 kilometres shuttling kayaks! That’s a good loaded carry work-out.

We paddled down to Green Cape in good conditions with a north to south running current and, a couple of kilometres from Green Cape met the other group returning. Harry had headed off to Merrica River while Doug and I continued around Green Cape and paddled along the cliffs on the south side of Green Cape before coming back and paddling home into the current. Our pace was almost a kilometre slower where the current was strongest. I headed down bouldering in the afternoon.

On drizzly mornings, it’s easy to think that a second cup of tea is a better idea then putting your wet gear on and heading down to the beach, but, luckily, we took the second option. Ten paddlers went to Saltwater Bay where there was a really nasty shore dump on a steep beach. With good timing, the landing was a doddle but with a group of ten and deep water immediately off the beach, someone would swim!

Doug, Stu and I paddled up to Mowarry and landed for about five minutes before paddling back. We saw Humpback Whales, Southern Right Whales, dolphins and a ton of seals on the steep, little island near Mowarry Bay.

An unexpected trip to Canberra appeared on Thursday, and, in order to make the drive more tolerable, we took our mountain bikes and rode Mount Majura on Thursday and Mount Stromlo on Friday. The trails at Mount Majura run through planted pine forest where the smell of pines in the sun reminded us of pine forests in Canada in summer. There are pines around Mount Stromlo as well but the real lure of Stromlo is the plethora of trails and views from the top of Mount Stromlo.