Day 6 Lilydale to Deloraine

Date: 11/JAN/2010

Route:Lilydale - Launceston - Perth - Westbury - Deloraine

Distance: 106km

Accident: 0

Puncture: 0

Weather: Fine

Accommodation: Deloraine Caravan Park ($10 / Unpowered)

Today's ride can divided into two parts. From Lilydale to Launceston, and Launceston to Deloraine.

The first half's trend was downhill as Lilydale was on the hillside and Lanceston was almost on the sea level. Easy cruising to Launceston. Civilization! Yes, Launceston is the second largest town in Tasmania. Where civilization where good eateries are. I sat in a cafe in a strip in the town centre and ordered its big breakfast. That was spot on! It came with 2 pieces of thick toast, few slices of well cooked bacon, few pieces of sausages, a well sauteed fresh sliced thick tomato and 2 lightly poached eggs. The sauce was hollander. Just right, mate. Having had eaten only cold food for the past day, this breakfast with a cup of latte was real luxurious moment.

Princess Square - Launceston

After breakfast, I wondered around the town briefly. There were some well maintained Victorian style grass gardens with in the city like Princess Square. There was interesting botanical garden as well. I found the town was quite artistic and made it very pretty. I wanted to check out the wine in this region as well, but unfortunately, the time didn't allow me to do it. So after the brief tour of Launceston, I left this town behind. (I will come back next time!)

Well, back to ride. The second half was pretty flat ish rather boring road as I did rode on very busy and not scenic highway by accident.

On the way I did a bit of detour as I found a interesting town in the south of Launceston. The name of the town was Perth. That where I came from. It was small heritage town. I had a chance to talk to a residence of Perth to ask about the connection or relationship between Perth in WA and Perth in TAS. There was none. None at all. It is always interesting to do a detour.

Welcome back to Perth? - Perth

Anyway, from Perth, I was riding toward west. I was riding on the busy highway (HW1) not knowing there was a nice and quiet side road (B54) just next to the highway. Although there was enough space to ride on the road as there was a reasonably wide shoulder on aside, riding next to bullet-speed trucks and road trains was not very present. The terrain was fairly flat so I was just riding and thinking something else in order to make time pass.

I finally realised the existence of the side road when I got to Westbury which was 16km before today's destination.

I stopped at Westbury for the last break for the today's ride. There was a bakery called Andy's Bakery. I had a pie there. It was very good.

During the break. I had a chat with a man who was the principal of a primary school in Tassie. After telling about my trip, we had a short but good conversation about the issue of the private education in Australia. It needs to be changed, it needs a decent quality control to the education and to the system itself. That was our conclusion. (Anyway, it is a bit out of the track from the topic of this blog so I will write about this issue on my blog when I have time.)

Looks like Window's default background - Between Westbury and Deloraine

Back to the saddle, from Westbury to today's goal, Deloraine was flat short ride. I made it to Deloraine at 3.00pm.

Some sort of art? - Entrance of Deloraine

Deloraine is a pretty riverside town with the population of 5,000. Along the main strip there were quiet boutique restaurants and cafes. I really liked this town because this nice cafe feeling with beautiful river, which was swimmable, and the town had a full of bits and pieces of arts everywhere in town. The people seemed very friendly (very used to looking after tourists in a good way) as well.

Beautiful Swimmable River (view from my tent) - Deloraine

I pitched my tent in the caravan park, which was right next to the river. Of course I swam in the river as it was particularly hot day for Tasmaia (probably over 30 c). I met another cycle tourist at this camp site. His name was Mikko from Philippines. He just arrived in Tasmania from Melbourne by ship, Spirit of Tasmania and rode to Deloraine (49km). We had dinner at on the main street's snack bar, then, bought some beer (Boag's Draft, Launceston's Premium Beer) at the bottle shop, walked back to the campsite and had a small party right front of the river with many ducks.

It was a good night. Everything was just right.

Today's Route

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Day 5 Port St Helens to Lilydale

Date: 10/JAN/2010

Route:St Helens - Derby - Scottsdale - Lilydale

Distance: 145km

Accident: 0

Puncture: 0

Weather: Cloudy then fine

Accommodation: Lilydale Falls Reserve (Free / Toilets and Water Falls)

This morning I was up at 5.3oish and had a slow breakfast as there was a TV in the campers' kitchen and it was showing 80's pop music.

As soon as I left St Helens many hills were waiting for me from moderate hills, normal hills, extremely steep hills, short hills to long hills. So today was the day of hills, I would say. Therefore It was a challenging terrain but the scenery was amazing as well.

Feeling like the Jurassic Period - Weldborough Pass Rainforest Walk


Like snow - Near Derby


Fish in the wood - Derby

In Derby I met a group of cycle tourists. They are from Germany, France and Australia. One of the guys were travelling with $175 bike from K-mart so the peddles and seat post was already bent with this rolling hills. That was legend, mate.

That was the major event of today. Otherwise I was riding, riding and riding for whole day from 7.00am to 5.30pm as I wanted to go as further as possible.

The campsite didn't have a shower so I took a natural shower under a fall. I felt like very wild today. Like the Man vs Wild. :)

You have to do this to survive - Lilydale Falls

All good but very tired today. My legs need good rest tonight. Good night.

Tea Time

Today's Route

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Day 4 Bicheno to St Helens

Date: 09/JAN/2010

Route:Bicheno - St Helens - Binalong Bay - Bay of Fires - St Helens

Distance: 116.90km

Accident: 0

Puncture: 0

Weather: Fine then cloudy and windy

Accommodation:BIG4 St Helens Caravan Park ($33 / Unpowered Site)

Started the day with the farewell for James, today's goal was Tassie's most visited natural attraction Bay of Fires where Tasmania's best beaches are. The ride was smooth as I got a reasonable tail wind for the first 30 to 40km. Terrain was basically flat with oceanic and forestry views. There was hardly no traffic!

Ragged Mountain - A3 HWY

I arrived at today's bed, St Helens at 11.30am. This caravan park, BIG3 was extremely expensive ($33/ Camp Site). Well, its a well facilitatd caravan park with new kitchen, clean bathroom and plenty of kids playing ground but I thought they are too profit oriented. It's not my taste, I like more wild places.

St Helens

Anyway, thinking this sort of thing I piched the tent, left all the heavy stuff in the tent, I went to check out the best beaches in Tassie. Bay of Fires was about 12km north east of St Helens. The beachs were massive and beautiful, but I realised one thing. Although there are beautiful beaches and a quiet a few number of tourists here but why no one is swimming in the beach?

I was expecting to swim here so jumped in the beach. I immediately realised why people don't swim there. The water was FREEEEEEEEZING. Couldn't hardly stay in the water for few minutes.

Its a not swimming place, nice viewing beaches.

Beautiful Sandy Beach - Bay of Fires


Like some resort island - Binalong Bay

Then, I went back to St Helens, did shopping, had some snack, and now I am writing this diary.

Another day was over, it seems to be going to be a hard day tomorrow with a lot of climbing so I will do a lot of stretching tonight and go to bed early enough. Good night.

Today's Route

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