travellingbennetts

“Humble Pie Luncheon”, the story of our numerous “reconnoitre” rides through D’Aguilar National Park and the ill-fated thrust into the dark forests of Conondale National Park, is a lesson in the mismatch that can slowly develop between perceived riding adequacy and harsh skill reality over time.
So, the only way forward was to expunge any memory of the sequences of stupidity that caused issues, pretend we’d never heard of Conondale National Park, and allow Garmin to run free. Cindy had a day off, I had a day off, so mid-week was a good opportunity to re-boot and get back out there while pretending we’d never been out there to start with.
A bog-standard SE QLD route was planned via Samford, Dayboro, and Woodford. The excellent Flying Nun Café in Samford was the coffee stop with a fortifying banana bread embedded with pistachios, before moving onto the Mt Mee twisties after Dayboro. Pumping through in a superb technical display of cornering wasn’t allowed by the road works crew, it was a slow putt down the winding bits into Woodford. A quick relief stop at Woodford and the ride became serious. Or did when we’d bypassed Kilcoy and headed north on the fantastic winding bitumen Kilcoy-Murgon road to Jimna, before the cut across east through the Conondale National Park on Sunday Creek Road.
The reading is from the Book of Garmin, chapter 3, verse 14; And yea verily, the faithful travellers with 50:50 on road:off-road tyres did enter the Dark Forests of Conondale, and Garmin did tempt the travellers, hinting that tracks severely overgrown were the real route to sunlit uplands and the Kenilworth Cheese Shop, but the faithful stayed on actual roads and were not led unto the Valley of Death by Garmin.
The road quality on Sunday Creek Road was not terribly concerning to begin with, even with the usual disclaimer road sign of narrow, winding, and dry weather use only. Recent rains hadn’t dried out completely though, remnant puddles and patches of mud with a suspicious tinge that in certain light could be red soon had the post-January crash stress levels peaking. We passed the Sunday Creek Environmental Camp and waved skilfully while up on the pegs to the school children who obviously found us far more interesting than their studies, no T-Rex living in the Conondale National Park kids, you’ll have to make do with learning about fungus.

Then suddenly a sign appeared proclaiming a traffic hazard, which we assumed correctly as it turned out, was the thick layer of rutted and slippery-looking mud disappearing out of view down a very steep hill. Learning from the January crashing experience, but not doing anything sensible like turning around, we sat down on the bikes and paddled them slowly down in the ruts, which actually worked well and no “offs” were recorded, although the mirror polish on the boots was destroyed by the mud. A severe case of dry “terror” mouth required a stop at the bottom of the hill to optimise clothing and re-hydrate, before heading off again.

The route continued as a highly variable surface, with muddy and slightly slippery bits interspersed with reasonable gravel, but the scenery made it far more pleasant with thick bush and tall straight trees. We had once been warned about riding Sunday Creek Road on a weekend due to the 4WD traffic, and the narrow and muddy sections would have been very unpleasant to meet something coming the other way, but as it was a Wednesday we had the entire Conondale National Park and the swarms of T-Rexes to ourselves.
Here is a link to a Sunday Creek Road video produced, directed, narrated, and cameoed in by Cindy, starring Duncan, which will hopefully give a flavour of our riding on the day and the waffling I tend to do about riding techniques I’ve just made up to calm myself in situations that make me a bit nervous:

Sunday Muddy Sunday

After about 10km we noted the opposite end traffic hazard sign with a collective yet tentative sigh of relief from the riding crowd, surely that meant the muddy and slippery-ish bits were finished. Soon after, we saw the opposite end National Park sign, which meant that we had finally ridden through the heart of the beast without causing laundry issues. A ride through the Charlie Moreland Camping Ground, and a small wave from a lady in an RV perfectly captured the euphoria felt by everyone witnessing our triumphant appearance from the primordial gloom of the Conondale forests.

To celebrate, we headed into Kenilworth and stopped at the bakery, famous for its 1kg donut which if finished, earns the victor a plate on the wall with their name, a comment, and the time taken to finish the job. And immediate cancellation of their health and life insurance policies. The slowest time we saw was over 4 hours, the shortest at about 26 minutes, by a late-stage Elvis impersonator.

We had one final dirt ride after our lunch which was a pie, in normal circumstances causing some guilt, but in this case seemingly a health food lunch with only 0.5% of the calorific value of the donut. Up the Obi Obi Road, then onto the lovely gravel of the Kidaman Creek Road and into Maleny, where the GPS was set to “home, and don’t spare the horses”.