Bike Rides: Day 3/4 Queenscliff to Geelong

Wednesday 21st & Thursday 22nd March 2012

Bingo.
My home for the start of Day 3.

There was really only supposed to be a day three, and never a day four, but the weather forecast wasn't looking good and it proved to be on the money - for the first five hours of Wednesday the dark clouds circled in, the heavens opened and the pretty sun basked seaside town of Sorrento was suddenly a shadowy and eerie semblance of its former glory. Alison had kindly proposed a contingency plan for the rain, and it involved me staying an extra day if required. 

I know what you're thinking 'tough break', and not surprisingly there were no complaints on my side. And it all fell nicely into place when the helpful staff at the Sorrento Beach House even rearranged the guest roster so I could keep the same room for another night. Since it looked like I had 'Buckleys chance' of getting on the saddle today, the coffee shop hangout I found of the same name seemed an apt place to see me up to lunch. It had the three most important things needed on a morning like this; friendly owners, great coffee and Free WiFi.

Sorrento YHA - now a recruiting
 home for lost souls.

I did have one interesting conversation over breakfast that morning, in what I could only describe as a uniquely hostel experience. The previous evening I had chatted happily to fellow guests in the lounge whilst we shared our day tripping stories.  When a middle aged kiwi lady joined me for a cup of tea, I presumed she was one of the guests from the night before. After a little probing, she eventually told me she was a teacher, and that she 'taught people how to live deliberately.'  Bizarrely, I had visions of Will Smith in Hitch advising his love-lost pupils to 'live every day as if you mean it.'  Unfortunately she was neither as funny as the Fresh Prince, nor could she teach me how to hook up with Eva Mendes. Instead it took me a further five minutes to realise she wasn't even staying at the hostel, but was obviously using it as a recruitment centre for her strange US cult group, Avatar, hoping to pick up lost vulnerable souls. It took her a further five minutes to whip out her propaganda pamphlet and business card. It took me no more than thirty seconds more to get the hell out of there. Freaky.

The Ocean back beaches.

By day three and a half, the weather had
cleared, and beach time beckoned.

By the middle of the afternoon, the sun was breaking out, the wind had relented, and it was time to get back in the saddle. Ocean beaches are often called Back beaches in Melbourne to differentiate them from the calmer, family friendly shores on Port Phillip Bay. The landscape is markedly different with windswept, wild surf crashing noisily into the cliffs rising above. There are rock pools to explore, great vantage points to find, and bays to claim as your own. Sorrento Back Beach has all of the above and much more, as long winding coastal paths head off in both directions. As inviting as they were, after a climb up to Coppins Lookout, I then chose a  more sedate option, settling in catch up on a few chapters of my book. For two blissful hours it was just me, the gulls, and the ocean.

After a quiet night chatting with a French backpacker and a carpenter from Ballarat over an open fire, I started early on day four and was boarding the Queenscliff ferry by seven am. This proved to be the perfect time to sail, with only a handful of fellow passengers and the sun rising over the bay during the course of the forty minute crossing. My forty kilometers bike ride to Geelong today would almost exclusively be along the Bellarine Rail Trail which follows the route of the former South Geelong Railway. It's a dream bike path with only two busy roads to cross along its entire route, gentle hills, and passing scenery of coastline, saltwater reserves, farmland and country villages. I was joined for the middle ten kilometres by a fellow trail rider called Alan. He was a seventy three year old keen cyclist who did this return journey of seventy kilometres or so, a couple of times a week just to keep fit. And boy did he look fit, which made me make a mental route of making these longer excursions more than just an annual pilgrimage.  

By lunchtime, I had reached my final destination, South Geelong train station with weary legs. What a fantastic few days it had been, it started with a train ride, a map, a bike, glorious sunshine and one hundred and fifty kilometres to explore. There had been a few mishaps along the way (the unplanned hill climb to Arthurs Seat, the mad woman, the unscheduled storms and extra night stopover) but they had all added to the adventure. And yes, the legs were a little sore, but that won't stop me booking in for next year....