I was excited to have a reason to drag myself out of the tent at dawn. It turned out to be worth getting up just to see the sun rise on the rock – the best light I saw all week.

I drove into Horsham to breakfast and get supplies for the day. I was horrified to discover that the first two bakeries I went to weren’t even open at seven o’clock! What kind of country is this? I had to resort to a chain bakery, as such my subsistence for the day was bread-heavy with little in the way of tasty fillings or toppings.

It took about an hour to get to the parking lot at Reed Lookout in Grampians National Park. On the slow, narrow windy road (by Australian standards, not so much NZ) the bush thickened as I left the plains and climbed. Up a hill! A very large deer leapt from nowhere and thoroughly put the wind up me as I avoided narrowly, through no emergency action on my part, the biggest scare I’ve had on the road in a long time. The day continued to brighten as forecast, but I was beginning to notice a bank of cloud behind the approaching ridge – where I was going.

Megan had provided inspiration for this ride, noticing that some of her friends had been on a gravel ride the weekend before. Before departing NZ I managed to contact the organiser of DirtyRat16 and get the GPS file and useful trail beta. Unfortunately Megan couldn’t source a suitable bike (there was little interest in the hardtail I’d seen seemingly abandoned on the edge of the Arapiles Big Sky Trail), so it was left to me selflessly to go and have a big day in the saddle, exploring solitarily.

I’d chosen a different start point of the DirtyRat16 loop to cut down on the driving. This was Reed Lookout, the parking lot was strangely busy with tourists at eight-ish in the morning. There wasn’t much to see however, as the entire valley was filled with cloud.

Nothing to see hear folks, move along.

But that was where I was going, so I set off climbing a little more on the road before turning off onto a dirt road. It wasn’t long before I came across a road-closure sign, which reminded me that the park had had an awful lot of rain recently and there was much related damage. I figured as the event had run this route ten days previously, I’d be OK. The gravel dumped me down to the valley floor, very quickly losing four hundred metres of elevation. At speed, under the cloud it was very chilly – but I knew the cloud would burn off eventually, so enjoyed the freshness while it lasted.

The road widened for a while before I turned off.

Onto another closed track, which narrowed, I startled many a kangaroo. They, sensibly, all bounded off away from me.

I’d been warned that the roughed-up Henham Trail had nearly finished off a few of the riders on the event – but suspected that was because they did it near the end of a big day. As it was, it was all rideable bar ten or twenty metres. There was signs of storm damage, particularly at the many creek crossing – but they were all negotiable.

The roughest bit of the day & the only bit I ended up walking. There’s a bit of a climb there and the surface deteriorates half way up.

Some of the creek crossing were fun to try and get across without dabbing. I soaked a foot in an earlier, deep, one – but as the cloud burned off this didn’t bother me.

The hills that had been in the distance, steadily got closer.

The nineteen kilometre track took me to the furtherest extremity of my loop, but only just over a third of the distance – the return took me west to the other side of the valley. I turned on to a road and it was much faster. I took to riding on the right side of the road to take advantage of the shade – and sometimes I like to pretend I’m in a country that drives on the right.

Easy gravel road riding. Smooth, wide – & red!

The route turned off the road to another 4WD track, to thread between two hills over a slight saddle. To no one’s surprise it was closed, but easily passable on a bike.

Just another sign to ride around.

I stopped for lunch where there was half a view, and finally decided it was warm enough to remove my gilet; sleeves stayed on as they are good sun protection and it still wasn’t hot. Perfect.

The road north up the western side of the valley was also fast & easy going. I hadn’t seen anyone since that sole car early on. I was having a blast, but thought it might be more fun with some company to remark at various animals, trees and other sights. Maybe they’d have been able to educate me on the types of eucalyptus trees I was seeing – they all look very similar to me and I saw thousands of them. The washboard surface of the road became a little tiresome, but that’s a very minor complaint in the scheme of how good a time I was having.

Even the swamp in the bottom of the valley, was looking good – I’m not sure if it had a castle or two lurking in the bottom.

Suddenly a water-logged airfield. The top of the hill on the left was my start and end point.

After crossing the valley floor, I passed where I’d originally turned off the big dirt road and headed north through a camping area. About this time I started to startle pairs of emus. This was alarming as they are big, fast, have big pointy beaks, fearsome feet – and seem to be rather skittish, preferring to run back in front of an opposing threat rather than away from it. I was hoping I was big enough on my bike that they’d leave me alone.

The only photo I managed to nab of an emu.

Through more closed track, where I actually had to lift my bike over a fallen tree – as opposed to riding around the dozens I’d encountered already – the only climb of the day began in earnest. Considering I had almost five hundred metres to gain, it was mostly gentle as the kilometres-to-go clicked down with moderate ascent.

I took a small side-trip to some falls, reasoning that they might have water over them.

There was only one kicker in the climb, where a track back to the road quickly gained metres and I sweated my way up. Then back to the road for a little seal to Reed Lookout. It was a ninety-five kilometre gravel section – fantastic riding and an excellent route by Will. I was looking forward to seeing where I’d been now that the cloud had burnt off. I was not disappointed.

I’d basically ridden from the bottom of the left of shot, towards the reservoir before continuing beyond it to the left, going between those two small hills and then heading back right on the other side of the reservoir.

Following that, I came back towards the camera in this shot before heading around the spur in the centre and finally back up to the lookout.

And there are even some rocks.

I took some time to cool down, admire the view and load the bike in the car. Getting word the others were down in Halls Gap, I made haste to be slightly social, and refuel on salt & vinegar crisps and gelato. While I’d taken plenty of water, I’d eaten all my food and was peckish.

It was most definitely worth bringing my bike all the way to western Victoria for a well good loop of gravel and exploring unfamiliar lands.