March 15 - Mansfield to Whitfield

Today was a 75 kilometer ride with a bit of climbing at 1,020 meters.  We set out on the Maroondah Highway.  But as you can see it was not a highway in terms of US.  It was more of a country lane with very little traffic.

But still there was the obligatory warning to try to keep us safe...

    In other words, be aware of being in Australia!

We rode through the bush country or arguably the outback.  It was a beautiful ride that really highlighted the diverse countryside that is Australia.  

We rode the morning over constantly increasing hills that turned into more strenuous climbs.  These climbs turned into what one person called updulating!  We came into the town of Tolmie.  And at first glance it appeared to be a one horse town, literally.  After we saw the sign to Tolmie there were no buildings or town square.  The only thing was a corral with one horse in it.  But luckily further along there appeared a pub.  But mind you this was ten o'clock in the morning.  We stopped as a group and many wanted coffee.  Coffee is a big thing here.  You order your coffee as a long black, short white, etc.  Well to give you the idea of the progressive pub we stopped in...  they had a brand new coffee machine that was state of the art.  The only issue was the man was not coming until tomorrow to install it.  So, no long blacks to the utter dismay of the group.  But I must say that they had a Coke that was just fine, thank you very much!

    Souvenir from the local pub we stopped at.

We continued on a bit further from the pub and came across the Grim Reaper:

    Local sculpture maker with a sense of humor...

After a good deal more climbing we stopped for lunch at the Power's Tower.  It was a lookout point for the valley below.  In the mid 1800's it was used by a notorious bushman (highwayman/robber) Harry Power to watch the valley to know when the law was coming.  Harry Power was a mentor to Ned Kelly, who was one of the most know bushman.  Ned Kelly fashioned himself an armor suit to become bullet proof to the law.  The only problem was that they figured out the armor and shot him in the legs in order to capture him.  They were kind enough to nurse him back to health before they hung him.

Here is the vista from the lookout:

Once we left the lookout the downhill sort of began.  It was a welcome site to see the climbing end and the road begin to slope off.  But the Australian highway was only a slight grade down versus the adrenaline infused descents of Central America.  I hit 67 kph which is 42 mph.  Not what I was hoping for after slugging it out up the climbs.  But it was still fun!

And for our dinner we went up to the local pub and had such a grand old time...

What a way to end a glorious day.  Our hosts, Janice and Simon, are doing a bang up job!

Oh yes, I would be remiss if I didn't put in a photo to cap this great day/:

    Sunset over the bush!