A tour of the NSW North Coast

Down to Kingscliff Sunday afternoon. Very easy drive - from our place, quick tour down to the Bogan, sorry Logan Motorway, right at the Pacific Motorway, through the brilliant Tugun Bypass and you're pretty much there. Highlight of the drive was the motorbike copper with the lidar as you went through the first of the tollgates - cruise control plus 60km/h on the GPS = me giving a smile and a wave as I glide past unmolested.

My mate and I hit the road at pretty much spot on 6:30am NSW time and basically rode down the Pacific Highway to Brunswick Heads, had coffee, and then rode back to Kingscliff. Only events of interest were a puncture to my back tyre (who the hell leaves brass staples by the side of the road?) and a self induced 3.9km induced penalty on the return journey as dumb-dumb here, who decided to finish on a bit of a time trial, for some reason decided to ride to Tweed Heads under the impression that it was Kingscliff. As I approached the Tweed River I realised my error, scooted over the roadside barrier and on to the footpath that lead back to Kingscliff.


Funny thing with the puncture - I was looking at the back tyre on Friday as I got the bike ready for Saturday morning and was concerned with the number of nicks in it, and just had a feeling I was going to cop a puncture today. Stupid thing is, the puncture had nothing to do with the nicks, none of which had penetrated the carcass of the tyre - that staple would have gotten into a new tyre and caused a flat anyway.

The ride was pretty even with a few gentle hills along the way (nothing really requiring getting out of the saddle, but you would on occasion just to vary the muscle workload), but quite noisy with a host of trucks and cars flashing past. Ended up doing just short of 100k in a bit under 3 1/2 hours, but to be honest I took it pretty easily, leading my mate most of the way - he's making a bit of a return after a bit of a work induced lull in training.



I'd also had a little fiddle with my seating position, bringing the seat forward a couple of millimetres as I'd felt like I was continuously edging forward into the front of the seat. Seemed to work pretty well, felt a bit more comfortable.

Good to be out somewhere different, and there certainly is excellent scenery with the mountains providing an excellent background. I'll get down there again in the new year - it would be good to do something different and get up into the hills (although I'll no doubt be singing a different tune afterwards).

A couple of guys from the Saturday group were planning to get out tomorrow morning at 6 - I'm hoping to get out and join them for a shortish ride.

I might try and get out for a run at some point before Xmas - I had my third physio session in a week which has helped free my back up quite a bit.