Written by Vanessa
Day 1: Bairnsdale to Orbost (rail trail Victoria)
Rick and I had the school holidays off, so we decided to give this trail a go. We planned to do this in just two days, which looking back now would have been better as a three day trip. We were in the steam roller team instead of fun and appreciation, but hey it was still fun!
We caught the Vline train ? to Bairnsdale then started our ride. (This took a few hours from memory).
The trail was, for the majority of the time, either on well maintained bike path with tarmac or compact dirt. We crossed a few bridges and relaxed into our ride, as the 88km trail was all on bike path….. so we thought!
We had however given ourselves an epic target for the day to reach our pre-booked accommodation in Orbost.
We stopped a few times to check out the scenery and admire the small towns. In Nowa Nowa we looked in the small tree house and information centre, then headed off.
Our next stop was in a small town (name escapes me) to get a drink at the Mingling Waters Café. Rick could not contain himself as the cafe was taken over by retro memorabilia such as Star Wars figurines, a life size C3PO, HeMan, SheRa and so much more. Rick was in heaven!!
We had already eaten lunch and headed towards our night’s accommodation, however the so called bike path turned to sh**! Sandy, rocky and very overgrown, with added bonus of undulation. We were also getting very tired, plus it started to rain ☔ . There were lots of gates to manoeuvre round and at one point Rick lost control and slid off his bike ?, for the second time. He then got up, picked up his bike and hurled it, whilst simultaneously swearing at it. I couldn’t help but laugh ? (obviously after first checking that he was ok).
It was getting late and we were both tired. The path was not doing us any favours. We did however spot a few kangaroos along the way.
Reaching Orbost, we shopped for dinner then headed to our night’s accommodation, which turned out to be an old converted petrol station. The curtains were to die for; stripy black and white liquorice flavour. We ate like kings, chatted for a while and then flaked out.
Day 2 Orbost to Bairnsdale
We did the above but pretty much in reverse, except that because it had rained overnight, we decided that the already poor conditions of the bike path would be better avoided. We therefore cycled on the adjacent road, which was a good choice but still really hilly.
I remember very little about this day apart from getting a bit of a sore knee. We did go back to the bike path, after avoiding the compact dirt uphill climb.
Once in Bairnsdale we caught the train home. Epic couple of days had!!
Trip summary
East Gippsland Rail Trail
Total Ascending: 569m
Total Descending: 568m
Total Distance: 98km