Written by Lucie
During the joint birthday weekend at Rosebud, Lucie and Mark took it upon themselves to stay committed to the challenge and smash out some kilometres.
Day one
On the Saturday, after a very extended breakfast consisting of many pancakes and copious amounts of Canadian maple syrup, we hopped on our bikes and set off from the house to the coast road at Rosebud.
Once on Point Nepean Road we had a very pleasant cycle along the bay. There was a bit of a headwind, but nothing too crazy, it kept threatening to rain, but it never really did, and there was always a rainbow or two in the sky. We stopped off once or twice to check out the view (of ocean and/or rainbow) and once to investigate a historic site.
After getting through Portsea we can to the Point Nepean National Park. It’s a really nice cycle through the park – green, good road surface and basically no cars. Plus, if you’ve got time, there are quite a lot of historical points of interest. unfortunately, we didn’t really have time because we spent so long on breakfast but we quickly swung by the outside of Gunnar’s Cottage before hitting Eagles Nest and Fort Pearce.
By this point it was quite dark overhead and the wind had really picked up. We chained up our bikes, did up coats and walked the last 800m to Fort Nepean, right on the end of the peninsular, as the rain started to come down. It’s an awesome spot because the land is so skinny you can look towards Queenscliff and without moving see the open ocean throwing up waves and spray to your left and the calm bay waters gently lapping the shore on your right.
Once we made it to the fort we had fun exploring the tunnels, magazines and getting confused if there were real people lurking around the corners or just cleverly made speakers (it was the latter). We then ate lunch, got a bit chilly, and walked back to the bikes to start back to Rosebud, with a quick cycle past the quarantine station on our way out of the park.
Cycling back to Rosebud was much the same as the way out – mostly flat but with a few big hills, mostly dry but with lots of rainbows and a bit windy. We did have to do the last 5 kilometres in the dark however and there was about 5 minutes of really heavy rain right at the end.
Luckily, we were nearly back at a warm house with showers, dry clothes and tasty Mexican food.
Day two
On Sunday we got an earlier start and set out along the Nepean Highway back towards Melbourne.
It was really nice along the shore up until Safety Beach when we had to move inland to get around Mornington and Mount Eliza (and the section of coast road that doesn’t exist). The inland route had a few rather steep hills, which were a bit of a shock to the system, but we made it and the happy news is that there’s a decent enough bike path/emergency lane for most of the way (it does disappear every now again, mostly on bridges, hill crests and through towns).
when we got to just south of Frankston the Nepean Highway joins the coast again with an awesome view and downhill section on Oliver’s Hill – lots of fun!
We stopped at the Franskton pier for lunch, saw some massive army helicopters fly over towards the city and a couple of planes pulling tricks, and then got cold and had to start moving again.
From Frankston north the cycle alternated between lovely coast road and busier built-up areas, usually flanked by shops on the left and the train line on the right.
At Mordialloc we took Beach Road, which is a bit quieter and hugs the cliff. It’s a very pretty section. And that took us all the way to Sandringham where we decided to call it a day and hop on a train the rest of the way back.
Trip summary
Rosebud to Fort Nepean (one way)
Total Ascending: 81m
Total Descending: 76m
Total Distance: 24.3km
Rosebud to Sandringham
Total Ascending: 255m
Total Descending: 245m
Total Distance: 64.8 km