Dave and Jen For Oxfam

To salvage the remains of a weekend spent in airports and on a very long and boring train journey, Jen and I returned to Brisbane with the aim of dumping bags on the floor and hitting the bikes for a quick ride. The quick ride quickly became our first time on a path we had previously discussed as a possible training route. Namely, New Farm to West End and back. This ride, which we have mapped online, travels mostly along the various floating platforms and riverside walkways that hug the Brisbane river. The weather at this stage seemed clear overhead. At this stage.

Starting at New Farm Park we rode through the happy picnic setting and down onto the New Farm stretch of Brisbane’s beautiful floating walkway. Soon enough we peddle on down to Eagle St Pier and hook around into the Botanical Gardens. Skirting the edge of the river this lovely stretch soon spits us out into the QUT university grounds and a quick weave or two through dawdling students brings us up onto the Goodwill Bridge. We pause to let Squishy rest and use the opportunity to take some photos and drink some water. We talk about some of the gadgets we will try to find, such as a bike friendly GPS and travel computer. Anyone have any suggestions? The next stage winds through the riverside stretch of South Bank where I give Jen a look that admits finally that I wouldn’t mind having a bell on my Mongoose Tyax Super, despite an ingrained reluctance to give such a solid bike the ability to go “ding ding!!!”. Unfortunately for us Jen has somehow managed to break her own little bell so we navigate through the equivalent of a herd of tourist cattle with an amusing combination of flat out peddling and cautious braking. In retrospect this is probably good training for our trip where crowds are involved!

Free from the humans we fly down past the Performing Art Complex, the Museum and the Gallery Of Modern Art. The next stretch down along the river hooks left to pass South’s Leagues club on the left and winds with a steady curve until we pull up in Orleigh Park in West End to nod “well done” and stare with concern at the clouds above. A storm is approaching. Cue lightning. A big storm. Cue drama. A very big storm. Cue riding.

Originally we had planned on grabbing some take-away from one of West End’s millions of quick and easy restaurants but the clouds gathering over head give way to stabs of lightning. Given our proximity to a few friends who live in the suburb, we figure them to be a potential refuge from the rain and use this as valid logic to think about food instead of storms. Discarding the take-away idea we settle for a Vietnamese Restaurant, eating at the table in our riding gear a few metres from our bikes in some convenient roadside bike racks. We get excited over plates of Crispy Chicken and Pork Something-Or-Other talking about the food we will be eating in Vietnam and Cambodia. The lightning and thunder punctuates the excited chatter so we hit the bikes again and make a bee-line for the river. A few drops fall on us as we head back over the Goodwill Bridge and divert onto Sydney Street for a slight shortcut back to New Farm Park. As we hit our destination the rain clouds show a very dramatic sense of timing and open up. Not so much to let rain drops meekly fall but, as Bill Bryson notes of the tendancy of Queensland rain, to move a large body of water from the sky to the ground. Just in time!

Time of round trip: Absolutely no idea
Distance: Approximately 22kms