Pedal Cure 4 FightMND – 2020
12th March, 2020
Another dawn start, Hannah and I made our way out of Benalla, on the Midland Highway, on a fairly cool morning. I’ve always preferred cycling in the cooler weather, and these early starts suited me fine. It wasn’t long until we were out into the country side. After crossing the Hume Freeway, we turned on to the much quieter country roads. Some of these back roads are quite hilly. Back when these roads were built, there probably wasn’t the money to dig cuttings or build too many bridges. The best thing about them, of course, is that they were very quiet. We hardly saw a car. As there weren’t going to be any official places for a rest stop, we just carried on our way.
We stopped for a short break at a petrol station in Violet Town. So far, no one had caught us up. We just assumed that they’d gone to a coffee shop, just has they’d previously done, before setting off. We carried on. As the day progressed, though, we were beginning to wonder whether we were indeed going the wrong way as no one had caught us up. After bypassing Euroa, I was starting to doubt whether I’d had the correct route. But I told Hannah that I was quite sure it was, as it had previously been checked by Snake (Paul Breust), who had organised the whole charity ride. After some nasty gravel road, which lasted almost 10 km, we came by someone. Apparenly, the main group took a wrong turn and went on a bit of a detour before getting back on course. Hannah and I were, as it turns out, following the correct route all the time.
We rolled into Nagambie and on to the regatta centre where we were staying for the evening. It felt so good to be the first ones for a change! Something that I didn’t let some of the other riders forget. 🙂 That evening, after a couple of beers at the regatta centre, we made our way to the Royal Mail Hotel, where St. Kilda footballer Jack Steele and a couple of others made an appearance.
