Stromlo

I woke up at 4.58 am this morning, 2 minutes before I had my alarm set for. Generally this means you are either busting for a wee or very excited about something. I was definately excited, although in fact I also needed a wee.

I set off for Mount Stromlo forest park (arguably the premier mountain bikers venue in Australia and only 20 mintues away!) hoping to get there for sunrise and be the first out. I got there just at day break and was lucky enough (some would say madly keen) to be the only one in the carpark. There are 6 different official single tracks you can chose from, 1 is for beginners (takes about 30 mins), 4 of them I think are intermediate (all around 1 hour) and the other is very challenging (about an hour and a half). I chose one of the intermediate ones which covered a large area, and set off.

The path winded its way up the hill, having some quite lose bumpy and technical parts where at one point I repeatidly kept losing my footing and balance (annoying!). When you start to see signs pointing to different sections of the track  like 'cardiac arrest', 'the luge' and 'roller coaster' you know your gonna be having some fun but also be hurting at some point. There were some insane bumps and jumps and quite steep inclines around tight bends which really tested my nerve and fitness.

Once reaching the top you are greated with panoramic 360' views of the ACT and also come across what Mount Stromlo was originally famous for, the Observatory. After those really bad fires 6 or 7 years ago that seriously affected parts of Canberra and wiped out most of Stromlo, some of the telescopes and their buildings were consumed by the flames. Although they still have what remains of them up there for you to see.

The downhill part of the circuit was brilliant! Most of the time I was just holding on for dear life and loving every minute of it! Jumps and high banking turns, streams, tunnels and bridges, extremely narrow passes and moguel type mounds were some of the things to concentrate on whilst still trying to focus on the amazing view. I was grinning for most of the day, even taking William back there to try out the beginners track with him later on. I think my newly found interest in cycling has rubbed off on him a little bit.