Epic overnight bikepacking, from Mountain to Coast

I met Dante in Queanbeyan to start the ride at 6:30am to Moruya. This ride was 85% dirt road and 15% bitumen.

The ride was very pleasant and sunny along Captains Flat until we’ve reached Coxes Creek which was the highest point for this ride at 1,100m. It was cold and snowed at the top. Then we headed down to Hoskinstown then to Rossi, planning to have lunch and a cold beer at Araluen Pub.

We reached Majors Creek (which is before Araluen) on time but when we turned to Elrington Lane (goat track) the challenge begun, as they closed the road from previous heavy rain landslide. Going down this short goat track was very hard as more than a dozen or more tress had fallen all over the track, every bend we had to walk, duct and navigate through with hundreds of vines and branches, it took us near 2 hours to pass this 6km track!

We made it to Araluen, arrived at the pub around 1pm ish, had 2 schooners of cold beers and massive chicken schnitzels with lots of chips and salad, what a treat, very full. Grinding along Deau National Park where the forest has started to recover from last summer’s fire. We arrived at Moruya around 4.30 head off to Pizza & Pide restaurant the have a good feed before grinding another 7ks to the campsite.

Camped for a night at Big4 caravan park at Moruya Heads. After setting up our tents, I headed for a good long hot shower then off to sleep after checking that my phone was 100% charged.

Was brisky early morning but not too cold. Packed, then head off back to Moruya for breakfast before climbing back to the mountain, but first off we took sunrise photos of our bikes on the beach.

We decided to take a detour via Monga Lane after arriving at Araluen, to avoid the goat trackfrom yesterday, but boy that climb from Araluen until Monga Lane was massive where I hiked mostly hahahaha. We knew that going back was hard but we kept grinding until we’ve reached Majors Creek for lunch another cold beer and big fed before the last 75km stretch back to Queanbeyan.

The legs felt great, mind was 100%, especially when sunset hits you along the vast plain of Rossi. The final stretch of this ride, rolling fast down the Kings Highway into Queanbeyan was a great way to finish this epic overnight ride from mountain to coast. Total distance 340 km @ 5,400m total elevation, averaged 17.5 kmph. (The words for this post was taken from Dante’s original Facebook post and modified).