On Sept 19th 2004 five keen souls departed from Canberra for Wild Horse Ridge, 25 kms east of Tumbarumba...
We set out from Canberra at 7:30am for what I though would be a 2 hour run to Tumut 3 Powerstation, a tad outside of the booming metroplis of Talbingo. The drive took 4 hours... not a good start :)
We rejiggered all the bikes and riding kit into Scott's Berlina, leaving Drew's Scooby as the recovery vehichle, and headed for where Powerline Road road meets Elliot Way, about 25kms east of Tumbarrumba. We headed out to apple scented Batlow and down to Tumba, then out into the far reaches of the middle of nowhere for the start of the run. It took an hour to get there from Tumut 3, and later we would realise that Powerline Road was open to cars and we could have just driven along Powerline Road to Elliot way, 30kms in 30 minutes... oh well :)
Out of the car, 5 hours after leaving, and we're ready... hmm, the trip was taking longer than expected, but that's the norm for adventure rides like these, you never know what'll happen! Luckily the boys have a sense of humor and didn;t lynch me at this point!
Onto the bikes and off for Tumut 3 power station...
The start of the run was realtively flat, some undulation here and there, through beautiful Aussie gums, a few kms in and we came across the first of two groups of Brumbies that we would get to see, ensuring Wild Horse Ridge lived up to it's name :)
Plenty of little obstacles to bunny hop, thanks to the Brumbies leaving there "mark" on the trail :) After a few kms the terrain changed to be lush forrest loaded with ferns and a wallaby or two. After a while we arrived at the Budding Falls turn off, where we knew we had to turn right to get the knife edge ridge run, back to the power station. Odly we couldn't see it, so we headed on (later we we drove back up and found the trail head was just over grown and very hard to see... something to remember for next time!), to the summit of what has to be rated as the best fire trail downhill I've ever done.... you could just open all the taps and let the bike cruise at 50+kms for what seemed like ages at a time, peaking out over 60kms a few times. One side of the fire trail was a sheer drop off to the valley below, which offered many glimpes of the valley below, but many a tree blocked our view... A third of the way down the trees opened up to reveal an awesome view of the valley and river below... awe inspiring stuff, enough to make us stop and soak it up, and get a few photos.
Shortly after that, I let the bike roll up to 55km/h and hit a tight left hander that came up waaaay too fast. No amount of grabbing the brakes could pull me up and I could see the gorge opening up in front of me like a huge hungry mouth ready to apply Darwin's theory of evolution to another idiot that has no repect for the laws of physics (until it's too late! :)), a sheer 500 vertical meter fall which was at best going to brought to a short end by flying straight into the side of a fat gum tree trunk (eek! :))... I was about to ping off the side of this firetrail and into oblivation when I bailed and used my back as a brake instead, the increased friction pulling me up with my front wheel hanging over the side and me under the bike... a lucky getaway, and much amusement for the crew :)
Back into it and we blast down to the top of the ridge line, where we had clear views again of the river and wild horse ridge (our intended target) about 1.2kms to our south, do'h! We stopped for a few more photos and appreciation of just how beautiful this part of Australia is, rugged and harsh, huge Mountains and snow capped peaks, Kosciousco really is "all that".
A quick roll down to the power station and we're infront of some of the biggest water pipes I've stood next to, huge suckers, they feed the water from the dam above into the turbines below, impressive stuff when you see it up front, and consider it was built in the 1950's, we marvelled at how they could have done it.
Back to the car where Scott had Crownies that begged cracking. Beers after a ride like this are the best beers ever, kudos to Scott for packing an eski! Thanx mate!
Back in the cars and we trialled driving to Elliot Way along Powerline Road, it was all good and 30mins later we were at Scott's Berlina, shuffling kit between cars and on the road home with an ear to ear grin.
All in all a great ride, tainted only by the long drive, a once in a lifetime ride with the chance to see legendary parts of Australia so few get to appreciate, we really are the lucky country.
The crew:
| Drew | Motitov Flaming Cow HT |
| Timbob | Hardtail madman |
| Jason | Giant VT dually |
| Scotto | Kick-a-poo dually ;) |
| Dave | Kick-a-poo dually ;) |
The Stats:
| Distance | 28km |
| Time | 1:29 total, 1:12 on the bike, the last 18kms done in 20mins! (not counting stops) |
| Decent | 780 Veritical Meters |
| Speed | 65km/h max, 23km/h avg |