While Not Working

I've gotten to know the southern half of Adelaide quite well by bicycle. I know pretty much the quickest bicycle route to anywhere, how to avoid hills and headwinds, and where I can jump on a train when pedaling gets wearisome. I've ridden up and down the foreshore more times than I can count and although it's beautiful with stunning beaches, sunsets, and sightings of dolphins and seals, it's also clogged with beach goers, kids on roller skates and training wheels, and everyone who wants to go for a walk and wander haphazardly over the shared path with nary a bother for whoever is frantically ringing a bell behind them. Slow spark that I am, it took a while before I realised that north of the city was a whole heap of Adelaide just waiting to be explored and accessible to anyone who cared to hop on the Gawler train line which afforded multiple spots for getting off and exploring. So on a bright sunny day with just a promise of summer I did just that, riding the train all...

 With the walking tracks of Belair National Park just at the bottom of our hill I took a break from clocking up kilometers on my bike and went walking instead. Spring has sprung in South Australia: tiny green leaves popped out on all the deciduous trees and the bright green grass, legacy of winter rains, was spattered with wildflowers.     The Lodge Loop walk followed the railway for the first kilometre or two.  I wasn't troubled by trains however, as the suburban network stopped at Belair Station so there was only the odd freight train to worry about and none of those came past during my walk. The Lodge Path went up past the old Belair Lodge.  The Lodge is a private residence so no Lodge-visiting allowed.   Belair roads and walking tracks, still showing signs of winter rains. I had the Lodge Loop all to myself apart from the odd mountain biker who came zooming past on a rapid gravity-assisted trip down to the bottom of the hill. For purposes of fire...

I can walk to Pinera Railway station from our house in Belair. From the Pinera station platform it takes 15 exhilarating if slightly terrifying minutes by bicycle to arrive 250m lower and slightly less than 4km later on the platform at Lynton, from whence you can cycle (or catch the train) wherever you need to go. The walk to Pinera Station is steep and mossy.   The train takes 18 minutes to clatter the long way round from Pinera to Lynton, stopping at three stations, wandering along the sides of steep rocky gullies, loitering through tunnels, and nodding convivially at passing goods trains. Theoretically I could race down the hill and have 3 minutes to twiddle my thumbs on the Lynton platform before catching the train to town. About to be fun. It takes longer when you stop to take photos of the city, And Glenelg, beside the sea. Train racing aside, the house on the hill was cold and a couple of days of miserable damp, cloudy weather left us itching to get out as soon as the sun st...

A small boy on a bicycle stopped beside me as I waited with my bike for a crossing light.  I was taking a quick spin beside the railway line to clear my head after work.  As serious cyclists do, the small boy and I checked out each other's rides. "There's a magpie up ahead," he said. "It's swooping." "Thanks for the heads-up," I replied.  "I'll keep a lookout." "I cross the railway line half way up. It's swooping pretty bad.  It hits your head." "Lucky I've got a brim on my helmet then.  That usually stops them." He thought about this for a while. "I'm lucky I've got a short neck.  Most people are higher than me and they get hit first." He was very matter-of-fact about his self-diagnosed lack of stature in the neck department, displaying an admirable facility for finding a silver lining. I refrained from commenting on the length of his neck, short or otherwise.  We watched an oncoming ...

On the way out of Moonta we visited the 400-ish unmarked child-size graves were still visible in the Moonta Cemetery, courtesy of the typhus and cholera epidemics that regularly affected the area until reticulated water finally arrived in 1890.  And that was only the graves that remained visible after 100+ years.   This was the waiting hut, where the bereaved could wait while the coffin made its slow journey from the church to the graveyard. With that sobering start out of the way we took a slight detour via Maitland, where we had Morning Coffee. Maitland was designed by the same person who designed Adelaide and had the same most excellent parkland encircling the city centre. The parkland was somewhat scruffier than Adelaide's, possibly because Maitland's population did not produce sufficient rates to maintain a large amount of parkland.   From Maitland we finished our crossing of the Yorke and visited the Ardrossan lookout. I expected a hill because that's how lookouts...

The pathways around Moonta just asked to be explored by bicycle rather than by car. The first stop of the morning was the brand new bicycle repair station at the Moonta Tourist Information  centre where I pumped my tyres up fully for the first time and also taught Roger how to use a Presta valve which, as you cyclists out there will know, is a fragile, fiddly thing. All pumped up, we initially followed the rail trail which took us through some of the old mine precinct. The railway line is for the little tourist train.  In the distance you can see a slag heap, of which there are at least four.  The heritage-listed site covers some 320 hectares, not all of it accessible to the public due to an unacceptable risk of falling down large holes.   Old cottage, history unknown (to me, anyway). Drifts of wildflowers to herald the coming Spring.                                       ...