{"id":56,"date":"2007-03-18T19:04:18","date_gmt":"2007-03-19T00:04:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lindystravels.com\/?p=56"},"modified":"2014-08-30T06:38:49","modified_gmt":"2014-08-30T11:38:49","slug":"great-ocean-road-day-6-short-nelson-to-portland-vic-not","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lindystravels.com\/?p=56","title":{"rendered":"GOR – Day 6: SHORT! (Nelson to Portland, VIC)"},"content":{"rendered":"

This day was a blast! We had planned for 76k, but ended up leaving the last of the logging road to the trucks, and rode only 30k (19 miles); average speed 18.87mph! It was drizzling when we woke up, so we loaded up, drove the hilly, winding road about 5 miles out to the beach \"Lighthouse\"<\/a>(which would have been a *great* warm-up ride, major bummer), and then drove to our next stop for the night in Portland. <\/p>\n

After checking into our caravan park cabin, we found another bike shop to replenish our supply of tubes – we have had 6 flats already, 3 from the tubes blowing when removing the pump. We then hopped on our bikes, and took a beautiful ride out to the Cape Nelson Lighthouse on the point \u00e2\u20ac\u201c a winding, *very* hilly (the Information Center lady said it was FLAT!), rough-surfaced coastal road , with spectacular dunes and ocean views. At the lighthouse we found a standing compass and located due South, straining to see Antarctica (tricky with a 50-mile horizon). On the way back we saw an echidna – like a very shy, roly-poly porcupine. It was in the road, and as we approached, it waddled quickly to the undergrowth, curling up into a motionless ball under some dead branches, hoping we wouldn’t notice it, though we were right above it.<\/p>\n

I reached my top speed ever today, of 36.2mph! And I felt fantastic after a 24-hour break, and could have ridden another 30-40 miles. But we decided to keep it short. Patricia had another flat from a nail on the road, just as we got back into town, that destroyed her tire.<\/p>\n

\"Cape<\/a>After collecting the bikes and chatting with the lady bike-shop owner, we piddled a few more hours away looking for internet access – nearly a lost cause late on a Saturday afternoon in a sleepy little town. We did find it – the last 30 minutes of the business day, in a steamy laundry (of all places!), with hot sun burning through the plate-glass window. Then we drove to Cape Bridgewater, about 30k due west, visited the Blow Holes and the Petrified Forest, and had a leisurely dinner on the patio of a great little beach, watching the waves \u00e2\u20ac\u201c it was a really great riding, relaxing day.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This day was a blast! We had planned for 76k, but ended up leaving the last of the logging road to the trucks, and rode only 30k (19 miles); average speed 18.87mph! It was drizzling when we woke up, so we loaded up, drove the hilly, winding road about 5 miles out to the beach […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,3,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-56","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-australia-2007","category-cycling","category-travels"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lindystravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lindystravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lindystravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lindystravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lindystravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=56"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.lindystravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":579,"href":"https:\/\/www.lindystravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56\/revisions\/579"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lindystravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=56"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lindystravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=56"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lindystravels.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=56"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}