Locked in...

We decided, what the hell, what's a thousand kilometre drive, twice, only a fortnight apart. We are going to the Sydney Spring Cycle on the 22nd October. The Gong Ride is only 2 weekends later.

We figured we should test drive the triplet on the 50km route before embarking on the 90km Gong route. (Plus there are some people from the Big Ride that we'd like to meet up with on the Spring Cycle.)

And we are a bit crazy.

So then come the logistics!

We decided, in the end, to stay at Wollongong the night before and after the Gong ride. We discussed many variations, including staying in Sydney the night before, but as Marc will have to catch the train back to pick up the car, (unless we can find someone willing to drive the car down for us, and make their own way back) we would have needed to pack the panniers up with clothes to change into, ra, ra, ra.

Accommodation for 2 nights starts getting expensive, particularly when you have 3 kids. Only people with 3 or more kids would know what it's like to find that most 'family' accommodation only accounts for 2 children. (Mr Costello should consider that when he urges families to have 'one for the country').

When a cabin at the caravan park was going to cost us $135 a night (for a cabin that takes 5 or 6) as opposed to $85 (for a cabin that only takes 4 people) we decided in the end (after revisiting the 'stay in Sydney Saturday night option') that if we could camp on the Big Ride, we could manage to camp for two nights in a holiday park resort.

Fingers crossed it doesn't rain, eh.

We have this u-beaut canvas touring tent now, which we bought so we can start doing some serious touring/camping trips with the (finally acquired) 4WD. Problem is, we haven't yet sorted roof racks for carrying bikes on the landcruiser, and we won't have the time to sort that in the next couple of weeks. (There will also be a height issue involved in getting tandems onto the top of a landcruiser!!) For now the tent touring and the bike touring won't mix, but that probably won't stop Marc working on it.

So it's the old faithful Commodore again for these two bike adventures, and so we have a space issue with the canvas tent (plus all the bike gear). Back to using the two domes we took on the Big Ride. At least we are flexible!

The kids won't mind if the trade-off is getting to go SWIMMING after the Ride (and, indeed, the afternoon before!)


That weekend's sleep sorted. Next is to hassle some relos for somewhere to sleep before the Spring Cycle. And sweet talking my Dad to do the car shuffle for us like he did last year.

Things are just that bit more complex when you're carting round tandems!

And exactly how are we going to transport the triplet? Lucky it's a convertible... plan is take out the middle section, put it on the mack rack (where the trailer bike used to travel).. make the triplet into a tandem, and carry on top as before. Easy. (Just trying not to think about the time we will have to get up on the morning of each ride so as to stick it all back together before starting off!)