March 29th, 2011
Jingellic to Albury
Distance: 114km
Total distance: 890km
Woke up to a morning fog all over the campsite. I have been wanting to start my day early, preferably before sunrise, but the past few mornings including today were freezing cold. As usual, I ended up having a bit of sleep in. While exiting the campsite, a gentleman from one of the caravan stopped me for a brief chat. I left Jingellic at about 8.30am. As predicted, the entire journey was quite scenic. There were brief uphills and downhills but all within a comfortable range. The Murray River flows into Hume Lake, so the river naturally grew wider as I progressed towards the lake. By the way, for almost the entire length, I was riding at the Victoria end along the NSW/Victoria border.
When the sun wasn’t obscured by the clouds, the sunlight was burning hot. Halfway riding, I realised I had sunburnt on my nose, probably developed over the past few days because my skin was starting to peel today. I’m guessing the sunscreen was not very effective since I applied it early in the morning and by noon, my sweat would have washed it all away. So from today onwards, I’m trying to make a habit of re-applying sunscreen once or twice throughout the day.
My legs still feel sore, especially so on an uphill gradient or when I accelerate. I lowered my gear to cycle in a higher cadence to reduce the soreness. While riding up the hills, baby mosquitoes appeared out of no where hover in front of my face which was really annoying. This only happens when I was riding slowly or when I stopped. Because of that, I couldn’t stop for a peaceful snack break. I only managed to make a few brief stops for the entire distance. In a way this was a good thing since my ride today was a 100+km ride, can’t afford to take long breaks. It’s been a while since my last 100+km ride. It is now more challenging than before due to my sore muscles but I was determined to reach that distance.
My original plan was to ride to Wodonga since the distance indicated by an earlier sign was about 3km less than Albury and it is also nearer to my destination for tomorrow. But I didn’t come across any turnout sign to Wodonga so I kept riding the current road all the way to Albury. The ride from Hume Lake (pass the bridge) to Albury was quite a long uphill followed by a long downhill. It was the evening rush hour and there were long sections of the road without shoulders to ride on. Albury is a reasonably large city, so riding into the town was quite a stressful affair.
When I entered Albury, it was getting dark and I was too exhausted to set up my tent so I just checked into a bunk bed at a YHA backpackers accommodation. My bed was in a standard 4-bunk beds room with one other guy currently staying in there. My first impression was that guy had a very unpleasant body odour. I told myself “Nevermind, it was only one night. Besides, I’m here just to sleep and will leave first thing in the morning tomorrow”. I had Hungry Jacks for dinner which was just opposite the YHA and off to bed I went after that.
