From Jacque:
Here's Katina waiting longingly for her tucker whilst I take a piccie. The grub was yum and the ride was more mentally taxing than physically as we negotiated riding in a pack and sharing the roads with cycle friendly and unfriendly road users!
From Katina:
I met Jacqueline B aka Boonie at Milton for a 7am departure.
I
won't do a blow by blow, but essentially there was a 50km route from
Milton out to Manly via Vulture St, Riding Rd, Lytton Rd, Tingal Rd, Bay
Tce, Manly Rd, Wynnum Rd, Waminda St, Stanley St East Goodwill Bridge,
city. (Notice those street names are all major roads?) We soon found
that there was actually very little organisation and basically you were
on your own with other riders in the same position. Luckily I had
mapped out the route the night before on a good paper map with detail,
so I had that to rely on. The other riders were just following their
noses and trying to glean where the route was. That was extremely
poorly organised. I had envisoned leaders to show us the way, but also
other riders with mounted i-phone gps'es, following the route. I didn't
see a single one. I don't understand that. It was all down to my
paper highlighted map. And we had some guys' phone number...
At the beginning of
the ride, as far as Lindum, there were many other riders together and
it was a great experience of riding in a disorganised mass ride. Riders
of varying speeds and abilities all hurtling along, and roads which
were populated by trucks and often lacking in any bike lane, or with a
very patchy and poorly maintained lane. As Boonie has commented, it
required absolute concentration. We could not let our guard down for a
moment and had to be constantly aware of what was going on behind,
beside in front of us, as well as the condition of the road ahead. You
often can't really see the road conditions ahead because of other
riders. So you have to respond quickly. Different attitudes to road
use were also apparent, e.g. I stopped before pulling out onto
Wellington Rd from Vulture St, however this wasn't what the riders
behind me were thinking, they were going to charge out, and that nearly
caused them to go up my bum. Lesson, the stopping signals are really
important, because what's obvious to you isn't obvious to others
behind. We need to be really vocal and explicit about all our moves to
let the other riders know what we are doing. We know each other well,
but there will be 1500 others. The start will probably be a bit
chaotic, but then it should thin out.
We
ended up as a group of 3 - me, Boonie and Rod, a guy we picked up - and
we made our way back to Morningside, there joined by others whom I was
apparently to lead to our brekkie destination. It required a fair bit
of courage I think for us all to take the route into the city we did,
along Wynnum Rd and finally riding past the Gabba on Stanley St and
along Vulture. You would not normally consider that as an obvious
route to take! However as a group we just resolved to stick together
and be visible and follow the route they had assigned us. It was ok, we
just had to be very assertive, sometimes claiming a whole lane in an
unambiguous way, for our safety.
Anyway
all was forgotten when Boonie and I got to the Villager Café and saw a
full hot breakfast buffet. I over-ate of course. We were able to speak
to a lovely fellow who was an RCC organiser. He clarified a few things
for us, e.g. that there won't be any road closures. There will be some
intersections closed for us at some times, however as Boonie said we
will be on major roads up to 100km hr. There will be a police and
marshal presence. Stops every 25km. Start will be about 7am.
We
worked out that those pockets at the back of your jersey are for
stuffing take away muffins in after buffet breakfasts. We left with
quite lumpy looking backs. Had a lovely ride home together in the
winter sun.
