Christmas in July

The town of Young is situated in the south west region of southern New South Wales, and for the more pedantic, 34' 18" south and 148' 18" east. For the cyclist, a more informative description is that it lies at a point for which no matter route you take to leave, there is an uphill climb of 3 to 7 kilometres, phew, it's hard work to leave the place! It's a rural center and before rationalization and globalization, an industrious little city.

So Young was where so 40 of us gathered on Friday night to partaketh in the annual Xmas in July ritual and for the unitiated, this ritual is ride most of Saturday, have Xmas celebration Saturday night and then ride again all day Sunday before coming home.

The Saturday ride was reasonably hard, east to Murringo and then north to Bendick Murril for a break at the pub for some morning tea, though some found better things to drink at the pub. Then off again, up an endlessly log hill to the 'Sunnyside Rose Gardens'.

This place was quite unique, a restuarant catering for I gather mainly bus tours, but we and our 40 bikes were made most welcome. Lunch of soup and sandwiches followed by cake and tea. And then, the owner gets up and gives us a speil and tells us he's a bit of a poetry reader and off he goes, Mulga Bill of course followed by a few others, he was just great and a fine time was had by all.

Then off we went again, up even more hills to a ridge line where most took off to see a castle, but, like a few other saner people, I turned south to head for home. There were some big hills, and the only saving grace was the downhill ride for the last few Ks into Young.

Christmas dinner went off OK, we had our crackers and caps and christmas pud and all in all a pleasant evening. Went to bed early, though the young ones played on and watched the TDF. I needed my beaty sleep!

Sunday saw an 8:30 start, up a 7 Km hill, it just went on and on and after about 20 Km in all we turned right into Barawang Rd and dropped into 'Sheppards Moon Vinyard'. It was a welcome break but as a non drinker, vinyards aren't my cup of tea so as to speak. Then we headed off to the twin towns of Harden/Murrumburrah, more hills!

Lunch had been organized at the 'Terracotta Restaurant'. A quaint old place well decked out. Soup, sandwiches and coffee were provided for our eleven dollars and we were about to leave when mein host announced that he was a bit of a poetry reader and off he goes with a few poems, excellently presented and throughly enjoyable. Guess poem reading is all the rage in that part of the world!

So that was the end of the weekend, I had come down by car with another rider and he had done an early morning run to position the car at Murrumburrah. Just a couple of hours we were home again. Great weekend.