Maidei goes on a world tour-Part 1 of the Bicycle Mystery Tour

[Maxxxie]

So how weird is it that you can meet somebody on a webforum from halfway around the world, and then find that you have actually met before, and also find out that you live one suburb away??!

I can't tell you how much that made me laugh!!!

Pleasure to meet you again, Pinkbikes. Give me a hoy if you'd like to go for a ride sometime.

Max

[pinkbikes]

Thanks Max - we'll have to catch up for a ride one morning.

So, I had great plans of taking Maidei for a jaunt in the forests of Bunya and Ironbark on the weekend. We have a regular Sunday afternoon ride called the Bunya Sunday Afternoon Cruise (BSAC) which I figured would be about the right pace for a social outing for Maidei.

It was the last one prior to Christmas and so would be festive, people with tinsel etc. I was going to get another ride out of my Santa jersey, and hand out little Santa chockies...

Unfortunately, it became pretty clear at about 10am that the afternoon was going to be a complete fizzer. The black clouds rolled in, the thunder rolled and the lightning fizzed. It poured rain fit to bust for ages and there was NO WAY I was going out in that by choice!

So I guess Maidei will have to wait a few more days before she can have a ride in the forest. Instead she'll have to laze around and socialise with our families over Christmas, gaze upon the turkey and baked ham, and enjoy Christmas Oz-style in the heat. But then she'd be used to the heat.

[cylegoddess]

I would have gone out!!
LOL, I could have wrapped her in cling wrap!!

[crazycanuck]

Ummm Cyclegoddess....you might want to pay attention to the weather forecasts around the country....There was a weather warning for the Brisbane region... I heard the word "flooding"...in an ABC news report..

[shootingstar]

Since we get so many close-up shots of Maidei, kind of forget how small she and her bike are.

[crazycanuck]

I must mention that grass trees (aka Blackboy bushes) are really really annoying when mtn biking...The stem stumps (?) are unfriendly & not fun to run into

They're on every trail here in WA. Pea gravel & grass trees make such a nice couple

[pinkbikes]

PB decided to take me on another ride on Sunday morning. This was to be the "urban Brisbane" experience.

PB, her DD, and another couple and their DD met at the Goodwill Bridge for a circuit of inner Brisbane by bikeway (sort of a 11yo-friendly version of a River Loop). This route crossed the Goodwill Bridge (an inner city bike and pedestrian bridge across the Brisbane River) and turned right to follow the river around the city botanic gardens, along the city boardwalk to Story Bridge, and along the floating walkway to a nice cafe at the end of New Farm Park for iced coffee/chocolates. If only PB had taken a picture of me there we'd have been happy, but she was saving me for the "money shot" back at Southbank Parklands by the inner city beach at the lagoon.

We rode back the way we came, but continued on to the newest inner city pedestrian and cycle bridge, the Kurilpa Bridge, which takes you across the river into the forecourt of the Gallery of Modern art (known as the GOMA - sort of like Gomer Pyle but not so poorly acted!). From there we headed back along to Southbank Parklands and the humans indulged in a dip in the lagoon.

http://www.visitsouthbank.com.au/att...bank_parklands

This link gives an idea of what the Southbank Parkland brings to the centre of the city in Brisbane.

Anyway, I was cooling my heels, waiting for them to finish their dip and take that money shot, when all of a sudden there was thunder, lightning and the skies opened with a pounding summer storm. We headed for cover but all of us got wet - even I got a little damp in my ziplock bag! I'm all dry now - although I never did get that money shot by the lagoon at Southbank!

So now PB has decided that the weather here is cursed and it is time for me to move on over to the "land of the long white cloud" and visit MillieNZ for some terrific riding on New Zealand's northern isle. So tomorrow I'll be on my way.

So it's goodbye to sunny (?) Queensland and Australia and off to new adventures....

[Trek420]

I would have gone out!!
LOL, I could have wrapped her in cling wrap!!

Awwwww, now she's gonna get a tiny see-through rain jackets.

http://www.teamestrogen.com/prodLG_1030005.html

[pinkbikes]

I might have forgotten to mention it was moutain biking and just how much mud would have been involved. I probably could have wrapped Maidei in wrap, but what about me? (Good name for a song!) I just wasn't up for the surgical extraction of mud from my every orifice. Not to mention the bike's every orifice!

Actually the ride got canned because it is just too dangerous in the forest with the lightning and trees falling etc.

[cylegoddess]

'I just wasn't up for the surgical extraction of mud from my every orifice. Not to mention the bike's every orifice!'

Oh that goes so well with the little scared face icon!!

Yikes! Its not Canberra , is it?!!
Flooding.....wow.

[pinkbikes]

And it's STILL #$*()&^$% RAINING!

At the rate I'm going it will be a picture of her nose pressed up against the window looking at the rain!

[Maxxxie]

And it's STILL #$*()&^$% RAINING!

At the rate I'm going it will be a picture of her nose pressed up against the window looking at the rain!

LMAO! I managed to get out for a 40Km ride out to Nudgee and back on xmas day. It's been raining ever-bloody-since, and all I wanna do is get out and ride, dammit! I need another 120Km under my belt and I'll have reached 4000Km for the year - twice my original goal of 2000Km. RAIN, RAIN, GO AWAY.. please come back after I've done my 120Km, OK????

Max