GoodnessGravel Glen Innes 2025

I have been trying to regain some fitness and hopefully shed some of these damn Covid kilograms that I have been lugging around for the last ~ 5 years. (5 years?!!🤯)

 

To this end I have been trying to get some consistent cycling action happening as observed by our recent Derby mtbing trip.  Of course,  another side of the equation is the "fueling" that occurs.... and Derby was definitely a case of "over fuelling" - well, in my defense it was a holiday too. 😉

But I digress. Partly inspired by my brother's training regime where he is cycling and swimming regularly (and has lost 10+ kilograms! Go Bro!) I have declared Alcohol Free April which should subtract a sizeable calorific intake from where it has been of late.  Apart from the loss of calories,  it has the obvious added benefits of not only leaving those beer credits in my wallet but I feel heaps better for it. 

Win WIN!

I also decided that I need to get back to the old (stupid) me.  The stupid me would work all week then drive somewhere far away to ride my bicycle a stupidly long distance - for no other reason than to see if I could do it. 

I did actually derive some sort of joy out of doing so.  

Not just the mind over matter stuff but the "being out there in the environment" fed my soul - the soul that Covid and my government's over reaction to it had killed. 

It has been raining a LOT in Brisbane this year which is making mtbing a dirty pastime, not to mention the damage to the trails.  Getting away from Brisbane makes sense so when I stumbled across a gravel riding series called GoodnessGravel I thought I had better investigate further. These guys started the series because they couldn't travel overseas during Covid, so turned to riding their bikes in long loops out of quiet country towns in NSW instead. Over the last few years they have built quite a following with the added benefit that all of these riders bring to the small towns that host the rides.

I saw that the next ride was coming up in a few weeks up on the Range at Glen Innes.  I managed a couple of longer rides into the city in the weeks prior to see if I was indeed capable of riding any sort of distance any more and was pleased to see that I could ride at least 50km and still function.

I had a four day work trip immediately prior to the ride so I loaded my bike and all of my gear into the car. That way if I decided that the weather looked good and I didn’t feel too flogged from work I would head straight from work on the Friday afternoon to Glen Innes. By the Wednesday I decided that it was a goer so paid my money and committed to the ride. Unfortunately there was no accomodation left in Glen Innes (see, these things are good for the local economy) but I managed to book a cheap motel in Tenterfield. I would just have to get up early to drive the remaining 100 kilometres to Glen Innes on the Saturday morning.

Up at 5am, I was into the car and knocked out the drive easily to arrive a bit after 6am. I found the showgrounds where the event was being held and quickly set my bike up. 

I had given the bike a bit of a birthday in the weeks prior with a damn good clean and a full brake bleed. It turns out that after owning the bike since 2018 and having pedalled just over 10 000km on it, I had never bled the brakes. Check the below photo for the new Dot 4 versus the colour of the apple juice that came out!

People were arriving and before long it was time to go. 

The riders doing the 125km course were first to start.

Then us 75km riders lined up and pedalled off five minutes later. There was also a 35km riders ride that departed at 0830. 

I sat at the back of the group and pedalled off slowly. I wasn’t sure how I would handle my lack of fitness with the added bonus of being at 3500ft (1100m) above sea level. Yes, slowly to warm up was a good idea.

My idea of slow and others idea of slow must be different because I passed a stack of riders in the first two or three kilometres as we left town. Heading east, we were riding into a pretty stiff headwind which made progress relatively slow but I soon slipped into a steady pace that I felt comfortable that I could hold.

We had quite a bit of sealed road initially which, given the headwind, I was fine with. I was still slowly reeling in riders but only every ten minutes or so now. The pack had thinned right out. 

Once we hit the gravel roads I instantly felt more relaxed. Less chance of traffic encounters and just much more interesting/challenging riding to take the mind off things. I realised I find (sealed) road riding so boring along here.

The event had a photographer who popped up here and there. His first appearance was along the gravel section just after a long steady climb. I was feeling good and gave the “ok” sign but he must have hit the shutter release a few milliseconds before I got it straightened out. 🙄😆

I had been riding solo for quite a while and had climbed up to around the high point on our course at 4000ft (1200m). 

I sped along a sealed section, with that wind now as a tailwind, into the little hamlet of Red Range. The organisers had set up a rest stop here at the 32km point which was peopled by some local ladies. 

The food selection was huge. There were Cliff bars, energy gels, bananas, donuts, energy drinks and of course water.

 

I already had my own banana in my jersey pocket as I like to be self sufficient but I did top my water bottle up and took them up on the offer of a donut.

As I pedalled off a couple had done the same not ten metres in front of me. I pedalled easily with the tailwind thinking they would pull away from me as they both looked pretty fit. I was a bit surprised that I was sticking with them and after a kilometre or so I shouted out that I hoped they didn’t mind me tagging on. (Tacking on and slipstreaming from other riders without asking is bad form in the cycling world. This is because you are basically getting a free ride as the leader breaks the wind and has to work much harder than the following riders) They said “yeah, no problem” so I sat on their tail.

We were making good time when we turned off onto gravel road again and we began riding side by side. Chatting, I found they were a couple from Armidale who were doing their first gravel ride on bikes they had borrowed from friends. Being avid roadies and mtbers they were loving it (and their Specialized bikes). 

The lovely couple from Armidale. 

We ended up riding the last 42km or so to the finish together. The second half of the ride just flew by as we chatted and I mentioned the Tour Divide Race to them, explaining what it was and suggesting they watch Ride The Divide to see what it looked like. (Knowing full well that that movie is responsible for getting so many people hooked into The Divide Race😏) The husband (sorry guys, I’m terrible with names) said he definitely would check it out as it sounded like something he would be keen on.

Anyway, we soon rolled back into town as the last ~10km was downhill with a tailwind.

I peeled off towards my car as we entered the Showgrounds gates and the other two went left, still rolling fast. I assumed that they were parked or camped down there. What I didn’t realise was that we were supposed to ride back around to the entrance to the parade ring inside the central oval. Here we would be given a completion pin, a ticket for a free sausage sandwich and a choice of a free alcohol-free beer.

I had packed my bike back into the car, got changed, stretched a bit, bought a steak sandwich from the bbq tent and went to sit on the grass near the start line. I was thinking “I wonder if I should let someone know I finished and I’m back” when I noticed people finishing on the parade ring and being handed all the things I just mentioned above!

I wandered over to the ladies manning the finish line and asked if I was supposed to ride through here. They said yes, if I wanted the finishers schwag. Seeing as I was standing there they loaded me up with it all. The pin and the free sausage sandwich I could take or leave but what was this Heaps Normal beer? I had actually seen it in a supermarket during the week (we can’t buy alcohol in supermarkets here in Australia) so knew it was alcohol free but they were asking full beer prices for it so I didn’t buy any. Here, I had the chance to try it for free!

And try it I did! Plonking myself on the grass, I washed down the steak sandwich with it. I was very pleasantly surprised to note that it tasted exactly like an IPA!

Nice!

So, while not a huge ride I had completed the 75 kilometres in a smidge over three hours. Considering that I’m not particularly fit and the route was all between 3000 and 4000ft above sea level I was happy with that. I was just starting to get some small niggles in the legs on the climbs toward the end but I was riding pretty hard to keep up with the couple from Armidale. I noticed some sustained 162 bpm on my Garmin which is too high for me at the moment so I backed of a bit to bring my heart rate down into the mid 150s which felt more do-able. And in hindsight sight the couple didn’t get away from me so they must have backed off as well….

I didn’t hang around much longer as I had an almost five hour drive to get home but I was glad I came to check out this GravelGoodness thing. I am seriously contemplating doing their next event. It is even further away so I had better sign up for the big distance next time. 😉

Cheers.

*All of the watermarked photos are by Outer Image photography.  Thanks in advance for providing us with quality images of the day!

Not The ADV Fest Ride

With adventure bike riding taking off here in Australia - as it probably rightly should because we have unlimited bits of dirt to ride an appropriately shod motorcycle on - there have been a couple of organised events over the last few years. The "Dirty Weekend" at Tingha last year was one that had run for a couple of years but I hear nothing about it this year as I think this event at Dorrigo may be organised by the same (or similar) folks.

ADVenture Fest  is getting all the attention this year with the culmination being this weekend on a property at Dorrigo. They have organised adv loops in some of the best riding area in the country (if you like rainforest on a big bike 🫤 😆 no seriously, it’s magic country), they have enduro legend Ben Grabham doing training sessions and even glamping tents so that you could ride your bike to the event carrying just a toothbrush and a change of undies! 

Of course I am working this weekend 😞. 

I would have liked to have looked at other rider’s set ups and how they load their bikes but mostly I would have loved to do the training sessions with Grabbo. Learning the right way from a master can’t be beat! 

Like many other events, I had days off either side of it so I decided on a quick, few days, lightly loaded dash along the roads around north eastern NSW in the days leading up to Adv Fest. I wanted to see how the bike handled without all of my camping gear so I was packed with just the minimum clothing for cold overnights in a pub.

 I was also trying out my new ADV Worx crash bar bags for all my tools and tyre fixing gear. This is all in the name of trying to get the load down lower and more forward ala Mr Rieman’s advice. (I reckon he probably knows his shit) Plus, having the tools in the crash bar bags would negate me having to mess around with them when fishing for my gear like I normally have to do with the full camping setup.

Day 1

 I decided to high tail it out of town via the Logan Motorway and Mt Lindsay highway to Boonah for lunch at the motorcycle friendly Flavours Cafe’. It was lunch because I had left home quite late again - I am finding it hard to get up early these days after long, late days at work.

Flavours is normally an efficient place to eat but today it took 45 minutes for a toasted sandwich to come out despite there only being a handful of customers in the place. I decided to ask about the sanger after about 35 minutes in case they forgot (which they clearly had 🙄 but they bullshitted that they were busy) because it came out shortly after.

Anyway, belly full and photos of some Army quads, I tootled off down Carney’s Creek road toward White Swamp road and Old Koreelah.

 This is a very scenic dirt ride that crosses into NSW at a little cattle grid in the middle of nowhere.

Once I adjusted to the feel of riding a big bike on dirt I began to notice how good the front tyre felt. 

I was a bit nervous of putting something called a “Goldentyre” on the front but I must admit, it was feeling very confidence inspiring!

From Old Koreelah (just an area really, not a town) I turned back around the Taloom road which Steve and I rode in early 2019. At the time it was sooo rough and it kicked our arse big time. Today though, it had been resurfaced and was nice and smooth. Until I turned a corner on a hill and then BANG, I was in rainforest. It was like a switch had been flipped! The road was a bit rough with very tight, loose corners here so it was slow going but no issue at all on a Desert X.

I then turned down Paddy’s Flat road. I have done this road a couple of times now but this time I hooked along as the front tyre grip was so inspiring, even on the loose downhill corners. 

I took a short stop at the Clarence river crossing for a pee and to look at the tank trap blocks that were built for the Brisbane line that apparently didn’t exist.

Paddy’s Flat road has been sealed for quite a bit further on the southern side of the river so I was soon back on the tar. 

I was originally going to turn onto Rocky River road just prior to Drake and make my way to Tenterfield that way but as it was now around 4pm I decided to just stick to the highway....

…..but not before a stop at the Lunatic Hotel in Drake.

 There were several patrons who had clearly been in attendance for some time. I grabbed a Toohey’s Old and sat outside admiring the scenery.

The ride up the range from here is an absolute cracker - I always forget how good it really is.

 I gradually pushed the speed more and more.

 For a knobby tyre the GT823 works really well on the blacktop. It doesn’t feel great if there is a big bump mid corner or if I needed to change direction while hard on the brakes or power but overall, for a knobby tyre it is more than acceptable on paved surfaces.

Rolling into the outskirts of Tenterfield I took a right and headed out the Mt Lindsay highway just a couple of kilometres. 

At the going down of the sun, we will remember them….

I made a couple of calls to find accomodation but the Tavern and bowling club motel were booked out. I managed to find a room, so stayed in the Settlers Motel and must say, it was a nice clean, modern room. I’d be more than happy to stay again.

After a shower I wandered into town to find something to eat. I ended up at the Commercial Hotel which was quite unexpectedly upmarket actually. I settled on the beef cheek with garlic mash and broccolini, all washed down with a nice house Shiraz.

I don’t normally go for desert but I thought I’d treat myself tonight. The deconstructed affogato was the winner. I normally wouldn’t go coffee this late at night but I thought “what the hell”!

(It was pretty good too….)

A wander around the main street to walk off dinner was a nice end to the day. 

Angry Bull trails office.

Day 2

I set an alarm for 0730 as I wanted to get up for a walk around town. 

Why? Well, more on that another day but It was a nice cool morning which is why I love coming up here onto the range. 2800 ft of elevation does that.

Breakfast of muesli bars and yoghurt was taken care of by a visit to Coles last night so I loaded up and set off around 9am. I had decided on a mostly dirt loop down off the range, along its base southward, then climb it again into Glen Innes. Yes, I could just ride 1 hour south to Glen Innes but where is the fun in that when you can spend all day on the bike ? 😏

Starting down Billyrimba road it soon became familiar as I had ridden this with Hodgo on the way back from the Dirty Weekend last year. The road here is a crushed granite surface which is super slippery when dry like today but is awesomely grippy if wet or damp. Considering I was running road pressures in my tyres 36/40 I was very pleased (again) with the grip of the front tyre and quickly dispatched several 4wd vehicles along here.

I stopped at Demon Creek for morning tea. 

After my last couple of Japan trips I finally get these little cans of coffee.

 Their native location is in a vending machine along a street or road in Japan. While a public vending machine in Australia wouldn’t last as long as a snowflake in summer, we can buy these little beauties in the supermarket.(At 4x the price they are in Tokyo🫤)

From here I carefully wound my way around Rocky River road. Last time I did this ride I found it loose and skatey on the crushed granite but as I said above, the tyres made all the difference today. 

Still, it is slow going with hundreds of ultra tight bends and switchbacks as the road follows the river.

 I didn’t stop to take many photos as I wanted to stay in front of the 4wds that I had passed. These GoPro shots do it justice though.  Stay well left kids! Too many adv heroes out there think they are on a closed course or in a race....

There is some nice open stuff as you get further east.  It's still pretty loose though. 

Hitting the Bruxner Highway I turned right for the short blast along to Plains Station road  where I would turn south. 

I stopped here for ten minutes to have a drink and look around the countryside, enjoying the cool breeze. It was hot work along Rocky River Rd.

Plains Station Rd drops down to the level of the Clarence river and provides some spectacular glimpses through the trees down to the river valley (but nowhere safe to stop for a photo). The road eventually crosses the river, where there were quite a few campsites set up along a sandy, beach like stretch. 

The road climbed steeply out of the crossing then switched back to look across the camping area and crossing. Very pretty!

I turned right onto Clarence Way and I was expecting plenty of dirt as reported by Steve back in this ride report of his.

 What I found was kilometres of wide, smooth, fast tarmac! It was interspersed with a couple of small sections of gravel but would be totally do-able on a sports bike.

At the intersection in the tiny hamlet of Baryugil I stopped next to three guys on KTM adv bikes. We had a quick chat and they said they were on the way to ADV Fest from Maryborough. They were just waiting for their support car to catch up, then they were off.  A short time later I saw one of them sitting at the Carnham road turn off. He was acting as cornerman for the support vehicle. We chatted again and it looked like they were planning the same back road route as myself to around Jackadgery. This made me feel a bit better knowing that some adv friendly people were in front and behind me as I wasn’t sure whether the river crossings were bridges or simply fords….and these were some big, wide rivers.

There was a lot of smoke around the district and I soon found out why. The farmer had been burning pasture which made for some interesting patterns on the hillsides. 

I couldn’t stop for too long as the Maryborough bloke’s support car keep appearing like something out of a TopGear special.

Thankfully, the river crossings were all low level bridges. There was evidence that the Clarence river had been over the bridge recently.

 It was still flowing very strongly which is unusual for most inland Aussie rivers.

There were plenty of campers here and with good reason. It is such an idyllic spot (use your imagination because I forgot to get photos🙄)

The next bit of the ride was up hill, down dale and twisting and turning.

 There were great views across the counutryside as I crested a hill, then the road would dive down with great sight lines so the DX could be pinned for a few seconds before climbing up to the next hillside corner.

The Mann river crossing was another long, low level bridge. The water was running hard here too.

Fish traps.

Crossing the Mann I was surprised to be met with a road that looked very much like dry river bed! It consisted of pebbles of all sizes (read river stones) that were deep and loose. Think sand riding. Yep, I was puckering but remembered to get my weight back and stay on the gas. The DX plowed its way along the few hundred metres of dry river bed before climbing up the bank, back onto the familiar gravel road.

It wasn’t very long before I came to the Gwydir Highway but not before I stopped to check out another active pasture burn off.

It wasn’t late but it wasn’t early afternoon either so I decided to climb the range and head toward Glen Innes.

 The road up here is cracking fun but it did look damp in the shadows and with an unproven knobby tyre on the front I took it pretty sensibly.

I decided to stop at Raspberry Lookout as I had always just motored past on (many) previous rides. I am so glad I did stop because the views over the Great Dividing Range were awesome!

I chilled out for quite a while, sipping some water and taking in the views.

When a couple of grey nomads towing their self contained effluent tanks….er caravans turned up, I decided to turn out. After all,  I’d had my fun. Time to let someone else soak in the view.

It was getting late in the afternoon and this road is ususally lined with marsupials of every variety, just waiting to take your front wheel out from under you so I took it carefully. I saw little black wallabies by the side of the road that just watched me motor by. I saw big eastern greys, toes up in the air, dead as doornails but none were jumping out at me……until I was only one or two kilometres from town and had let my guard down. Then a huge eastern grey bounded out in front of me. I hit the anchors and was interested to see him change direction to go along the road so that I was now mowing him down from behind. Much better than being sideswiped I guess? In the end I managed to wash off enough speed and he decided to step left and continue with his unnecessary crossing of the road (I mean, there were 1 000 000 acres of land he could have skipped into on the side of the road he was on 🙄) so that the crisis was averted. 

FFS.🤦‍♂️ 

Rocking into Glen Innes I fueled up the bike then rode the fifty metres to the Great Central Hotel where I secured a room for the night and celebrated with a stiff glass of Deepwater Brewing Deliverance Imperial Stout! Just a middy mind, as this stuff is near 10% rocket fuel.

I parked the bike in the shed out the back where two other ADV bikes were already in residence, unloaded, found my room, found a shower then hit the bar for one of the biggest chicken parmys I’ve seen. Good value, this place. 😉

I did have a quick yarn to the two KTM boys before I turned in. They were both from SE QLD and headed for home tomorrow, like me as they had to work the weekend too.

It had been a solid day in the saddle today. Dirt roads require a high level of concentration. Much like road riding at warp speeds used to - until that became very unfashionable twenty years ago.

Damn, that Stout is good!

Day 3

Today began with breakfast next door at the appropriately named “The Local”. The food and coffee are great here and the location couldn’t be better, right next to the pub!

I rolled out of town heading north on the New England highway to make some miles but turned off at Deepwater to ride the Torrington road to Stannum. While it is sealed all the way to Stannum, there was one very interesting ninety degree corner on the edge of Stannum that was covered in about 50mm of fine blue metal for the entire width of the road!

 A better motorcycle trap you could not make!

🫣🤨🫤😡 

I stood the bike up and thankfully because I wasn’t going very quick and had great tyres (for gravel) was able to make the corner in one piece. I was awake now!

Stannum is a one horse locality so I was through it in twenty seconds and onto very skatey crushed granite surface road. It took me a minute to find my “loose bike” bearings but then I had fun. I have done this road the last few times I have come this way so am getting to know it. 

That doesn’t mean I go fast - it demands respect or you will be down in a flash - but the scenery is ever changing and the ride challenging for a gravel road.

 I filled up in Tenterfield then decided to just head for home via the Mt Lindsay highway to Old Koreelah, White Swamp and Carneys creek roads through Boonah and home as I wanted to beat Friday afternoon traffic.

Cobb & Co museum, Liston.

 I hate traffic so much these days that I tend to tailor all of my riding around missing it. The joys of living in the big smoke.

My welcoming committee/lawn mowing service was home to greet me. At least she didn’t cut across in front of me in some suicidal endeavour. Nope, just pooping weed seeds into my lawn was enough for her today….

That was just over 1000 kilometres for the three days (2 full days away really). The tyres performed flawlessly.

Travelling light with my tools in the crash bar bags made for a sweeter handling bike on the dirt.

 I might not have made it to ADV Fest but hell,  I don't like crowds much anyway....🤨

 Now, with the DX all squared away, I pumped up the mtb tyres and headed out for a some singletrack goodness. Most of our local trails have been given a facelift by council in the last few months so that they are like new again - some better than new actually! And none of it needing us volunteers to bust a gut.  All that hard work ten or so years ago is paying dividends now. 

Living the dream!

 😉

Cheers.