Beachfront Hotel - Lee Point, 4 March 2007
Wet Wet Wet by Jon Presswell
On Sunday 4 March at the end of that weekend of rain in Darwin about a dozen riders assembled at the Beachfront Hotel for the Lee Pt ride. Funnily enough it was raining when we left and we all knew it was going to be a dirty day. I was in the not so privileged position of ride leader. Now, the Lee Pt ride is best when it is combined with a loop to the eastern side of Lee Pt Rd where there are some great forest 4WD tracks.... the only hitch is that this forest is low lying paperbark forest and after all this rain it could be a wee bit damp. I promised myself I wouldn't be stupid enough to lead the group there.
We headed out along the coastal dune path. It rides well after rain as this hardens the sand and today was no exception. On the early sections the trail was blocked by fallen trees but once we cleared these it was a fast single track spin to the end of the trail. Doubling back on the 4WD track we cut through to the main trail and headed up towards Kyle's original singletrack above the main trail. Water was everywhere with the first grill bridge being covered by a raging (well almost) torrent. I didn't see it but apparently Robyn rode not very deliberately off the bridge into said torrent. Cool. Literally.
We assembled again and I tried to get Dave to agree with me that it was too wet to head for the other side of Lee Pt Road. He agreed it would be way too wet so it was settled and we headed there. Five minutes into the eastern track and it began. At first we crossed a few deep puddles then as the terrain dropped away the trail became a 3 ft deep river for stretches of up to 100 metres or more. People began to screech with horror and delight. It was amazing, just keep pedalling, churn, churn, churn as your cluster and bottom bracket ground themselves to bits beneath you. We made it through this section and re-grouped before heading north back into the forest proper. The whole forest was draining east into Buffalo Creek; what were normally dry waterways had become huge rivers 3 and 4 ft deep and awfully wide, all flowing like crazy through the trees. I began to wonder if we (whaddya mean we white boy?) had made a serious error of judgement. We swam on through, still riding, occasionally dragging our bikes. It was excellent to see the conditions like this, probably a one in ten year phenomena. One thought in the back of my mind was that this wasn’t the most unlikely place in the world to chance upon a crocodile. We could re-name the ride the Crocodile Trophy - but that name is taken.
Finally we made it through to the Lee Pt picnic area and then it was the usual fast flog down the main trail and back to the pub. One of the best and most ridiculous rides I have ever participated in. I am trying not to think about the state of my bike.
