Picket Hill

It’s hard not to enjoy a ride like this.

I felt the need to ride out a few kinks this morning, so after a breakfast and reading the paper by Kingston Beach I headed down to Summerleas Road near Kingston.

The plan was to head up the trails from there and then around the side of Picket Hill, follow the backroads to Ferntree and see if I could find this trail I’ve heard about from Westringa Road. 

Nobody will be surprised to know it didn’t go to plan.

It was a beautiful ride up to Cades Drive, lots of flowers around, and a few dogs that didn’t seem to like me very much.  I was petty pleased that I cycled up a few sections that only 3 months ago I had thought were uncyclable.  Yay me.

From the top of Cades Drive instead of heading up the trail to the lookout on Pickles Hill, I instead followed the other junction.  It went down, way down until it came out on what I hoped was the trail headng around the hill.

This section of the trail was a fun ride (pretty overgrown) firstly through reeds and paddocks, but then through open bushland with lot sof wildflowers. 

I had to start pushing at a small washout as the track got really steep and rocky (for me) and then I saw a gate on the track above me, with a sign on it. 

A sign can be good or bad.  Sometimes, very few times, they say things like “Please shut the gate”.  More often, much more often, they say “Private Property, No Trespassers”.  This sign was one of the latter signs.  I checked on my GPS and I was only 300 metres from the main road in front of me, so close and yet so far. I took a few snap shots and then turned around and explored the trail going the other way.  It ended up running down parallel to the power lines and dropping out onto Cripps Road which is a cute little road.

An hour and 30 minutes after heading off I was back loading my bike in the car.  Not quite the day I planned, but that’s a few more trails that I know about.

What does intrigue me though is when looking at my route back on the computer apparently there is a trail that heads down and around the property.  I can’t remember seeing any trail leading off, but this means I have to put it back into my possible rides list for another day.,

The No Tresspassers Sign, Sigh.