I think I have done some fairly adventurous stuff, but in general it has been on roads regularly frequented by cars, or on asphalt. Even though this trip was only about 75Km and a day and a half long, this was no ordinary road and there wasn't much around to help me if I got in trouble. Although short, this was as adventurous a trip as I have done yet.
The CREB stands for the Cairns Regional Electricity Board, and is basically a very rough 4WD track originally carved through the wilderness to connect rural communities north of Cairns with electricity.
The track is closed for much of the year as it is impassable in the wet, even in the best of 4WD vehicles. It becomes impassable for a few reasons; firstly, it gets too muddy on the Daintree side, causing vehicles to get stuck, and also on the Daintree side the river swells and gets too deep, especially through the wet season. With no bridge, you have to wade through the river at the start of the track, which is also inhabited by crocodiles - one in that particular part of the river is apparently over 5 metres long! The rain also makes the clay dirt on the track impossibly slippery, making it hard to get the traction to get up the steep inclines, and then dangerously difficult to use the brakes to control the descent. Alongside the track there is plenty of evidence of cars that didn't make it.
I had originally planned to cycle the CREB track and then the Bloomfield track the next day. The Bloomfield track is a 4WD track that runs from Cape Tribulation (the end of the sealed road) to Cooktown. I had planned to come off the CREB and do part of it back to my car, which was parked at the Daintree River Ferry car park. In retrospect, this was a pretty stupidly ambitious plan.
I am still quite new to bikepacking and it can be very difficult to know exactly what distances I am able to cover in a day. When I bicycle tour on sealed roads, I know that 100Km is a comfortable day on an average road. If it is very mountainous or windy, maybe 80Km. However, I can do 140Km+ on almost any day if I push myself. Bikepacking is much harder to judge.
There are many more variables at play on a bikepacking trip. The first being the severity of the climbs and descents; they are usually much less forgiving meaning you may have to push the bike on the way up and go very slowly even on the way down. The road surface can also vary quite a bit and this determines how fast you can go, and you never really know until you are on the track itself. The weather also can change the road conditions rapidly, making some sections almost undoable, or at least incredibly slow going.
Bikepacking usually also involves being far away from any resources; you may have to source your water from the surroundings, carry more water, and carry more food. You may also need to bring some specialist equipment, and finding comfortable places to rest and recuperate is often much harder - you won't find a nice energy boosting coffee around the corner unless you make it yourself.
I had intended then to do about 140Km over two days, and I thought I'd have plenty of time. How wrong I was. I did about 60Km on the first day on the CREB, with about 16 of those on the sealed roads going from my car to the start of the track. The 45 or so Km on the CREB track took me the whole day, with lots of hiking the bike and heavy braking down the hills. There was hardly a flat section.
The day also included plenty of river and creek crossings; the first was across the crocodile-infested Daintree river, which I did worry a bit about. Most people cross this river in their 4WD, I would be walking it across on a bicycle. I was told by a local that I had no worries though as the river level was very low, and as long as I didn't cross at dusk, dawn or at night I'd be absolutely fine. Multiple river crossings did slow me down though.
The biggest reason for the slow day, however, was simply the arduous nature of the track. Incredibly steep inclines, so steep to the point I was struggling at a few points to push the bike up them, made worse by some slightly wet areas making it difficult to get a grip with my shoes. After finishing the biggest climb of the day up "Big Red", I was so spent in the 35 C heat that I starting cramping in multiple areas, first getting on and off the bike, and then just walking. This had me a little concerned for a while about how I'd make enough progress to even get off the track by the end of the next day, let alone do another 70Km on another track.
I rested and recovered, but even after the big climbs were done, there were multiple steep, smaller climbs, which took a lot out of me and I was soaked with sweat all day. This was hard yakka, as they say in this part of the world.
Still, the track was remote and beautiful and it felt like a real adventure. The only other person doing the track on both days was a motorcyclist I saw a few kilometres in from the start in the morning on the first day. He was going to visit a friend in Cooktown and thought he'd give the track a go (that's him in the picture below).
I was quite happy with not seeing too much dangerous wildlife, particularly the crocodiles at the Daintree river crossing (the other creeks were in the mountains, and crocs don't enjoy climbing), with the only creepy crawly being a red-bellied black snake that slithered away from me on the track. A Ulysses butterfly also followed me for while, a strikingly beautiful, large turquoise and black butterfly found here in Far North Queensland.
By about 2pm I was utterly spent, and I know I have said this a few times on this blog, but on this occasion, I really mean it. Cramping in multiple areas, I was truly struggling to put one foot in front of the other and even to get on the bike to ride it. With that in mind then, I was glad to find a campground about 30Km into the track. I knew that there was a place called, "Yundilli Camp", but I had assumed it was just an unmanned and basic campground with a bench and some flat areas for pitching a tent. I was surprised to find a Garden of Eden-like place in the middle of the harshness of the forest.
So knackered at this point, I failed to take any pictures, but I wish I had. There was a nice little house within a large plot of land with an almost perfectly manicured lawn and garden. I had assumed it must be aboriginals living all the way out here (with a perfectly manicured garden, I should have known better), but it was just an older white couple who decided to live away from it all in the forest. I was amazed at how well their home was kitted-out. The husband was sitting down in front of a huge widescreen TV and their kitchen had all the appliances you might expect (the house was on the track for the electricity board after all, I guess).
The lady gave me some water and said I could camp for free if I wanted seeing as I was just on a bicycle, but that they had moved the camping area to just down the road because their outside toilet was not useable. I thanked the lady and commented how I was envious of their wonderful property and little piece of heaven in the rainforest.
The camping area just down the road had a permanent resident whose car and bed sat under a shelter with no walls. He had a few chairs, a couple of wash basins, and a clothes line, and just a rainwater tank for drinking and washing dishes and clothes. He was doing some work for the couple doing odd jobs and some backburning of the forest to make sure they didn't get any serious forest fires engulfing the property. For most of the year this area of Australia is very green and moist, so there is a fairly low chance of forest fires, but just before the rains come in December, it can be very hot and dry so you do see the odd forest fire every now and then, although usually not serious.
The chap living at the campsite had hardly moved from the area in decades, and rarely even visited any of the small towns in the region. He seemed quite happy with a largely solitary existence in the forest, although he did talk my head off for about half an hour which suggested to me that he missed having a good conversation.
It was a perfect area to camp, better than I ever could have expected on this track, but I had arrived at about 2pm, so it felt a bit early to stop. With what I thought was the whole Bloomfield track to do the following day, I asked the man whether there were any other camping areas further up the track. He replied no, but said that I could just camp in the bush and that there was nothing really dangerous in the forest except for Yowies and Hairy Men. I had no idea what they were so I asked him. He said that Yowies were giant hairy men that roamed the forest and only came into contact with those who were truly connected to nature (basically the Australian version on Bigfoot). The Hairy Men were as described, hairy men, but were pygmy-like and more numerous. He was being dead serious, so I was trying not to laugh.
Anyway, I decided to move on but not before taking a good rest and having an early supper. It really pained me to go on as it would have been a great place to camp the night. I ended up camping under one of the electricity pylons as it was on a flat piece of grassy ground (sort of). There were plenty of mosquitoes and it took me quite a while to cool down in the tent. A sweaty and uncomfortable night, but I did manage some sleep, although I had some concerns for the next day.
My chief concern was how I was going to get back to my car the next day. It seemed a mammoth task after the day I had. I knew the Bloomfield track would be a lot easier than the CREB but I still knew that the Bloomfield track was not for the faint-hearted either, with steep climbs and no services. I knew that the CREB had taken a lot out of me too. The other issue I had was that for most of the first half of the night it was raining. I was worried about the track condition the next day and whether I could get across the Bloomfield river, and whether it had any crocs! A quick, panicked glance at the map revealed that I at least didn't have to worry about crocodiles as the river crossing was at an elevation of about 200m. No crocs up there.
I was still concerned about the water level though, especially after waking up in the morning to lightning in the sky. Bizarrely, however, there were no clouds that I could see. Looking up, all I could see were a thousand stars and the MilkyWay, then suddenly a flash of light.
The storms were on the coast and I was still somewhat inland, so the first mission of the day was to get to the river and cross it nice and early before any heavy downpours arrived and swelled the river, so I set-off before 5.30am.
On the way I had a bit of a scare. There was pink tape blocking-off the track. I was now way too far in to turn back so I just ducked underneath it and hoped for the best. I had visions of a landslide devouring the route or something, but soon discovered that it must have been because of some backburning of the forest as most of the way after it was showing evidence of recent burns. It was beautiful though as the fire made tree leaves turn red and the earth black. Recent rains meant that bright green shoots and leaves on trees could be seen within the charred colours. It was like Autumn and Spring combined and made for a unique and pretty landscape.
I made it to the river in good time and crossed it with no problems at all. The only thing in my way after that was a steep descent onto the Bloomfield track. You'd think that would be fun, but actually I had to walk my bike down, so steep as it was. There were some really nice views to finish the track and it was much better than pushing the bike up the insane climbs on the previous day.
It was about 9am at this time and by then I had figured-out that I was never going to make it to my car by the end of the day, particularly as the Bloomfield track's surface was quite rough and corrugated in most places. I thought about flagging-down a vehicle that past me and seeing if I could hitch a lift. I knew that every vehicle going past would be a 4WD, and likely with space in the back for a bike. It did take 2 hours for me to see a car though and the first one overtook me on a steep descent in which I was doing my best to concentrate on not falling off the bike, so I missed my chance to hail him. The ascents were up to 30% incline, so I got a fair taster of my day to come. To be honest, they felt a good deal easier than the ascents on the CREB, so I dread to think what the incline was on there in some places.
Luckily, about 30 minutes later a car passed me going up a hill. Stupidly, I didn't flag him down and I thought I had missed my chance. However, so forlorn I must have looked, the driver stopped a little further up and offered me a lift up the hill. I simply asked him if I could go a little further. He happily accepted and we had a good chat on the way back to the river crossing where my car was parked. He was a great guy actually and I think we had a fair amount in common, so it was an enjoyable conversation. He was driving to Cairns to pick his mother up from the airport. He did drive incredibly fast down that track, but I was very glad I wasn't riding it. This kind chap truly saved my bacon.
Safely back to the car then and very relieved to be. As if by magic, the heavens started to open about 2 minutes down the road and didn't really stop for the rest of the day, sometimes being extremely heavy. Basically, I had avoided the day from hell by pulling up stumps and calling it a day a little early. Great decision, and the Bloomfield track will have to wait for another day. A real adventure squeezed into a day and a half, an eventful first major trip on the new bike.
You can also check-out this vlog I did on this trip below:
