Day 11- Albury to Wangaratta

27 Oct

Last evening we were joined by Ellio Stocco from my riding group in Melbourne…. He caught the train up from Melbourne to join us on the last 4 days into Melbourne….

After briefing him on the ride and sorting out his Garmin to download rides etc we had a delightful roast dinner at the hotel…. Roast pork chops and vegetables!

After a good night of sleep we awoke to a reasonably good day with some clouds and even a bit of sun!

We started at about 8.30 am and made our way through aaaaqAlbury to the Murray River which was right up to the bridge almost. There was water everywhere along the floodway near the river!

After crossing into Victoria we then made our way to Barnawatha for a lovely coffee stop run out of a caravan next to the post office. The lady serving us was delightful and it seems the place to go for bike riders as several groups of riders from Albury stop there.

After coffee we made on to the lovely town of Chilton and enjoyed the history of the place which started during the 1850 gold rush.

Being not ready for lunch, Ellio and I found a lovely cafe/ winery where we were able to get a toasted sandwich to go. The venue in Chilton was called Posh Plonk which is work another visit sometime.

After this the fun began with ever increasing showers along the way to Wangaratta. We also managed to organise ourselves to draft into the wind hitch proved to be very helpful to progress towards Wangaratta.

When the rain became very heavy we stopped to have our toasted sandwich in the shelter of the CFA station in North Wangaratta…. Thank god for this shelter as the rain was very heavy!

After this it was on to the final push in to Wangaratta and the closer we got to the to the town the heavier the rain became!

We finally arrived at the motel at 3.30 pm after doing about 90 kms with about 450 metres of climbing.

We were absolutely drenched and it was off with the clothes and on to a warm shower….

The accommodation tonight is in bungalow style buildings such as you see in caravan parks

We are a little out of town so will do an Uber to somewhere for dinner

We are on the road again tomorrow to Euroa and we all hope the rain eases!