The Sound of Music

Letting your soul sing is challenging especially when you find yourself competing with an out of tune rendition of Old Macdonald had a Farm. No matter how far into the silent wilderness you manage to wander it is difficult to escape the white noise that is parenthood. Even in the 'wildest woods' a two year old is still a two year old, full of incessant questions and mutterings.

This harsh and somewhat disturbing realisation comes after the completion of our first overnight mountain bike trip; a two day and two night exploration of Barrington Tops National Park. At 1500m it was going to be a subalpine adventure along the Barrington Trail in an area we had never before ventured. The drive to where we would leave the car was slow and windy as we ascended some 1400m up the escarpment and onto the plateau.

Those first few wobbly pedal strokes out of the car park were satisfying indeed. We were on our way. Everything we needed for the next 48 hours we had firmly strapped and loaded on our bikes.

Barrington Trail

The Kit

You could say that it was a journey of discovery. We now know that one and a half sleeping mats between a family of four really isn't enough, that even a couple of days without coffee will in fact bring on withdrawal symptoms, that padded bike shorts are essential, that although the food gets lighter throughout the journey the nappies just get heavier and that the one time you choose to ignore Tahlia's whining in the hope of teaching her some resilience turns out to be the time that she's trapped inside the chariot with a spider crawling on her.

But we also learnt how satisfying it felt to ride into camp at the end of a long day, to be self sufficient and to know that we had everything our little family needed right there, to collect water from the tiny creek at the bottom of the campsite, to sit and watch at dusk the wild brumbys cautiously make their way towards us and to spend a few days and nights lost in our own little world. Maybe there was some music of the soul after all.

Our First Campsite

Morning Tea Time

The Tent Makes a Great Play Pen