Not so good on the home front though as I woke up weak, dizzy and shaking with the gastro flu that is making it’s way through our household and around the region lately – change of season bug I guess that seems to happen each year. It was a day of sucking it up (literally, eewww !) and making the best of it as MUni called.

Thanks to the local and Melbourne guys who made it a fun day. With minimal signage to go by everyone (well… we thought it was everyone) managed to meet up at the second entry point to the Wombat MTB Singletrack and we headed off just after 11.30am.

Group shot at start of ride

The ride route was all single track apart from the shortcut back to the cars at the end of the day, bypassing the steeper trails on the eastern side of the dividing road.

Ride Route

Joell the uni maniac came prepared with highly fashionable body armour he’d scabbed from junk in my attic the night before… it’s now a trail marker

Joell with his high fashion body armour

The group gathered around numerous challenges along the way.

John at one of the mud challenges

There was singletrack, lots of twisty, narrow singletrack!

Sid on the trail

Paddy crossing a bridge on his one of a kind 'Only' 29'er!

And quite a few rest stops along the way.

Pit Stop

Even with the recent dry weather there was still lots of greasy mud to be enjoyed.

Joell carving mud

And a bunch of obstacles to clear.

Eric on the trail

There was a lot of discussion about making a uni movie, well actually, discussing the most important thing – the title.

Nick, Uni Movie Maniac

The ride of the day has to go to Connor. His first MUni and on a 20″ — he hardly broke a sweat! GREAT ride mate!

Connor, Ride of the Day. AWESOME!

I felt dizzy and disorientated towards the end of the ride,  like we were riding in circles – not so handy when you are meant to be giving directions. Luckily singletrack is just that – all we needed to do was follow it until it crossed the main dirt road that lead back to the cars.

Heading back to the cars along the access road after the ride

The end of ride photo turned into something else. What exactly? No idea!

End of ride 'What the?!' photo

The big and small of it!

The big and small of it!

We discovered a note written on my unwashed van from Morgan. Sorry mate, next time!

Nooooo Morgan! Sorry mate, must have just missed ya. Next time!

Then the worst news of the ride – we headed into the bakery at Woodend and they had sold out of their legendary vanilla slices…. NOOOOOOO!

The Melbourne guys headed for home while the local gang messed around for an hour or so on uni’s in the nearby parklands at Woodend.

Fun day, thanks all. I’m off to sleep.

Next Monthly MUni: Sunday October 4th

Like many unicyclists almost all of my riding is alone so the social aspect of the monthly MUni rides is really enjoyable, though always sort of strange initially. From looking forward and seeing a bunch of uni’s cruising through the forest, meeting other riders,  to chatting about anything uni with people who ‘get it’,  it’s a cool way to ride and a different experience to going solo.

Pre Ride Group Shot

The looping route included fire track climbs followed by single track descents.

Single Track

After French Vanilla Slice and munchies at the Woodend Bakery, the local guys took over the Woodend Skate Park before heading home.

Liam 'All your skate park belong to us'

Thanks to everyone who came up for the ride, hope to catch up with you guys for another ride or three.

Special mention to Joell and Oscar who rode the trail on 20″ uni’s, onya guys!

Details of September MUni Ride 04 — Wombat MTB Trail

We drove out to an area of forest called Dry Diggings which was anything but dry due to the wild weather over the last couple of days and with uni’s sorted rode along single track to Browns Gully and back.

Monthy MUni (Thanks for the pic Robyn!)

Thanks to Unicycle.Com Australia we had 24″ and 26″ ISIS Nimbus MUni’s available as loaners for the ride which were put to good use.

Ride Route, Monthly MUni 02

The single track was wet and slippery but lots of fun.

Joell, in Browns Gully

It was my first ride in a couple of weeks due to a crappy winter flu so the aim was to take it easy and not get too wet and cold. Amazingly and thankfully the stormy weather held off all day, until we returned to the Chocolate Mill.

Leaving Browns Gully, Monthly MUni

The Chocolate Mill offered a free ultimate hot chocolate for the best UPD of the Day, claimed by Oscar although Joell’s nut buster while crossing Browns Gully on a fallen tree was a close second

Thanks to everyone who braved the weather forecast and came along for the second Monthly MUni ride, especially the families who drove up from Melbourne.

Next Monthly MUni: Sunday August 9th

After meeting up at the Glenlyon General Store we drove to Bridge Road/Reed Track, a handy starting point with forest rides heading out in all directions. With uni’s sorted we hit the trails.

The ride route:

 

Ride Route, Wombat Forest

Mud puddle crossings were the order of the day, providing lots of laughs and wet gear, but unfortunately no full on face plants

Eric the Red crossing one of the many mud puddles

After looping down to the Loddon river and back up to vehicles we rode down an unnamed idyllic stretch of single track.

Paddy, infected with MUni Madness

Morgan bailing, Boundary Road

After the ride we headed back to the Glenlyon General Store for drinks and food.

Barry, Morgan, Paddy, Eric, Pete

Many thanks to Barry and Julie who came up from Melbourne, and generously helped out with a spare MUni. Barry, Morgan, Paddy and Eric, thanks for the ride. Onya guys!

Lesson learned: Everyone bring more food next time, and a few more tools.

Next monthly MUni: Sunday 12th July