Having spent the past three weeks exploring the Victorian Alps, the time had to say farewell to the mountains and make my way back to Melbourne, via the rural city of Wangaratta. But rather than simply hopping on a coach for the kilometre trip from Bright (possibly my favourite small town in Australia) I wanted to get there in a way that would do justice to the wondrous scenery to be found all along the Ovens Valley; and if I could find a way to incorporate a visit to some of the local craft breweries in the region, well, that would probably be okay too. And so after locating a bicycle (appropriately named The Bike Hire Company) in nearby Beechworth who could drop a bicycle off to me in Bright and then collect it from Wangaratta (free of charge, no less) it was decided: I would cycle the 86km Murray to Mountains Rail Trail - as well as the 15km spur trail to Beechworth and back - and just to make sure I would have plenty of time for the odd brewery visit along the way, I would spread it out over three days. The fact
that I would still have to get a coach back to Bright to collect my backpack - then another coach back to Wangaratta again, before I could continue onto Melbourne - irrelevant as far as I was concerned...
Leaving Bright just after midday on a glorious late summers day - with the temperature in the and just a light sprinkling of clouds - it occurred to me that my trip would probably qualify as some sort of biathlon: instead of skiing and shooting, my two chosen disciplines would be cycling and drinking. And though until very recently Id done very little of either activity over the past twelve months, I was quietly confident that my years of experience and (by me at least) staying power would prove equal to the challenge. The cycling I was less confident about, but it was for this reason that I had deliberately set my sights pretty low, giving myself three days to cycle no more than 150km, so as to ensure I would have maximum energy left at the end of each day to devote to the
lager that dominates the Australian market, but beers - whether they be golden ales, pale ales, amber ales, red ales, IPAs, stouts, porters, barley wines, wheat beers, or even the occasional sour, I cant get enough of the precious nectar. And theres no better way to enjoy such delectable beverages than to sample as many as possible - within moderation, if need be - fresh from the tap at the point of their origin: the brewery bar.
It was for this reason that I up with the idea (though Im sure I wasnt the first to do so) the High Country Brewery Trail with the Murray to Mountains Rail Trail. The theory was simple: cycle a reasonable distance (everything in moderation, after all) each day, then set up camp in the nearest holiday park and head straight to the local brewery to replenish any lost liquids. And with no less than five craft breweries located on or near the trail, I would have plenty of opportunities to do just that. In fact the tone for the trip was set early on, when I called a halt only 6km
into my ride to indulge in one of the greatest cheeseburgers of all time, at the Rail Trail Cafe in the town of Porepunkah.
Suitably recharged I pressed on down the trail (which, unlike the East Gippsland Rail Trail that I had cycled about a month earlier, is paved for its entire length) as the gorgeous scenery of the Ovens Valley unfolded all around me. From vineyards loaded with grapes to fields full of sunflowers; and farms growing everything from berries to nuts to pumpkins and raising cows, deer and alpacas, it seemed that every inch of the valley floor was devoted to producing a rich harvest of one sort or another; yet always in the background were mountains cloaked in trees, while the impressive granite bulk of Mount Buffalo towered impressively above it all.
