Bunbury to Noggerup 2000

Bunbury to Noggerup, day 1, Monday 18 September 2000. I left the Bunbury Motel at 8:38 on a cool overcast morning with light WSW winds. The odometer read 36. I was riding due east to get onto the old South Western Highway and head for Dardanup. It was good to ‘break the surly bonds’ of the city and move out into the open country. I reached Dardanup and turned left into Ferguson Road. A sign said that this led to the Ferguson Valley, in the sense that they were trying to encourage tourists in. I rested at 53.

Noggerup roadway

The hill-climbing inevitably began as I left the coastal plain and mounted the scarp. I found the going quite hard because I wasn’t as fit as I normally would have been at the start of a Ride. I had only left work on Friday and hadn’t done any long rides for a while. But I managed and eventually rolled down a long descent towards the point I had chosen for my next rest. It turned out to be a roundabout constructed at a three-way intersection.

As I came down the hill towards it I was reminded of the movie ‘Pet Sematary’ because it seemed that the whole eastern side of the roundabout was covered with small graves, but when I arrived this turned out to be Gnomesville, a collection of hundreds of garden gnomes. These colourful little people were grouped around small structures and nestled in trees and stumps, inscribed with every imaginable pun on ‘gnome’; dun gnomin’, gnomeless, ungnome, gnomessin’ about, and so on.

After leaving this curious apparition in empty pastoral country I followed the sign that said ‘Lowden 9km’ though my map said it was 12, which it proved to be. At the bottom of a hill I turned right onto the Donnybrook-Boyup Brook Road and headed east again. The road wasn’t too hilly because it followed the old railway reserve, and I still had a tailwind, but I was feeling my lack of fitness and wondered if I would be able to make the Boyup Brook-Nannup-Augusta run that I planned, in two days, or was this to be another chicken ride? Was I just too old, new bike or no?

I took another rest at 86, then reached the Noggerup cabins where I had booked a couple of weeks before, at 104, 12:39. I had to get off to walk down the soft track, and heard someone yell out ‘Charles!’ It was Dennis, the owner of the establishment, who was over the other side building more of it, with help from his friends. I went over there to see them and they were having a long discussion about one of the walls that was out of whack.

It took a while for them to finish their discussion and come over. I was particularly in need on this day of a rest and wanted to get into my room or cabin.

Eventually Dennis came over and told me that he had bumped me from the original cabin that he was going to put me in. There were only two. Mine was very small with a bed and light and heater, but a verandah outside, with table and chairs and lots of reading material, including a German dictionary. There was a dish of oranges on the table, from the orchard that was part of the property.

The toilet and shower were in a separate small cabin some distance away. Dennis said he was going into ‘town’, one of the ‘Brooks I presume, so I could do what I liked. I slept in the cabin for about an hour, then awoke with a bad attack of cramp. After recovering from this I had a shower and washed my clothes, then looked around the property, saw the ducks and geese and pig and, as invited, enjoyed a fresh orange from a tree. There was a fine sturdy crop of silver beet. I went down to the road, saw the hall then looked over what there was of the settlement.

Noggerup used to be a timber town and had its own school from 1909 to 1960. The site of this is marked but bears nothing now but the rusty remnant of old-fashioned playground equipment. The ruins of a tennis court are nearby. After closure, the school was used as a youth hostel until about 20 years ago – I remember it used to be mentioned in Cycle Touring Association newsletters, quite popular with cycle tourists. But the local shire council condemned it and it was demolished.

Dennis came back and cooked me stir-fry chicken and apple pie for dinner. During this time the farmer and his son arrived. Bruce, the son, came in with a large casserole dish, containing dinner prepared by his mum and frozen, to be microwaved that evening. Dennis had the microwave oven. The two of them chatted about farming, and soils and crops. Eventually after about three goes in the microwave, during which the casserole became rather mushy, Bruce was satisfied that it contained no ice, just bone, and took it away to consume with his Dad.

After dinner Dennis invited me up to his room to watch Olympics on his TV. The ‘live coverage’ was a bit dead by that time so we watched ‘Wallace and Gromit’ on Channel 2 instead.

I retired to my cabin at about nine. I brought my washing in to blow with the fan heater. The night was very cold and damp, and dark with no moon or outside lighting. The milky way stood out as we never see it in the city, like a glowing cloud. Dennis had kindly lent me his torch to find my way to the facilities in the dark. Even so, I had trouble – the farmers had parked their vehicle too close to the toilet cabin, beside which a thorny bush was growing. I struggled past the thorny bush only to bang my head on an elevated bar structure on the front of the vehicle. Blood flowed freely as I made my way back to my cabin. I stopped the bleeding and applied yellow stuff and a band-aid from my first-aid kit. I didn’t want any blood on the pillow-case. Apart from that episode I slept well until thump, thump past my door and a cry of ‘breakfast!’ from Dennis at 7:20 am. He had put it on the table on the verandah and I crept out to eat it in the frosty morning.

I had cereal, scrambled egg, toast and coffee, and the staple orange. I got organised, paid Dennis $40, shook hands and got on my way. See day 2!

Reading at Noggerup: 104 km. day’s ride: 68 km. Speed to Noggerup: 17 kph.

Charles A. Pierce

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Tags: Bunbury, Dardanup, Noggerup

Bunbury to Noggerup 2000

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