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RENTON 425-255-1874 GREGGSCYCLES.COM 7007 WOOOLAWN AVE NE. SEATTLE 706-523-1822 407 E 4TH AVE. OLYMPIA 360-357-7047 PATAGONIA PATAGONIA.COM 2100 1ST St SEATTLE 206-622-9700 e SNOWBOARD CONNECTION SNOWBOARDCONNECTION.COM 604 ALASKAN WAY. SEATTLE 706-467-8545 URBAN SURF URBANSURECOM 2100 N NORTH LAKE WAY. SEATTLE 206-545-9463 o. III to included in blue gearfinder please call 212.777.0024. e III GRAVITY SPORTS 0 • III GREG'S GREEN LAKE • 0 III OLYMPIC OUTFITTERS. 0 e e continued from page 70 obvious fork in the t rack. IN SEARCH OF THE OLD ROAD The singletrack suddenly widened and with in three-feet branched sharply into two distinct trails. I quickly f lexed and released my right brake lever, pivoted my hips to the left and abandoned my eastern bearing: a smoothly executed righthand turn. Within seconds the solid ground under my free wheeling tires gave way to air. I sailed over a sheer precipice and dropped fast. This is going to hurt, was all I had time to think. In fine form, my rear tire stabbed the sloped earth . With a bone-jarring thud , the front followed su it. I lurched forward, jamming my stomach into the headset, but managed not to fa ll off the bike. The wi nd knocked out of me, I snapped back and landed hard squarely on the seat. Rigid and upright I bounced to the bottom of the steep descent. How far I fell I will never know. Stunned to have survived unscathed, I pedaled away without looking back. My search for the old Great Ocean Road was over. I had found it. A steep decline, I had been told, was the last landmark I would encounter. Confident the same was behind me, al l my facu lties focused on color. Accordi ng to Iris, prior to my discovering the old road, brown would no longer dominate the barren landscape. The final piece of the puzzle had snapped itself into place. The earth under my tires was burnt red. Georgia clay is dull in comparison. I had finally discovered a vintage section of the old Great Ocean Road. The riding I longed to experience had commenced. The old Great Ocean Road does not emulate the Karakoram Highway in Pakistan, nor Route 66. Nor does the Gellibrand River riva l the Nile, Mississippi or Rio Grande. Like a gracefu l couple in thei r autumn years, the storied Australian treasures before my eyes were both shy and proud in their grandeur and eloquently projected a peaceful aura. The old road was fl at and spacious. Three mountain bikes could have comfortably traveled abreast. To the north , plump and rounded hills, covered in thick green grass, jutted from the road's edge. A silent wind combed the tall vibrant blades. No trace of human or animal traffic was present in the loamy red soil. My mountain bike floated over the soft red surface. Looking over my shoulder, I saw that noth ing could track me, my tires left no mark . . I had the entire road to myself yet was not alone. Keeping me company was the rippling Gellibrand. Clear and inviting, the Gellibrand is more a stream than a river. Her current flowed lazily, occasionally slowing to ease around a familiar bend. Never did her course wander too long or too far from the old road. A gentle gradient lifted the old road one, five , 10 feet above the Gellibrand. My legs didn't even feel the steady incline. An outcrop of polished boulders emerged and buffered the road and the river. A batallion of river red gums stood sentinel on the Gellibrand's southern bank, their branches providing a canopy over the river and the old road. Pedaling the pavement along the coast, I was contin ually at the mercy of the sun's intensified rays and of oppressive headwinds. Each was uninhibited in the discomfort they delivered. Short legs and webbed feet propelled what looked like a dead log drifting upriver. Upon closer inspection , I realized the floating object was a live platypus. To my aston ishment , the living fossil made a one hundred and eighty degree turn and paddled downriver. Having never seen such an an imal before, I slowed to keep pace. Before long, the platypus reversed course, sWam upriver and out of sight. The old road pushed deeper into the river red gum-shaded tunnel. Headlong through the green darkness, I turned the pedals strong and fast. As one, my body and mountain bike moved in absolute quiet. Raising my arms high in the air, I prayed for the moment to last forever. Just the opposite happened. The light at the end of the tunnel was the sun. Breaking through the canopy, blinding waves of yellow flooded the red road. The instant my eyes adjusted to the brightness I wished they had not. Bending south, the Gellibrand turned away from the old road and was not seen again. The river red gums, having nothing left to protect, abandoned their posts. Scrub brush littered the ground where the ta ll trees had stood. The once wide and sinuous old road began to narrow. Gone was the red soil. A dusty brown path, no wider than my shou lders, bottlenecked into the thickening knee-high bush. Illuminated and baked raw by the sun, the bland ground pu lsated heavy with heat. As if they never existed, both the Gellibrand River and the old Great Ocean Road rippled out of my day. A mere 30 feet before me, a red-ta iled fox meandered out of the brush and onto the sun lit trail. Undetected, I maintained an even cadence and, as if leading me, the f leet - footed animal continued up the trail. Then it must have sensed I was following it, for without turning its head its trot quickened . Darting to the right, the left and to the right again , it sprinted into the brush and disappeared. Smiling a wide smile, I pedaled one last peaceful mile before diffidently rejoining the relatively new Great Ocean Road. There was no need to turn my head for a fi nal glimpse. I sprinted onto the tarmac and, like the wandering fox, disappeared. • 77