Munda Biddi - first overnight trip, days 3-6, 30 May - 1 June

Planning for the first overnight trip on the Munda Biddi started more than four months ago, with researching light-weight camping gear and racks and panniers for the mountain bike. Finally, it was one week before the first multi-day trip, which was going to be three days (two nights). The last batch of online orders arrived the day before the trip. It took me a whole day to plan and prepare all my food and decide exactly what I needed to take, then how to pack it into two panniers.

Food for three days - focus on lightweight, small volume and tasty 

Luggage for the Munda Biddi

Clothing - focus on layers, with only a change of base layers each day. Everything else was worn for three days. I was pretty smelly by the third day!

Luggage - included bike spares, first aid kit, cooking equipment, lightweight and compact sleeping bag and mat and a luxury travel pillow :)


My luggage all up weighed approx 16kg, which included 3L of water in my Camelbak and 2kg of food. My bike was carrying 11kg and I carried 5kg in my backpack. This was a good weight for me, although after the first day I took some of the heavier items out of my backpack and reduced the amount of water in my Camelbak as the straps were digging into my shoulders. I discovered that the weight on the back of my bike actually helped me riding through loose gravel, which was a nice change. It was definitely tougher and slower going up hills, but I never ran out of gears when climbing.

All smiles before we started

I had two travelling companions for this trip, Wayne and Annie. We left home in cars at 7am to drive to Lake Brockman (our finishing point), leave a car there, then drive in another car with bikes to the starting point in Jarrahdale. After getting our bikes all set up with luggage, we finally headed off at 11:30am.

The first things we noticed after starting on the bikes were that the bike handling was different with panniers, and it was much harder to go uphill!

On the first day, we did 33km to Dandalup hut. We did 615m of climbing in those 32km! Our average speed was 7kph with a riding time of 4:40. This was much slower than I had anticipated, as we averaged 10kph without the panniers. With breaks for snacks, this meant that we didn't arrive at the camp until 5pm (total time 5:40).

Catching our breath after a hard climb. 

The route was quite technical, and particularly the uphill sections were rutted and steep and involved a lot of walking and pushing a 20kg bike and luggage up gradients of 10-20%. There were at least ten sections throughout the day where I was walking and pushing my bike, and some of those sections were so hard that I had to stop every 5-10m to catch my breath and prepare for the next push. There was also a small "river crossing" (large puddle) and lots of deep pea gravel. By the end of the day, I learnt that steering is option through gravel, just relax and let the bike find it's own way.


In spite of the challenge of the route, we enjoyed the forest scenery and found some nice spots to stop for a picnic snack and some pretty rural scenery.

Morning tea

We take the green "touring route" option - which was quite technical enough, thank you. 

We were very happy to see the dam at the Dandalup picnic area, which was not far from our camp site. The weather was ideal, not a breath of wind stirred the waters of the dam.

Bikes at Dandalup dam

Happy to see Dandalup - nearly at the camp! 

View from the Dandalup hut

Sunset and stars coming out

I was so tired by the time we got the turnoff to the Dandalup hut that I decided to walk some of the technical downhill sections as I didn't trust my bike handling skills. It didn't take me long to get back on the bike though. By this stage it was only 30min before sunset so it was hard to see where the trail went with setting sun in our eyes. However, the campsite was in a terrific location - perched on the edge of the ridge looking west. It was so great to get there and discover we were the only ones there. In fact, we hadn't seen anyone else on the trail all day.

 Dinner was re-hydrated spaghetti bolognaise sauce, pasta and parmesan cheese. Followed by mini chocolate bars, milo and port. We earnt it! 

Dinner - re-hydrated bolognaise sauce, pasta and parmesan cheese. Yum! 

Breakfast at the Dandalup hut

Day Two - started with porridge on the camp stove. After a sleepin til after 7am, by the time we made breakfast, packed up camp, packed up the bikes and had a last toilet stop, we got going at 11am. We rode 45km in 4:20, with 680m of elevation gain. Average speed for the day was 10kph. With breaks, including a cooked lunch, it took us 6hrs to reach Dwellingup.

I walked at least seven sections on the second day, and I lost count of the number of times I came off my bike. No major damage, but lots of bruises. Reasons I came off included climbing on technical sections and losing my nerve or not being able to keep the bike on track, and skidding too fast in gravel. I learnt that faster is not always faster, if it means that you come off and have to take the time to pick yourself and your bike back up, dust yourself off, ad check for damage.

I was very happy to reach Turner River mountain bike park, where we stopped for a cooked lunch. This meal was two minute noodles with tinned tuna, plus rice cakes and peanut butter. Followed by a cup of coffee and a mini chocolate. Enough fuel to tackle the rest of the trail!

Picnic lunch

Sadly, one of my companions didn't continue on after our lunch stop. Wayne pulled out as he was totally cooked. This was his first back-to-back days of hard riding, and he didn't have the energy to continue on. He phoned his dad, who had his car, to pick him up.


Annie and I continued on to Dwellingup. There was a long tough hill after lunch, so it was a good thing that Wayne did pull out. However, after that we had some long sections of downhill and rail trail, which helped our average speed. There were also some beautiful fast and narrow sections of singletrack winding through the forest between Turner River and Marrinup. After Marrinup, the trail was closed so we had to take the roads to Dwellingup.

In Dwellingup, we were staying the luxury of a motel room (thanks to Wayne who booked it a few days earlier!). We arrived at 5pm, so it was great to not have to put up tents or cook our own dinner. Shower, then to the pub for dinner :)

The next morning, we set an alarm so that we could get going early and finish at a reasonable hour. We started at 8:15am after a coffee at the local cafe and it was cold! We had all our layers on, and we needed it as the day started with a long downhill.

Setting off from Dwellingup

Day Three was a long day - 62.5km at an average speed of 11kph with 890m of elevation gain. Our riding time was 5:30, with total time from start to finish 8hrs including stops for food and approx an hour looking at maps and trying to figure out where the trail went.

Annie cresting a long climb - note the steep descent
sign (for the reverse direction) - 10% gradient. 

Emma enjoying the trails

We had some beautiful riding on the third day. It started with a non-technical trail through the forest, but there were some hard climbs to contend with.












We then headed past and through Lane Poole Reserve, where we got mislead by some confusing signs. Thankfully we spotted a Department of Parks and Wildlife Ranger who pointed us in the right direction.

Enormous mess made in the road by 4WD vehicles. 

After that was a quite fun section on North Junction Form, which was a highly compacted road used and abused by 4WD vehicles. It was easy riding but you had to watch the trail the whole way as pot holes would appear out of nowhere in the shadows.

We saw more than a dozen 4WD vehicles in an hour on the road and as we stopped for lunch at a beautiful granite outcrop. Picnic lunch included a cup of hot milo, rice cakes and peanut butter and cream cheese.

Technical downhill section  with rocks and gravel

Right next to the granite outcrop was a technical section of downhill. The photo doesn't really do it justice. The tricky thing about technical downhill sections is choosing a good line, as you are going downhill and trying to maintain the right speed. Then applying your bike handling skills, carrying 15+kg of luggage, to get your bike to take the line you have picked. Momentum helps with rolling through but it meas everything happens more quickly!

Tunnel with bike lane

After the 4WD road there was a lovely section of singletrack alongside Nanga Road. It was fun with a few tricky bits that made it interesting. We also went through a tunnel with a dedicated bike lane. There should be more of this in Perth!





The next 15km were unsealed roads connected by fun singletrack. Some sections of sand, where all the riding though pea gravel paid off with my bike handling. Annie and I were both getting pretty tired by this stage, with a few stops for food to replenish the stores and give us energy to get to the end.

The last 8km of the day were on an unsealed road, which was a detour due to construction work on Logue Brook Dam. It was definitely the least fun part of the three days, as we were tired and it was a corrugated unsealed road with sections of deepish pea gravel. Tiring after 55km and 4 1/2 hours already on the bikes.

Finally we reached the car - what a relief!

It was a fantastic trip. I couldn't have done it without my travelling companions Wayne and Annie, who were very keen to take up the challenge of three days off-road. It was much harder physically than I expected and I certainly appreciated reaching the end every day. I was also surprised how long each day took - next time we will try to leave earlier in the day so that we are not feeling rushed at the end of the day to reach our campsite before dark.

I'm six days into the Munda Biddi adventure of 2015 - and already planning the next multi-day trip!