Hey, Im coming from los angeles CA in november to tour australia by bicycle, I work at a track bike shop called LABrakeless and just looking if anyone has any advice for me on routes or shops to check out. I have a one way ticket and a 12 month working visa, so if anyone knows any shops looking for help I would love to hang out and work for a bit. Any info helps. Thanks. see you soon.
41 people looking and no one has anything to say? bummmer
Where do you land? Where are you thinking of spending most of your time?
Brisbane info.
Gear Shop for bits and pieces - www.gearbrisbane.com
thursday nights - social ride. leaves gear at 6pm for a ride around the city.
sunday afternoons - bike polo at musgrave park, south bank.
You could ride from Brisbane down through Sydney, on to Melbourne and then finish in Adelaide. That’d take in a lot of what Australia has to offer and it’d give you a chance to rest up in each city and make some money. There’s fixed crew in all those cities who’d take care of you I’m sure.
If you want to add some desert to that you could keep going across the Nullarbor Plain on to Perth as well. Depends what sort of experience you’re after. There’s a lot to see here.
what he said.
Taking Brisbane as a starting point, (and why not? travelling south is like travelling downhill right?) it’s about 1000 ks or more down to Sydney. I know a girl who did it not long a go, a little bit nuts, but it’s possible.
The coastline is basically a collection of small towns the whole way along so you’re never too far from civilisation (compared to going inland and not seeing a soul for hundreds of k’s).
For a lot of the east coast there’s usually an old slow coast road that’s separate from the highway, but not always.
If you come to Sydney, here’s a few pointers i typed out for a french guy that’s coming out here in January:
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See http://lepistaresistance.com/ for sydney fixed gear related information. This is the blog of some local guys. A lot of the people who come to these events - alleycats, polo etc - also come to the Wednesday night rides. (See thread about this). For a big city it’s surprising how friendly the crowd is - we all somehow know each other, more or less.
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Most of the backpackers here stay in the area around Bondi, close to the beaches, or Kings Cross, close to the strip clubs. This is good for meeting lots of other travellers, but some other places are cheaper and have a wider variety of things happening. Surry Hills/Darlinghurst is great, so is Newtown/Enmore. Good buses and trains in both these areas, if you’re ever not on your bike.
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There’s Polo played on Thursdays nights and Sunday afternoons. See lepistaresistance. The courts are around Newtown and Wooloomooloo, ie: close to the city centre.
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Some good bike shops (see thread about this):
- Cheeky Transport, Newtown (touring & commuting)
- City Bike Depot, City (all sorts)
- Wooly’s Wheels, Paddington (road bikes mostly)
- Deus Ex Machina, (nice fixed parts)
- Sable & Argent, Wooloomooloo (nice fixed parts and scooters)
most of those have websites with more info.
Being here in summer though, you’ll probably find riding around the south, ie: around country Victoria, a lot more pleasant than the north. Anywhere further north than Sydney gets seriously hot from December to February.
Someone else on here will have more info for rides you could do from Melbourne and around.
http://www.bottlesandchains.com/
Also, see the Bottles and Chains website - i think those guys are in Hobart. Tasmania, being so small and villagey and cool in summer, could be a great place to tour around, so long as you don’t mind the lack of big-city-stuff. Would be a serious change from LA anyway - like time travel.
Western Australia has an excellent coastline so don’t count it out. Perth to Esperance will take you roughly a month and theres some awesome scenerary and great camping spots all the way down.
If you decide to cross the nullabour I’d recommend crossing it in a west to east direction due to prevailing winds. Though this depends on the time of the year.
Awesome, super helpful!. I will be starting in brisbane and heading south. I will be siked to come out the polo, we have a good crew here so it will be fun as well as the races. I wont have my track bike but I will come check it out, maybe borrow one. i am gonan check out as many shops as I can as well, its always fun to see new shops. I work for swrve clothing company and I know I ship to shifter bikes and get other orders from all over so its gonna be rad meeting people. Thanks for everyones help! Im getting super stoked!!!
Adelaide has a pretty small scene, but if you’re coming down, the only real shop worth going to is North Adelaide Cycles.
Also, we ride on Tuesday nights, and there’s polo on Sundays (check the Adelaide section for dates).
I’m not sure if I have the necessary credentials to speak for Melbourne, but it looks like nobody else wants to, so here goes.
Melbourne is the best city in Australia. We’re so fucking cool we call it Melburn, or Burn City. We have a large fixed gear population partly due to our uber-coolness and for the fact that it’s fairly flat. There’s heaps of bike shops; Fitzroy Revolution, BSC, Abbotsford Cycles, Cecil Walker…we usually spend a fair bit of time arguing about which ones suck. We drink a lot of coffee thanks to our sizeable Italian population, and we need something to do when it rains, which is quite regularly, which is somewhat ironic given we are on water restrictions.
You can ride pretty much any direction from Melburn. South will get you to the scenic Great Ocean Road, North will get you nowhere particularly interesting, East will get you to the Yarra Valley wine region and West will get you to quaint country towns like Ballarat and Bendigo.
There is a regular ride on Wednesday evenings see here, and there is usually plenty of other stuff going on, just check the Meets section.
Hope to see you soon!
Oh yeah, One thing Adelaide does have is good beer.
and peadophiles. :evil:
Not with my sister the cop on the case.
I would say 1/2 of those shops have a fair bit of suck and 1/4 are awesome. You also forgot to mention Shifter Bikes, Pony Bikes, Commuter Cycles, Human Powered Cycles, Cyclic Bikes, all small local operations run by good people who support the “Melburn scene.”
Nothing wrong with heading North, plenty of good riding (and racing in winter), and Bendigo rocks in summer for track racing on Thursday nights.
We also have more velodromes in Melbourne than America has in total (speculating, but it’s a safe bet), including two indoor timber 250m tracks and many outdoor concrete tracks.
If you’re heading from BNE down, PM Heatseeker he’s planning to ride that route soon.
Also, most of the posters here don’t tour. You’d be better off checking out crazyguyonabike for more info on self supported / credit card touring.
Plus, you should jump on a plane / ferry from Melbourne and spend at least 2 weeks in Tasmania, great riding, lots to see, and the Bottles ‘n’ Chains guys will show you a good time.
Well he’s already mentioned Shifterbikes, so I didn’t feel the need to mention it again. Is Pony Bikes a shop as such? I reckon I would struggle to get panniers there. Totally agree with the others…(see, we LOVE arguing about bike shops :lol:) Good beer here too, Mountain Goat and 3 Ravens comes to mind. Mmmm…beer.
Panniers???
Who uses panniers???
Also on the working side of things…
financial bloody crisis might add to trouble getting work but it aint so bad, especially if you’re a good worker. Wages in Australia are pretty good, minimum wage is way above u.s minimum. You won’t earn as much working in hospitality (no tipping here!!) but you will probs get lots of free beer.
Also if you wana get a headstart on looking for work, www.seek.com.au has job ads, and bike work comes up on there for mechanics every now and again.
Thank you everyone for your responses! I leave La on monday night and will be in Brisbane on wednesday!!! Hope to meet some of you soon!!! Happy halloweeeen