Thu 19th Feb..     Castlemaine > Bendigo 56kms
 
We had a great time in Castlemaine but today was time to head off to Bendigo. The ride was pretty breezy.. 56ks doesn't feel like that much any more. When we got close to Bendigo we had a bit of city-shock as it was the biggest city for us since Geelong - many weeks ago.
 
We had to organise our selves into three groups to be billeted around the town. The lovely Karen from Bendigo Sustainability Group had 3 of us staying with her, 6 at another house and two at another.. all organised by Karen.
 
In the afternoon Celine and I were riding around town on food missions and Celine had a tram track stack. She hit her toe on the road, had a visit to the medical centre and has to rest for a few days. She will hop a train to the next town and join the group riding on the next ride hopefully. Were having no luck with injuries recently, but the support and responses from the group is very comforting.
 
Those not staying with Celine whilst she got some treatment went to a BBQ put on by the Council in conjunction with the sustainability group. We were greeted by a councillor and some people from the community. The councillor had done his research and quoted several moments from our blog, it was nice for the group to reflect on the recent past. Although im not sure we logged that many flat tires. Did we? Anyway, did i mention there was amazing food? well, there was. Salads, pastas, lasangna, fruits. All vegan mmm. The caterers were nice enough to let us take the left overs home so we grabbed as much as we could carry.
 
Bendigo + Eagle Hawk
 
Fri 20th Feb
 
This morning was Kelsey and Tash's first time on radio. It was our third ABC radio appearance whilst on tour and the two came back with big smiles.
 
We went for a bit of a ride out of town to Eagle Hawk Primary School. Time was tight and it was hot but we made it with a bit of time to spare. Suprisingly I had a tech team of four young students who helped me find all the right cables to hook up our slideshow equipment. The older year groups in high schools can be a bit of a tough audience so its been nice for us to play to a few primary school audiences. After the performance I was surrounded by kids hanging out in their lunch break, asking questions, some about bike gear as a few of the kids raced bicycles. Awesome.
 
On the way to the school we rode past some burnt areas of Eagle Hawk. This would be our first sighting of areas affected by the fires. We had some free time after the school so I felt the compelling need to see it up close. Bindy joined me for a little while then I ventured further. Blackend parks, reserves and interspersed bushland showed the intensity of the fire; with tanker tracks all through them. There was around 50 houses lost in Bendigo area, locals tell us that crews were containing the fire front south of bendigo then the fire moved in from the north. We saw some "Keep Out" signs which seemed to be in response to looting or unwanted attention in general. I recognised one sign painted onto a scrap car bonnet from a photo in the papers. Flowers on a gate marked the burnt house where there was the one fatality in the area. Some plain white vehicles pulled up and began setting up a sattelite dish as we rode through. Perhaps they were setting up for a live cross for the news?..
 
Amidst the charred landscape and the russian roulette of destroyed homes.. I found the "Long Gully TOOL LIBRARY". I came in close to check it out and saw a few blokes who looked like they were putting up a fence. Continuing my sticky beak I saw that it was part of the community centre for the suburb. A local woman entering the building caught my gaze and invited me in to have a look. I made my way to the tool library at the back through rooms filled with groceries and big bags of clothes. Out the back I ran into Dave and a few helpers who were actually building a small shed for the bike cooperative. Nice. My bike for this tour was built at/from bike coops in Sydney and Melbourne so this place just kept getting better for me. Dave explained how the tool library worked, their plans to develop the Men's shed and also that the the whole place had been a command centre during the fires. Access to the tool library was helping locals rebuild damaged houses, sheds and fencing. As we were chatting a few people started loading in some sound equipment. . this place was becoming hilariously familiar to me by this point (Ive been working with events sound/lights in sydney for the last few years). After some confused conversation we figured out that a community concert was happening there that evening. A real positive note which Ive heard a few times and was experiencing then was a huge increase in the general sense of community (within this community and others), an unlikely result from such a horrible situation.
 
I managed to fix my bike pump whilst I was in the tool library with a small rivet,  which I had day-dreamt of doing just the day before. Yay.
 
As I left the centre I noticed a strange hand painted sign along the road:
 
" Have fun, did you ? "
 
At first I thought maybe it was a response to fire bugs starting fires but the other side said.
 
" Sight Seers Go Home "
 
Hmmm. There did seem to a fair bit of road traffic in the area and alot of 'rubberneckers' about - as I heard some locals call them. Although they didn't seem to be bothered by me on my touring bicycle, I started to make my way back towards Bendigo anyhow. I noticed another similar sign as I got closer to the main road.
 
"If you dont live here go home"
 
It's a complicated situation, youve got a damaged, distraught immediate community which still needs time and space to grieve. Then theres us on the outside. Bombarded with media about the damage, just wanting to see it for ourselves, to feel connected. A time of extremes: looting and huge generosity; courageous CFA heroes and fire bug villians. For me, it was really positive to see the community (re)building and the resilience displayed. It was also great to stumble accross a community centre with these amazing projects happening. We are also totally blessed to have had no contact or direct threats from the fires for our whole tour.                                
                                                                                                       -dylan