It seems if you throw a few cycling spots into a mountain town, the people will come. Bright's one of those towns - about two hours from Melbourne, so accessible enough, and with tons of mountain biking trails for the family to enjoy. In Autumn, it's famously beautiful - tons of colour from the deciduous trees paint the town red and orange, and with Mount Feathertop and other mountains surrounding it, it almost has a Europeon feel to it. There's a ton of cool shops from bike and ski shops (it's not far from the skiing mountains either) and clothing and gift stores, and about ten caravan or holiday parks around. It's honestly a great place to bring the whole family and though that seems like my worst nightmare (my family is okay - every one elses, not so much), I really do like visiting Bright.

We drove over from Thredbo as we needed to pick up some Landie parts from Yea - if you're not from Victoria this might not make sense, but we were basically tranversing this part of the state rather than heading home along the coast. We stayed at a little free camp called Smoko which was on the edge of a small river and really nice. I did want to hire some electric bikes as I'd never ridden one and thought it'd be fun, but Jamie hardly slept because of some inconsiderate twats in a van talking all night.

If I don't sleep, my theory is this: don't talk about the night before, get some sun on your face, and tell yourself you have, in fact, have had plenty of sleep. IN this way you can trick yourself into having an okay day. Jamie has learnt to listen to me after all these years so he tried his best to cheer up as I dragged him round the Bright Canyon walk - a little less than 5 kms and perfect to get the blood flowing and wake him up.

Here's a summary of the sign, courtesty of Chat GTP:

The Bright Canyon Walk follows a historically significant gold sluicing area in Victoria, showcasing an early form of gold mining that has been active since 1851. The walk traces the banks of the Ovens River and features remnants of mining activity, including tail-races and sluiced gravel paths. The area was once central to the Upper Ovens Goldfield, attracting thousands of miners after gold was discovered at Beechworth in 1852. Water played a crucial role in the mining process, with Chinese miners contributing significantly during the mid-1850s. The walk includes a swing bridge and uneven terrain, and highlights how dredging operations, using massive gold 'ships', continued until 1955. It also acknowledges the Yaitmathang Aboriginal people, who lived in the area long before European settlers arrived.

The walk takes you through town and via kids parks and river banks where caravans happily perced, full of holiday makers and latte drinkers. You couldn't help but feel happy because everyone else seemed happy, plus it was a nice sunny day. We passed under a bridge with this mural of a platypus.

We are passed by joggers and cyclists doing their morning constitutional before things got quieter and we started going alongside the river gorge itself. It was certainly beautiful and if I lived here I wouldn't mind walking round this circuit every day.

There's two bridges you need to note - you go past the first one if you want the proper canyon walk, but for a shorter walk, you cross over the first one.

Whilst it was reasonably cool today, I can imagine people swimming in many f the riverbeaches along the way - I was tempted, but didn't have my bathers on me. It was pretty cold but I'm not adverse to that.

Along the way there were plenty of these traces, which are basically chutes cut out of rock for the gold miners to allow silt and mud to flow down into the river below away from their digs.

The canyon itself is rather small, but it is rather beautiful. You certainly have to watch yourstep and not slip - by this point, it's not a walk for prams or people with slippery soles or clumsy steps and weak ankles.

When you get to the second swing bridge, you cross and walk back on the other side of the river. I'm not a fan of swing bridges. Like planes, I don't trust the physics nor the mechanics.

This is the section that's a little dubious if it's wet or you aren't very fit - there are a few steps which take you down to the beach and a rocky path. Again, I thought it'd be a fantastic place on a hot day.

We even passed a little waterfall, which was actually one of the traces - obviously not silt, rock and sludge these days but water. It certainly added to the prettiness of the gorge walk.

After the walk we wondered through town and window shopped. I actually bought a gorgeous ceramic lemon squeeze I didn't need, but it's nice to come away from a place sometimes with a souvenir of a lovely time. It was only $15 bucks as well. We had pasties for lunch as unlike last time when we were cashed up, we couldn't really afford a proper sit down lunch. Still, it didn't matter - some days are just priceless despite having no money and no sleep.