Cycling the Lavender Trail – Murray Bridge to Kinchina Conservation Park

Update: This post was written before the development of the Lavender Cycling Trail. The official cycling trail does not enter Kinchina Conservation Park.

Kathie was staying at the Murray Bridge Marina Caravan Park for a few days and invited me down to try cycling the Lavender Trail with her.

The Lavender Federation Trail is a 325 kilometre walking trail. It wends its way north from Murray Bridge along the eastern side of the Mt Lofty Ranges to Clare.

Having completed the Mawson Trail in short sections in 2016, I was only too keen to start exploring a new long distance trail.

Setting out from Murray Bridge

We met at Sturt Reserve, and after taking a bit of time to explore the old railway station, we began cycling the Lavender Trail. We passed under the railway bridge

and continued up the old train line that used to run to the river port.

We missed a turn shortly after this. There was no sign, so we continued up the old railway line before deciding we were heading in the wrong direction.

We retraced our steps and turned right. Before long, we found a Lavender Trail marker. Very reassuring!

Soon we were cycling along a levee in the beautiful Rocky Gully Wetlands.

Shortly after this photo, we failed to see a marker and kept cycling along the levee. Eventually this added an unnecessary five kilometres to our ride. Kathie took this photo of me just before we decided to retrace our steps.

We used Google Maps to help us get back on track and soon we found the marker we had missed. We continued on our way.

Finally we were heading out of town.

The Lavender trail began to follow alongside the railway. Although the track was a bit undulating in places, the surface was good and it was easy and enjoyable cycling.

Kinchina Conservation Park

After a few kilometres, we came to the entrance to Kinchina Conservation Park.

As we had already got lost twice, Kathie wanted to make very sure we were meant to go under the railway bridge.

Yes, the Lavender Trail definitely went through that tunnel. I went first. Kathie had my phone at the ready just in case there was some worthwhile footage of me falling into the slime.

I didn’t oblige.

Then it was Kathie’s turn.

We emerged into another world on the other side of the tunnel. It was easy to see why this area is called Rocky Gully.

This didn’t look like a very promising cycling track for non-mountain bikers like Kathie and me.

However, up to this point, cycling the Lavender Trail had been fun and easy. We were optimistic that this rough bit would not continue for long.

We decided to persevere.

Our Rocky Gully adventure

Fortunately there were sections of the Lavender Trail which were quite ride-able.

Others were not.

The Lavender Trail map indicates that the path through Kinchina Reserve is 4.3 kilometres, but it felt much further to us. We pushed our bikes up and down rocky gullies for over half that distance.

Eventually the ground began to even out as we approached the end of the park and we were able to ride more consistently.

We had one last obstacle when we came to the edge of the park – getting through the gate. I lifted my bike over the fence and somehow Kathie manoeuvred her shorter bike through.

Exhausted, we sat and had our lunch break. We had originally intended to go on to Monarto, but it was already after 2pm. We decided to go back the quick way, via Maurice Road.

In a very short time, we found ourselves in the Rocky Gully Wetlands again. Cycling along the levee was so easy.

Soon we were riding under the road and railway bridges that we had passed at the start of our ride.

Cycling the Lavender Trail

As I said at the beginning, the Lavender Federation Trail is designed to be a walking trail.

Cycling the Lavender Trail will be more enjoyable if we can find quiet country backroads to follow when the track heads off-road for some serious hiking.

Unfortunately my Strava failed the second time we got lost, so the record of our ride is incomplete:

Here is the elevation chart.

Kathie’s odometer logged a total ride of 26 kilometres.

Another ride where I misread a sign was the Munda Biddi Trail near Dwellingup.

An excellent ride which incorporates another part of the Lavender Trail is the Eudunda Cycling Loop. I would also recommend cycling from Watervale to Manoora.