Tour of Duty, you absolute beauty.

I reckon I’m as close to 100% certainty as I’m ever going to get on selling you an adventure this week, Jarrod. You’re a V8 driver, so you’re used to your vehicle really announcing it’s presence when you drive down the street. But! Do fellow drivers and random pedestrians stare at you dumbfounded, mouths agape, wondering whether they missed the memo that martial law has been declared on their small shopping strip as you rumble down the street? Never experienced that? Then you totally need to sign up for a trip with Tour of Duty.

Handles off off off off road terrain like a champion

Who ever would have guessed that when you type “things to do in Bright” into google, you’d come across a company that had the wherewithal to purchase an ex SAS truck, returned from Afghanistan, and establish themselves as a tour operator in the Victorian High Country? Genius! Said SAS truck might not have been suited to conditions in the Stan, but when it comes to hammering up mountainsides, fanging it through riverbeds, negotiating snow, and arriving at wineries and trout farms in proper Step Aside Bitches, We Are Making A F%^&ing Entrance fashion, well, it makes Jeep commercials with their quaint little Potbelliez soundtrack look frankly pretty twee.

Toorak tractors, step aside please

TOD have packages ranging from a couple of hours to full day tours of the region, you can check them all out here:

www.tourofdutybright.com.au

I settle on the Bubbly Sunset option. Because it includes wine and cheese. You could lure me anywhere with the promise of wine and cheese. The ‘stranger danger’ warnings my parents gave me as a child went something along the lines of “you never, ever get into a car with a stranger. Even if he’s offering you a sharp cheddar and a pinot with a complex bouquet.”

I put out tentative feelers with some writing friends and buddies Rachel and Leisl respond almost immediately in the affirmative:

Saturday morning dawns and we make our road trip 3 and a half hours up the Hume Highway to Bright. We wind up arriving early afternoon, so we take the opportunity to do the Bright Canyon Walk to stretch our legs after the drive.

This bridge was made for propping casually.

I had forgotten how insanely pretty Bright and the surrounding countryside is. It’s like you’ve fallen through a wormhole and landed smack bang in the middle of a Tom Roberts painting. I half expect to come across a makeshift campsite with a strapping settler chopping wood but alas, all we encounter are some pre-pubescent boys dropping huge rocks off one of the swinging bridges to see who can make the biggest splash.

Sadly, a sexy settler free zone

Our TOD pick up is 6pm sharp at our hotel and we’ve been warned that even though it’s been a humid 30 degrees today, we’ll need to have WARM clothes with us on the tour, because once we’re up on the mountain top we’ll have the wind whipping off Mt Buffalo opposite and it gets quite chilly. I say “really? okaaay” to this advice in a tone reminiscent of the one I use with patients who are confused and telling me a story that cannot possibly be factually correct. The thought of even donning a long sleeved T Shirt is making me clammy. But I pack a polar fleece and perhaps not surprisingly, it turns out the people who live there and do this stuff for a living are right, it’s definitely needed.

We exit the hotel to find the SAS truck parked out front waiting for us, and we’re all more excited than we would be faced with a gilded Cinderella carriage. Pretty sure it’s not standard army procedure to sight your truck, clap your hands over your mouth and do a giddy little dance on the spot. Hindsight being 20/20, I wish I’d taken the time to perfect my special forces hand and arm signals like you see in the movies. Next time I’ll remember to silently hold up a fist to stop everyone, then point at people individually and get them to run to position, maybe employing a commando roll on the way.

Real soldiers carry handbags

We’re strapped in, and it’s time for our tour through town to the next pick up where we’re gathering a few more passengers. With the weather being warm, we have the sides of the truck open so we have a clear view of the slack jawed responses from other motorists and pedestrians. It’s like being a minor celebrity for a few hours. We wave back at excited children (and some more excited dads)

Slight blur courtesy of all terrain tyres

Once we have all passengers on board, we wave some final goodbyes to our adoring general public (okay, it’s possibly going to my head just a bit now…) Time to leave the streets and begin our ascent up the mountain.

Kicking up a little bit of dust in our wake

Sealed roads give way to unsealed road, which in turn give way to holy shit that is some rough terrain–oh good with hairpin turns thrown in for good measure.

Perfectly happy being a back seat driver

And the elaborate harness seat belts we’ve been strapped in with– initially a novelty factor–now come into their own. We would never in a million years have been able to make it up these roads in the Nissan Tiida we journeyed to Bright in. It would have shuddered so hard that car panels would shake off one by one – a chassis shedding, if you like, creating a progressive vehicular carcass that culminates in the undercarriage being ripped open like a fish belly. But in the SAS truck we’re in takes it all in it’s stride, leaving us to sit back and drink in these views out the side…..

And we ALL have a window seat 🙂

And once we make our way to the top, we’re afforded those lovely views in 360 degree form. It’s a little cloudy, and our driver Allan is a bit worried it’s not going to be a great sunset but he needed be concerned because everyone is happily scurrying about wielding iPhones and Samsung Galaxies, trying to capture the panorama in a fashion that does it justice.

No need to jostle for position when you’re afforded 360 degree vistas

Backlight always makes one look angelic

And while we’re all busily garnering our Instagram worthy shots, with almost unnerving efficiency, they’ve unpacked chairs and set up a heavenly spread of local produce. It’s as though they flicked open a tablecloth and it has populated with food and beverage by magic. We’ve got Prosecco to quaff, as well as an abundance of bread, olive oil, crackers, cheeses, smoked trout dip and pate. Great friends, great views, great food, great wine. It’s a recipe for genuine contentment.

I defy you to sit here with bread and cheese and say anything other than “ahhhh”

Allan apologises that the with all the cloud cover, the sunset is a ‘bit of a fizzer, sorry’ which is about as ridiculous as a Master Chef contestant declaring a dish to be a ‘disaster’ when one tiny component which is more or less a garnish anyway, hasn’t turned out absolutely perfectly. Honestly, if you leave an evening like this unsatisfied, well I feel pretty sorry for you really, because it probably means you have no capacity for happiness. That’s my diagnosis as a qualified health professional.

Actually, you’re right Allan. Dead disappointing

Bewdiful

Pretty sure no one is thinking ‘what a fizzer’

Sunset observed, food consumed, riding a lovely Prosecco buzz, we begin our journey downhill in darkness via a different route and it’s pretty hairy going. We can only see the tiny bit of road illuminated by the headlights, which I feel is a good thing, because based on how I’m more or less hanging sideways into my harness, we are on some pretty quality slopes. But we’re in very capable hands and make it back onto to sealed roads to be delivered back to our hotel safely.

We had such a fun time and I absolutely wouldn’t hesitate to recommend Tour Of Duty to anyone. (Truthfully, I am already plotting a return trip to Bright just so that I can do one of the daytime adventures). But I’m going to throw it over to you, Jarrod. Heading up to the High Country for some SAS truck action, Jarrod, would you go there?

Our chariot home awaits