Wednesday, February 19, 2014

Days 10 &11 – West of the Murray River


West of the Murray
Looking back at sunrise. All is good
The last two days have been lucky and restorative, steadying my nerves about the whole exercise. The main highlight was the picture above. Last thing yesterday I rolled over the Murray River, out of NSW and into Victoria and the city of Mildura. The moment was slightly coloured by one of the previously mentioned teen incidents (four blokes in a Matiz were screaming at me about their genitals as I was taking this shot) but it felt like a serious achievement. Cycled clean across NSW, good times.

It got worse
But more than that it has been seriously lucky timing. Mildura is the last city before Perth on my trip with anything near 50,000 people, and all the services that entails. I’d been toying with stopping, but was a little worried about progress to date. As it was the bike decided for me. Late on Monday afternoon I’d started to hear what sounded like the tyre rubbing on the frame. I flipped the bike upside down in the evening, and was so focused on potential frame rubbing (of which there was none) I missed the howler right in front of me. Left is a shote of part of the back tyre at 11:00, it got worse, but to it’s credit held out till Mildura. Am quite surprised as the roads are pretty good in Australia, but it forced my decision and I’ve halted in Mildura for a day.

Not sure this needs a caption
And it wasn’t just lucky breakdowns, yesterday was a good day. There was a head or cross wind for most of the day, but never destructive, and to my surprise the land rolled gently all day, so there was more to do than on the bleak Hay plains. The countryside was proper outback bush as I’d expected it when planning, but with two surprise interludes. Most of the day was just scrub bushes and trees in the red earth hard up against the surprisingly winding road, but around Robinvale/Euston and the run into the Mildura the land was suddenly irrigated. With no warning, you were out the bush, and into rolling vineyards, orange grovels and fruit farms. Bang, just like that. Outback, beautiful farmland, outback, repeat. It’s surreal, from adventure to leisurely country cycle in 50m. Cool, but surreal.

Mildura is a real draw for this whole area, and the roads were noticeably busier after a sleepy few days in rural NSW, but with one exception, there was little trouble. In fact the riding was pure pleasure yesterday. Up begrudgingly in the pre-dawn, there really is something magical about those first two or three hours of the day. Whilst I’m not riding into sunrise, it is a real privilege to be up to see dawn break in the bush, and the feeling of freedom is hard to put into words.

Englishman in the mid day sun
But where yesterday really improved was around 09:00. At first buzz, and I donned the new fly defender. It has a strange bit of camouflage fabric at the top that keeps some of the heat in, whistles in the wind constantly and makes me look slightly like one of those weekend Nazis at paintball practice, in America’s bible belt, that you see on Channel 5 documentaries, but it is a game changer. With no flies in the face I’m a much happier boy.

The day’s ride even split perfectly in half with a rest stop at Euston, giving me my first sit down lunch out riding for a nearly a week. It was all good. As has been Mildura. A thriving city, this is a step up from other places to date. There is a whiff of California to place, with palm trees down the strip and flashier hotels and restaurants, but admit I may have Stockholm syndrome from the road.
Amazing what year round sun will do
to the meaning of a word

Although much of Australia does look and feel like an idealised version of Britain and the American suburbs had a love child, who in its teenage years has decided to rebel, run away to the sun and put its own distinctive and somewhat quirky stamp on the basic frameworks. Makes for very decent towns and Mildura is no exception.

After a leisurely start, today has been about admin and errands. Took the cycle in to a great little shop for a repair and new tyre, then it was about planning out the trip across the Nullarbor. Truth be told when setting off planning is a little vague and generalist. Head West and hope, because it all seems too big to contemplate. Now out here I’ve got a good picture of what can, and more importantly can’t be achieved. Thanks to some brilliant amateur websites on the area now have a day by day plan from here on in.

Aware pics of parcels are
boring, but it's illustrative
That just left me to go and pick up food supplies to post on to Nullabor roadhouses at the start of bigger crossings. Sure I will pick these up the other end and the idea of freeze dried camping food will seem ludicrous given the facilities, but it made me feel adventurous, and organized. And there is nothing like to a panacea to fool yourself into doing something silly.

Finally it’s been coldish , stormy and occasionally wet outside all day, with the wind gusting in from the west. Sometimes you really are lucky in life.


Miles: 100 – Balranald, Euston, Mildura

Tuesday
Breakfast – Standard in the motel room
Rainy trip to the post office
Lunch – Rather rancid corned beef and pickle sandwich at the take away/post office, washed down with Bunderberg ginger beer and a mars bar. Luckily I had a back up chicken sandwich bought from Balranald bakery pre-dawn (they all seem to open that early)
Snack – Cliff bar to take with the new pain killers that need to be taken with food
Supper – Bruschetta and Picante Pizza – I forget the name. On the throbbing main street in Mildura. There must be money in this town, all the bars and restaurants were packed. 

Wednesday
Breakfast – Motel “continental” option, although not sure toast and cereal would really cut it in Paris.
Lunch – Over priced ham sandwich from some expensive looking deli. Was not impressed.

Supper – Pass, just about to go.

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