Gregory Downs

We got a lift to old Gregory Downs with a couple of folks from NSW. We chatted and bonded over things we had in common like all being from NSW.

The town has a cute pub. No beer on tap but they do sell milk and bread and that's how you can tell Gregory Downs is a real town. Unlike Burke & Wills Roadhouse which only sold postcards and stubby holder shaped memorabilia.


We had even more beers when we got here. It might make today our most drunkenly day of the whole trip.

We found a pretty caravan park with roos and sprinklers and ants and caretakers from Melbourne. One of them offered us one of the empty cabins if it got too cold. She said she wouldn't tell anyone else - presumably meaning her fellow caretaker and husband. It was quite lovely of her. It was about 35 degrees today.

As we settled down and started to reflect on our small-scale, high-mobility pack, I realised I'd removed every sort of dinner flavour from the kitchen bag. Alice was gracious and forgiving but insisted I never be permitted again to make serious spice decisions without supervision. I agreed that was only fair. Fortunately salt and olive oil are great even in fairly remote isolation from other flavours. And peanut butter on a spoon makes both an excellent entree and dessert. So the night was no Desert Dinner Disaster by any means.

We both like cycling almost 10.

Burke and Wills Roadhouse

We made it to Burke and Wills safe, sound, slightly thirsty and with a healthy hot chip craving. It's a funny place which seems to exist purely for tourists. There's nothing else for 150km but you can't buy milk. Or beer on tap.


Today was short - about 30km. But it was enough. Much hotter than the last couple of days. Luckily we had a glorious tail wind all the way into town.


We are trying to find folks who might want to give us a lift into Lawn Hill. Because we are lazy loafers and don't want to do the 300km side trip.

It rained last night, for about 10 minutes. Big desert raindrops. Alice put up the tarp and the rain stopped. But there were puddles on the road thus morning which I rode through fast with a splash.

There were a bunch of mosquitoes too last night. We are a but paranoid about Murray Basin Encephalitis. Alice put up the tent and the mosquitoes stopped. For me at least. I didn't get in the tent.

I have just eaten chips and beer so I like cycling 10 and I think Alice does too.

Second day to Burke & Wills

Our second day is not quite so impressive. By the time we'd finished eating our celebratory pancakes last night it was 11pm which meant there was no chance we'd be leaving at 4:30am. In the end we had a nice sleep in and left about 8am. It was funny to wake up and find we were sleeping just a few metres from the highway. But in the mornings and evenings we only see one or two cars an hour so they didn't wake us up.

Instead of belting through 70km happily before lunch as we traditionally do (once at least), we struggled through 40km. Nut snack stops at least every 5km or it really wouldn't be manageable.


We managed to lose our lunch time rest stop entirely. We're still not sure where it went. But luckily we found a lovely clump of trees in an otherwise barren stretch of road. We had a bit of a fire and cooked up some chapatis. We had them with some hot (hardly) mango chutney we found at Stop Shop in Normanton. What a treat it was.


This was also where we ran out of soy milk so no more cappuccinos for us (or me). I'll have to struggle by on short blacks only for the next two days. Fortunately we found water at one rest stop so I can now wash the percolator between bliss times.

Alice likes riding 10 today and I like it 8.

Slow and far

After 7 hours riding even macadamias can't totally cheer Alice up. It will be our slowest day and also our furthest.

Lunch out of Normanton

We had a tremendous morning. There was a foul head wind but luckily for me and Alice we are both totally tough and fit. Not to mention wholesome early riser sorts.

There were flocks of brolga about 40km out of Normanton. Heaps of them in bunches waiting by the side of the road. As we rolled past they'd take off and it was pretty great. They had about the same trouble flying south as we did riding south so I felt a little solidarity.

We crossed the Flinders River and I collected extra water without being eaten at all by crocodiles. Alice didn't collect any spare water so I anticipate I'll be faced with an ethical dilemma if her life is threatened by dehydration. One thing I've learned out here is that helping people survive doesn't help anyone so I believe it would be best to let her perish nobly with her independence and dignity in tact. Welfare gets you nowhere.

We did about 15kph (slow) throughout the morning and made it to a good rest stop for lunch. There are no shade trees in these parts so finding a shed is rather exciting. We'll probably sit happily under this fellow for quite some hours.



We had something of a spectacular satay pita bread wrap for lunch followed by freshly percolated coffee from my brand new middle-class gadget (or at least I did).



Alice lost some crosswords to a particularly vicious gust of wind. She ran down the road after them and I wondered if I should follow and help. I decided it was too hot so I stayed in the shed. Then I had images of Alice getting lost running around paddocks looking for crosswords and getting heatstroke or something. And it definitely seemed too hot to mount any sort of search and/or rescue if that happened so I was somewhat torn. Eventually Alice came back with most of the crosswords, interrupting my reflection time. She doesn't appear to have suffered any permanent side effects from her ordeal. The scars will be largely emotional.

So the plan us to sit around. Read books. Make more fancy coffee. Perhaps have a siesta.

Morning Starting

We finally left at about 5am after much daffing around by me and a longish detour to the post office to post some cinnamon to our friends.

We've just had a breakfast stop while the sun rises over some pretty Savannah grasses.

Normanton to Cloncurry

Alice and I are heading off in a few hours. For our epic desert trek. 200km of pure crocodile and grey nomad infested territory with no water save that from the greys campervan sinks. It will be some tough distance to cover to be sure. Asking people at rest stops for water and lunch biscuits because we couldn't carry enough for ourselves. Hard, sweaty and humiliating work. But it's all part of the genuine desert cycling tour adventure upon which we embark.

See you all on the other side. Or at least at the next roadhouse.

Location:Sutherland St,Normanton,Australia

Gulf!

We made it to the Gulf!
Have just had a lovely few days in Normanton and Karumba.
I hope my previous post hasn't turned anyone off cycle touring- it was an exceptional day, probably our toughest yet.
Ryan has new tyres which are proving good and tough (thanks to Atherton Bike shop and the Normanton coach/courier service!), I continue puncture free thanks to the bargain Schwalbe Big Apples from the good folk at Bicycle Revolution in Bris.

So many highlights! Almost everything is a highlight. We're trying to get to bed to get up early tomorrow and start our longest stretch (205km) between water to Burke and Wills Road House.
So won't try to describe them too descriptively, but once again resort to list form:

• Normanton state school fete! How lucky we were to be in town for one of the biggest social events of the year!
• Watching the sun set over the gulf of carpentaria (although no, we couldn't swim in it)
• Riding a 105km day.
• So many birds, I'm at around 110 species for the trip (despite myself I've become one of those list makers)- including a bustard, burdekin ducks, rufous throated honeyeater, pied herons in the past few days...
• Spending long hours chatting with the lovely Mark and Erika, our amazing Normanton hosts (who also picked us up from Karumba, saving us riding back the 70km into a headwind and got us back in time for the fete- thanks a million guys!).
• Picking up an amazing package (contents pictured) from Dad at the Normanton Post Office- it was better than Christmas! Dried fruit and veg, quinoa, macadamias, crosswords thanks to mum, anything we could have possibly thought of and more! Yum yum yum we will most certainly be well fuelled on the next leg, and we may well need it more than ever as we turn south into possible headwinds, eek!

Ryan did a blind test of hot chips claimed to be the best in the southern hemisphere. The jury is still out but it made us pretty happy anyway.









Getting blown away by our first strong crosswinds. Note my caravan-park-chic helmet hat (version one, as that one was quickly destroyed by wind and cats)




Sunset and beer at the Gulf.
Pretty stoked to have made it this far.

A day (and a bit) in the life of savannah cyclists

Thursday August 19
0430 Alarm goes off but I don't hear it
0520 Waken up by an engine starting- a miner who lives in this Mt Surprise caravan park heading to work. Scurry to pack and leave to escape the heat
0610 On the road! What bliss! The bike just hums along this flat savannah way. Pedalling seems almost perfunctory, like my bike has a will of its own drawing me ever westward.
0630 The sun is rising behind me, warming my back in a promise of the heat of the day to come
0640 We stop at a creek to watch a Jabiru legging wirily through the shallows, then ascend skyward and float skyward, a calligraphic question mark heading for the horizon.
0650 Ryan has a flat tyre. We declare it breakfast time ( soaked mueslie with figs, nuts, dates and the ever-present cinnamon)
0730 Try to leave. Ryan's bike (Walnut) refuses, revealing another hissing hole, and then two more.
0815 Ok! Tyre fixed, back on the road- we should still be able to get some good distance behind us before the day heats up too much.
0845 Walnut has another flat. Pull off the now single-lane highway into some paltry shade.
0915 Ryan still fixing and searching for holes and their sources. I help by taking photos.
0930 A car stops to say hello and out gets Tash, who I met on the sunshine coast- small world! Unfortunately not carrying any thorn-proof tyres.
0945 Eat half a packet of jatz out of boredom
1000 Back on the road! Getting warm.
1015 Another flat. Somehow still haven't heard Ryan swear. Examine tyres in fine detail and extract tiny but deadly thorns. Shade is getting shady, in the dodgy sense, not in the shielding-us-from-the-sun sense.
1100 Back on the road.
1130 Half an hour with no flats! Bringing us 30km since we left over 5 hours ago, to the sandy banks of the Einasleigh river. Stop for a 'swim' and decide to shelter here from the heat, as it's the best shade around
1230 Baked beans for lunch!
1300 Siesta time!
1315 What the hell are we doing here?
Confined to the languid midday shade, whiling away these stifling hours. I watch weebills flit from tree to tree. Australia's smallest bird, moving with freedom across that seems so daunting and vast to me, despite being hundreds of times bigger. Makes us clumsy humans luggan all sorts of paraphernalia merely to survive seem pretty comical.
1330 I sit on our only banana. Mix with peanut butter and declare it a new dessert- 'Platano plano'
1400 Did I mention it's hot?
1430 Try to leave but still too hot to move.
1530 Action! Not that it's cooled down noticably but hope to create some of our own wind. Sunglasses on as we head into the lowering sun. Given up on making it the 90km to Georgetown, but we should at least make it up the Newcastle Range, our last decent climb of the trip.
1630 An hour and no flats! Celebrate with peanuts.
1700 Start to climb the range
1715 Ryan gets a flat. We declare it a day and set up camp just off the road (actually quite a pleasant clearing, with ghostly termite mounds dancing politely around stately granite tors, and sweeping views back to the east)
1730 Ryan fixing flat (or 5 flats to be precise, bringing the days total to 11). I help by playing ukelele
1800 Too hot and tired to cook (still 32degrees we later find out), we eat sandwiches for dinner.
1900 Too hot for the tent, we flop onto our mattresses on the groundsheet, sheltered from the highway by a big friendly rock.
1901 SLEEP.
Friday August 20
0630 Wake to the spectrum of the rising sun
0700 Porridge!
0800 On the road, just hoping for no flats for the 30km into Georgetown, where we plan to wait till Ryan can get better tyres posted.
0815! Yes! Up the range, the bike just hums along, pedalling seems almost perfunctory, I am drawn magnetically westward, through glowing hills dotted with charismatic termite mounds and skeletal Kapok trees, passing handfuls of crayon yellow flowers to the sun. What bliss!

*******
Postscript: We cheated a little and got a bus from Georgetown to Croydon, an interesting historic goldtown in which to spend a weekend (it used to have 36 pubs!). Ryan's tyres should arrive today and then we'll be on the move again, this early summer weather is predicted to cool off at least slightly. Only one banana was harmed in the writing of this blog.

We rode 84km yesterday. Or maybe even 87km. We have forgotten. But anyway, it was well far and we are feeling pretty hot stuff. Starting to even feel like this whole endeavour might be possible. Not totally convinced yet, but certainly hopeful. It sure is a long way to Alice Springs. People keep telling us that. And they're right.

This morning we set out deadly early, although Alice had been up for hours, patiently waiting while I slept. We got the best tail wind and swept (and were swept) along at 25km/hour all morning. There were bits where we'd be going uphill at 30km/hour without much pedalling at all. With full panniers and all. It would be good to know how much gear we are actually hauling across the continent. My estimates are from 30kg to 55kg. I'm not very good at estimating.

So far the highlights have been the food (although we haven't had hot chips for almost a week), the friendly folk we've stayed with, the Rock Wallabies at Granite Gorge. Also the nice morning rides. And the tail winds. And the sunset at Atkinson Lookout tonight. And the hot chips we had before we stopped having hot chips. And good company to Alice, in Alice.

We upgraded our panniers and added a spare trailer we found abandoned by the road.

Good storage capacity, but quite slow.

Cairns to Atherton tablelands

Five days into our adventure and we are certainly epitomising slow and curious travel, having only made it 70km or so from Cairns as the crow flies. Which doesn't mean our days haven't been action packed. So much to see and do (and eat) up here on the Atherton Tablelands, a lush volcanic landscape, diverse and full of surprises- be they pockets of rainforest, delicious places to swim or produce stalls.

Lots of things have made us happy and in love with cycle touring (today we give it an 11 out of 10!) and this land these past few days:

*riding through a traffic-free backroad in Dinden national park, in lush rainforest in the misting rain, thinking about how different most of the rest of the trip will be.

*getting up on to the tablelands- we survived the climb!

*being greeted by a coffee plantation with cafe soon after joining the main road.

*finding a local fruit and veg stall 500m further down the road

*a local icecream factory 500m further down the road (hm it sure is tricky to get very far when there is the serious job of food sampling to be attended to)

*sunshine

*falling in love with Mareeba unadorned rock wallabies at granite gorge, where we wandered blissfully among the boulders.

*swimming in rivers and waterfalls, gorges and lakes- Lake Eacham, a 55m deep lake in a volcano crater today was especially divine

*making new avian friends- today a huge shifting flock of magpie geese huddled in a paddock, sending out regular gangs westward, a little further down the road were a congregation of sarus cranes stepping perfectly through long grass. Also a yellow honeyeaters, great bowerbirds, little shrike-thrush, forest kingfisher, a huge raucous flock of redtailed black cockatoos and probably more.

*staying with a wonderful family from WarmShowers in Atherton, we knew when we were greeted by 4 smiling boys riding bikes in their undies and a bunch of chooks waddling round the green garden that we were in the Right Place- thanks guys!

The list of things that has made us grumpy is a lot shorter:

*grumpy ranger at Clohesy River telling us you can't camp here go back to cairns (we'd got there over 3 hoursof climbing)

*having to push our bikes up very very steep dirt roads for a couple of hours out of copperlode dam- although ryan said he was having fun, I was swearing like a sailor under my breath.

*not being allowed to adopt a Mareeba unadorned rock wallaby as a pet

Tommorow we go through ravenshoe, the highest town in queensland (it actually gets cold up here) and on to Innot hot springs. starting to cover some real distances as fruit stalls and cheese factories become further and further apart. Any mail offerings can be sent to Normanton.

Cairns to Alice

Well, I have joined Alice on her adventures for a time. She has invited me on her cycle and also to her blog. A few of weeks ago I suggested to Alice that we ride to Alice Springs, just trying to be funny. She said she'd call me back. She did think it was a pretty funny idea, but she also said she would do it. So here we are in Cairns, about to ride 2500kms to Alice Springs.

We are both pretty crazy excited. We got a little carried away buying food. Our spice bag takes up half a pannier - and that was after we heavily culled the Hungarian paprika. We haven't left so much room for water, which apparently out in the desert everyone seems to think is important. We bought some extra bottles and stuff just in case.

We are saying goodbye to Sarah and Renee, who looked after us while we explored Cairns. We'd expected to stay a night, but we ended up spending three days following them around town poking into their social lives. Cairns is a nice place. Nice and tropical. Certainly warm enough for nice swimming. In the winter. But we want to thank Sarah and Renee for being so great. Everyone who comes to Cairns should stay with them. Although perhaps we should ask them if that's OK first.

Our first destination is Copperlode Dam and then to Tinaroo Dam. Our first few days are going to be dirt roads, so it's possible everything our bikes will bounce/snap off and we'll have to return to Cairns for stronger clips and straps and bikes. But it sure sounds like a nice ride and it has plenty of water, which is a nice introduction to a desert trip.

• Cairns to Alice Springs (Google Maps route)

Go West!

In Cairns, heading West tomorrow!

Lots of last minute preparations and excitedness.

We're a bit scared about the 1000m climb ahead of us, but it will be largely downhill from there.

The drive up here was as nice as it could be, in a monster of a campervan for $5 a day. There were many moments reminding me why I prefer being on a bike- which is just as well, because there's a lot of hours in the saddle ahead!

My partner in crime, Ryan, will be a guest author on the blog for the journey. Not sure when we'll have internets but when we do you'll be sure to hear about all our crocodile encounters, desert pancake-cookups and other near-death experiences.

Time for bed, as we'll need our energy for the climb tomorrow, just wanted to do a quick post announcing the beginning of this adventure. Hurrah!

Gympie to Gayndah

(written 31/7)
How quickly the country has changed, not even 100km west from the luscious green of Pomona and the last of the glasshouse mountains, and suddenly everything dries out, I find myself swept up by rolling brown hills, open box woodland and expansive plains, riding over creek bed after dried-up creek bed- a little bit like home. Only a stones throw from the trendy consumer cornucopia of Noosa and suddenly it's 70km between water and I'm having to pay $8 for a dusty packet of oats and a lonely refrigerated orange from a tiny general store/service station. Ah yes, this is more like the Queensland of my imagination. Like many, I feel I had fallen into the trap of identifying Queensland with its beautiful but touristy coastland. But that is merely the icing on the cake, the fringe on the lily, and I get the feeling I'm starting to really move to the heart of things.
What this land lacks in conveniences for the traveller, it makes up for in friendliness. I had hardbly been off the highway for 20minutes when the (relatively) quiet backroad produced my first new friend for the day- Martin- who's 4 years in to travelling the bicentennial trail with 2 horses (today in a car), and loves to stop and chat to fellow travellers. Further down the road I was invited in for morning tea by Les and Lorraine (to their friend Jan's house they were just turning off to), plied with chips and tim tams, a cup of tea, and sent along with cheery waves an hour later. And then to top it off, 3 young locals and their grandad befriended me in Kilkivan, quizzed me seriously about my survival skills (always go west, I'm told!), spoke to me of feathers, ladybeetles, mandarins and native bees (scared away by grown-ups but not my kids) and filled my waterbottle with cool sweet tankwater.

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Now I'm in Gayndah, accepted a gift of a bag of oranges this morning- wouldn't have normally, but tomorrow Ryan will catch me with a car and we head up to Cairns.