Day 133 - Plan B

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Stamford - Hughenden 65km

Our plan B for the final stretch of the isolated and uninspiring Kennedy Development road into the town of Hughenden begins at 05:00am, when the alarm goes off. The BOM is predicting the exact same conditions as yesterday. So we decide to start early, hoping to get a fair chunk of the total distance done, before the worst of the easterly wind kicks in (around 10am). The spectacular ride into sunrise comes at the price of numb fingers and toes for the first hour but it is a surprisingly reinvigorating experience. Louise asks me whether this replaces the cold shower in my winter morning routine that I am currently missing out on... "Maybe it would if I rode naked!" I reply. But we won't go there. 

06:00am @ breakfast

06:30am @ roll out

Our plan works. Trying to keep warm combined with a sense of pride that we stuck to the plan packing up camp in the dark, freezing cold, allows us to speed towards Hughenden with a pace that I haven't seen on the bike computer for a few days. But at 09:30am on the dot the wind starts to get progressively worse and with 10km to go we are on the lower chainring and hoping more than ever that Hughenden has something good in store for us. 

The 'something good' comes first in the shape of an Italian. I know that many of you would agree that good + Italian can deliver a promising result. Well, in our case it is Andrea, a young and energetic Italian (originally from Torino) who is the first travelling cyclist we get to chat to! Since Barcaldine, fellow travellers have been telling us about this other cyclist and we had hoped that we would eventually meet him. So there is a big hurrah in front of the Hughenden visitor's centre followed by a long chat. It only took him a month to ride from Adelaide to here, heading for his Australian home in Cairns. Huge credit to him for so freely and refreshingly engaging in a conversation with us ladies, likely double his age. We are having a good time amongst freewheelers.

Finally meeting him: Andrea

The next good thing is also delivering a sense of 'la vita e bella' - the caravan park has got one cabin left for two nights. And when I finally stand under the hot shower with the dirt and dust running off me, I truly think life is pretty good and so was plan B!


Location: Hughenden QLD 4821, Australia

Comments

  1. FrancieJune 21, 2022 at 1:04 PM

    The True Grit day was hard to read and I am so glad that things 'looked up' at Hughenden.
    Years ago we met a lone Italian cyclist at Ballan roadhouse on one of our many trips to and fro from Ballarat. He needed to send an email to his father so I did that on my computer (hot-spotting from my phone) and he was ecstatic - as only Italians can be. We all were happy to be speaking Italian. Yes, it is the smaller 'gifts' such as food (and an email) which are memorable.

    ReplyDelete
  2. FrancieJune 21, 2022 at 1:11 PM

    If Mick is still on track to get to Cairns by 1 July, you also should make it. Though they will be there for a month at least I believe.

    ReplyDelete
  3. AnonymousJune 21, 2022 at 5:36 PM

    Hooray for you two!!

    ReplyDelete

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