How to fly with a bike

Black Beauty - my bicycle

Flying with a bike is always a big hassle, but it is becoming more and more difficult!
I encountered the first serious problem last year in Korea when I was flying back to Germany. In order to save weight, I had put heavy bike parts like my bike lock and the saddle into my hand luggage. I had done that before on other flights and never had a problem. But for whatever reason the Koreans did not like it. Security sent me back to check in the bike saddle and the air pump. Maybe they assumed I could hit the pilot with the saddle?

Yesterday I flew from Darwin to Adelaide at the very friendly time of 2.40 am in the morning. I cycled to the airport and wanted to buy a bike box which is offered by various airlines - unfortunately not by Jetstar, the airline I was using. I tried Qantas first only to find out that they sell bike boxes only to Qantas customers. Jetstar and Qantas are codesharing their flights, but that did not impress them.

I then tried to convince Qantas passengers to buy a bike box for me (of course I would give them the money), but they reacted as if I had asked them to smuggle drugs for me! I started to get a bit nervous, because it is difficult to get a bike box at midnight anywhere else and airlines will not accept a bike as baggage without a box.

Would you trust this person?

Because nobody wanted to buy a box for me I tried another airline myself. I was lucky at the Virginblue counter. The attendant asked me whether I flew Virginblue but still sold me the box when I had denied. I left happily with my box and thought all was good. Big mistake! After two minutes she came running after me and told me that she had made a mistake and could only sell bike boxes to their own customers! It took me a lot of persuasion (I had already folded up the box) and talking to her manager so that they would let me keep the box.

I put everything that even looked remotely dangerous into the bike box and that I would have no problems now with hand luggage. I was wrong againg. Security confiscated and destroyed a roll of packaging tape! Even in my wildest dreams I cannot imagine how I could use a roll of packaging tape as a weapon on a flight and it is still a mystery to me why I was not allowed to bring it onto the plane.
But just for the record: After all that hassle everything went well and me and my bike made it to Adelaide.

Stuart Highway: The real attractions

In the middle of the great Nothingness there are some real attractions. They are few and far between, but that makes them even more attractive.

Devil's Marbles

Devil's marbles: This is a rock formation that looks like huge marbles piled on top of the other.For me they were mostly memorable because of two events: 3 Italian guys had climbed the rocks (which is forbidden), were flashing their willies around on top of the marbles (which is weird) showing them amongst other people to the local ranger who had happened to come by (which is just plain stupid). The ranger got terribly upset, made them come done and gave them a lengthy lecture about being disrespectful - all of which was a great evening entertainment for me. But when I was looking for a campsite (after the ranger had left, of course) I got another companion: a wild dingo kept following. He did not attack me and always kept his distance, but still it was sort of weird. Also, what would the dingo do at my dinner time? I decided to stay at the official camp ground which made the dingo leave me. But as soon as I left camp the next morning, the dingo was on my heels again... Seems I have made a friend there.

Fantastic hot springs

The towns: Between Alice and Darwin there are just 2 towns that are worth being called town: Tennant Creek and Katherine. There is not really much to see there but after cycling for 5 days with no shower and only packaged noodle soup these little towns with swimming pools and a supermarket can be a real attraction. I already started having hallucinations about showers and fresh fruit! In Tennant Creek I ran into 2 Mormon missionaries - these guys are everywhere! I decided to be nice and told them that I had recently been to Salt Lake City and how much I had been impressed by it. We talked for about an hour and I learnt a lot about the hard life of a missionary. And when I cycled out of Tennant Creek a car stopped for me. To my big surprise my 2 missionary friends came out and gave me tons of food - thank you so much! In both towns I stayed at a commercial campground - and that is pretty luxurious after camping in the bush for a week. There usually is a swimming pool, barbecues and a camp kitchen - and I ate lots of kangaroo steak and lamb sausages...

Katherine gorge National Park

Tropical Australia: Around Katherine the area becomes tropical. It does not look like that from the road - there you just realize that there are bigger and bigger trees and sometimes even palm trees. But Katherine has the first permanent river and around the water the vegetation is quite lush. And to my big joy there are hot springs! And to my even bigger joy they are free! So no more dust and grime - I was going to bed clean! There are also some famous National Parks like Katherine Gorge and Litchfield. All this means that you can go swimming amidst the most beautiful tropical setting: Waterfalls, palm trees, kakadus! Just beware of the crocodiles!

I with a Japanese cyclist

What else happened? I met about 7 other cyclist going the other way fighting a headwind. All of them were male and most of them Asian. I could even impress two Japanese guys with my little Japanese vocabulary. I always stayed on the Stuart Highway except for Litchfield National Park where I cycled on 42 km of dirt road in order to avoid backtracking. What can I say? I am not made for dirt roads..... Still, no bike problems whatsoever. No puncture, no broken spoke, no nothing. I love my bike.

But now I will go hiking again. I am in Darwin right now and will fly to Adelaide this weekend to tackle the Great South West Walk (250 km) and the Heysen Trail (1.200 km).

Stuart Highway: The great Nothingness

Luckily that wasn't my highway...

Most people whom I met on the Stuart Highway did not understand how I could possibly enjoy cycling 1.500 km with nothing to see in between. They always called it the great "Nothingness". Well, partly they are right. There is not really that much to see. It is all flat with a lot of red dust and scrub. Cycling there was a bit like meditation. But still, there are things that keep you entertained:

Termite mounds: There are literally millions of termite mounds out there. There are magnetic mounds (all aligned the same way), giant cathedral mounds (look like giant cathedrals) and just plain whatever mounds. They are everywhere and sometime reminded me of tomb stones on a grave yard. But this means there are also a lot of ants out there - which can be a bit of a nuisance while camping...So if you get bored, just start counting the mounds.

Daily kangaroo death toll: You should not drive around in the outback in the dark - not if you are a cyclist, because traffic will not see you and also not if you are in a car, because you will hit kangaroos. Kangaroos are night active and blinded by the cars' headlights and so every morning I could count last night's death toll... which gets pretty smelly after a couple of days roasting in the sun.

Pink Panther road house

Road houses and rest areas:  About every 100 km there is a road house with fuel, food and most importantly, water. I never had any problem getting water at these road houses which had been a major concern of mine. Because they are the only attraction in a radius of 100 km they can become really famous. There even is a "Pink Panther" Road house! The rest areas do not have any services, but they generally have water tanks, sometimes toilets and people can camp there for free. I never did because they are directly at the road and a road train passing your tent with a speed of 130 km/h and a distance of 10 meters will certainly wake you up in the middle of the night....But I restocked on water there and was always greeted very friendly by the motorists. People had already heard about me! (Hey, there are not so many single women cycling around in the middle of nowhere.) I was offered drinks and water - and usually a friendly chat.

Stuart Highway: 1.500 km across the Outback

Wicked camper

When I was about to leave Alice Springs on my bike I was not at all enthusiastic about cycling at all. Cycling in the US had not been a great experience and Dave's death in a bike accident still gave me nightmares. But at least I wanted to give it a try. It is 1.500 km from Alice Springs to Darwin and in the worst case I only had to cycle 500 km to get to the next bus stop. So sort of grudgingly I set off from Alice - and I did not have to regret it. On the contrary: My bike trip from Alice to Darwin turned out to be a wonderful experience!!! But that was mostly due to the following:

Wind:  After my wind problems in the US I had enquired about the prevailing wind directions in Australia. My old Australian friend Alan (whom I had met the year before cycling) and my warmshowers host in Alice both told me the same thing: Prevailing wind is East South East. So my original plan to cycle from Darwin to Alice was prone to be another desaster. So I decided to change cycling direction and had a tail wind most of the time. I was averaging 15 km/h + every day - as opposed to under 10 km/h in the US. I really pitied all the poor guys I met on the Stuart Highway going the other direction....

Camping spot

Terrain: Australia is mostly flat - especially the Outback! And I just loved that! No more 1.000 m elevation gains everyday. Just plain flat! The terrain gets sort of hilly towards Darwin, but by then I was nearly finished anyways. Call me a wuss - but I love flatland cycling.

Camping: The Outback is basically a huge "nothingness" - just flat brush. And luckily there are hardly any fences. If there are fences, there are also gates to cross the fences and these gates are not locked. And on top of all that there is hardly any traffic at night, so not much road noise. All you have to do is get off the road for a couple of hundred meters, duck behind some bushes and set up camp. Great!

Road train

Traffic: Traffic was so much better than I had expected. First of all there is not that much traffic. Second, most of the traffic is friendly holiday traffic. Lots of retirees who all waved at me. I kept bumping into the same people again and again. Most of the holiday people were doing about my mileage - even in a car!!! Plus Australians don't drive these monster-size RV's like Americans. They mostly have a car or truck with a little caravan behind. And the young backpackers have campervans. I loved the "wicked" campers best. This is a cheap campervan rental and all their campers have tons of graffiti on them. Great entertainment on a long ride. Of course there are the road trains. Trucks with up to 4 trailers and a length of 54 meters. These guys don't get out of their way for everyone - but they did for me on a bike. I still had to watch for oncoming traffic (because then the road trains can't get out of their way), but generally they were much less frightening than I had thought.

So life is good again on a bike!!!!!

Melbourne to Adelaide

Benny and I

Our first stop was visiting an AT hiker friend of mine at Geelong: Benny or Daisy (the latter one being his trail name). Daisy and I had met on the AT where he had been a true advocate of hiking in Australia by giving me a 2 hour long presentation of hiking the Bibbulmun Track. And it has worked as I have hiked it now, too. At Benny's place we were treated with about the most luxurious meal I have had in a long time: Roast lamb with various sides. Benny's mom is a great cook and I got about 5 seconds....plus there was a delicious desert! Benny looked after us very well giving us directions how to get in and out of town.

12 Apostles

So the next day we were on the Great Ocean Road, which should be called Good Ocean Road. It was nice, but not overwhelming. The road is narrow and winding with a lot of tourist traffic, but fortunately tourists are not in a hurry so cycling was not too bad. We saw same very interesting rock formations out in the ocean, like the 12 apostles or London Bridge. I think they chose these names to attract tourists... The 12 apostles are one of the biggest Australian attractions, so I was a little bit overwhelmed by the size of the car park and the amount of tourists. Although the rock formations are quite impressive I still think the sight is a bit overrated.

In South Australia

We continued on to Adelaide passing and camping in Tower Hill Forest Reserve, that turned out to be a volcanoe crater. I was quite surprised to end up in a crater instead of on top of a hill. Unfortunately, I got real bad diarrhea when we got closer to Adelaide. I still continued cycling, but I was hardly able to eat anything and knowing me you can now assume that I was pretty sick. On the other hand John put on even more weight because he now had to eat my part of the dinner, too. He eventually convinced me to take some Immodium and the situation improved. And in Adelaide I was back to normal.

The joy of cycling or luxury bike tours are us

Getting water from a windmill

I ended up cycling all the way from Melbourne to Adelaide with John. The whole trip turned into a luxury tour - but I guess that is what happens if you cycle with a guy carrying a petrol stove and a kitchen sink.... Here is a typical day on the road with John: Around 7.30 am there is the first serious attempt to get out of the tent and have breakfast. John is addicted to coffee so he has to have a brew first. Breakfast consists of leftovers from last night, bread and cheese and jam and on one occasion even of bacon and eggs (I am not kidding you there!). After breakfast is devoured packing up start. I am usually done in less than half an hour, whereas John takes more than an hour to pack up all his crap. We are leaving camp later and later and I have to admit that on one occasion we left as late as 10 am. Gone are my hiker days where I was on the trail at first daylight!

Happy lunch break

We usually cycle around 100 km per day. The terrain between Melbourne and Adelaide is pretty flat, so 100 km is no problem if the wind is cooperating. We do not have much of a lunch break, but you don't really need that after bacon and eggs for breakfast and a 3-course dinner. The only big task is to find a super market and buy food for the evening. At 5 pm it is time to look for a campsite. We are always stealth camping and finding a site can be somewhat of an adventure. We always found something, but sometimes it is less than perfect. When hiking you are usually far away from roads, but cycling is different, so traffic noise can be a problem. Luckily, traffic here dies down at night - very useful if you are camped just 50 m from a road....

Brats for dinner

After setting up the tents the relax time starts when John has his first coffee and I am getting tea. Then comes the highlight of the day: dinner! Our dinners have become more and more elaborate and the hobby cook in me has come out. A typcial dinner starts with a soup as starter. We would then have barbecued fish or cangaroo or lamb or sausages with one or two side dishes followed by an extensive dessert like pineapple simmered in sweet condensed milk. It should come as no surprise that John has been putting on weight ever since he met me. All this is accompanied by various cups of coffee. Of course preparing a 3 course dinner takes quite a while so we are stopping earlier and earlier...BUT: Life is never been so luxurious on this trip!

Travelling partners or what have I done to deserve this...

John

I am getting along very well with my cycling partner John, but before I seemed to be jinxed.

My first attempt to find a hiking partner here in Australia led me to a German guy called Reiner. I found him through another hiker and we emailed back and forth for a while until we finally met on the Bibbulmun Track. I know that hiking is no beauty contest but meeting Reiner was some sort of a shock. Reiner is about 1,65 m (I am 1,84m) and has hair growing out of every face orifice. I am used to hikers having a beard, but not to dreadlocks growing out of ears. On top of all that Reiner was the most negative person I have ever met on a hike. He has been to Australia 6 times and hiked the Bibbulmun Track about 4 times, but in a 2 hour conversation he did not say a single good word about either one of them. It was very clear to me after 5 minutes that there was no way I would hike with this guy - compatriot or not!

My next attempt was an add on the crazyguyonabike website. I was looking for a travel partner for Japan and ended up with Mark cycling around Tasmania. I have already posted that Mark left me on day 2, but I have not written yet about his peculiarities. Mark was riding a folding bike. There is nothing wrong with that. The folding bike was transported in a suitcase that converted into a trailer. I am not kidding you now, but I was following a guy on a folding bike with a red Samsonite suitcase trailer. On top of all that Mark had some sort of a unfortunate figure. He was not bad looking, but he was sort of 7 months pregnant. That is nothing a nice shirt could not tactfully hide, but Mark decided to wear bike shorts that had fit him 5 years ago and a bike shirt he had traded with a Japanese cyclist (who was probably half a meter shorter than Mark). It was very difficult to keep looking into his face and not onto his exposed belly buttom... I still do hope he was having a good time in Tasmania without me.

Tassie - the happy ending

Rocky beach

 As bad as my trip to Tasmania started - it ended very nicely. Cycling with John for a week was so much fun: We barbecued sausages on his petrol stove and had a bottle of wine for dinner. John is definitely not an ultralighter: He is carrying a teddy bear (only 5 cm big) and a kitchen sink (collapsible, it is more like a water carrier - but still!). But he also carries a very useful picnic blanket for our gourmet dinners and a real Swiss army knife. It also takes him half an hour longer every morning to pack up all his crap... When cycling together we averaged about 70 - 80 km every day. That is not much, but still ok considering that Tasmania is very, very hilly (according to his bike computer we had an average elevation gain per day around 1.000 m) and we ended up in all sorts of interesting discussions every day.

Central highland plateau

We got along so nicely that I decided to continue cycling with him. John went back to Melbourne and I did a shortcut across the Tasmanian Highlands to go back to Hobart and fly out to Melbourne as well. This shortcut involved only one minor problem: I had to get up to the central plateau - and that is an elevation gain of 1.000 m in one go. And after that 30 km on my beloved dirt roads through the middle of nowhere. I was not very happy.

My high point in Tassie

To my big surprise everything went extremely well. I climbed up 1.000 m in 2 hours and was not even very exhausted (you have to keep in mind that 1.000 m is not much for hikers, but demanding on a bike). The dirt roads turned out to be not too bad and the weather cooperated. Add some really spectacular scenery and I had one of my best days on a bike! With 3 days I was much faster than I expected and made it back to Hobart earlier than planned: Time to visit the Cadbury chocolate factory there. In their factory outlet they sell 5 kg of chocolate for 40 AUS$ - I was very tempted, but no, I already had a baggage weight problem.

Roadside attraction in Tasmania

Today I flew back to Melbourne and I can proudly say that I am an expert now in disassembling and assembling my bike for transport in a bike box! What happens next depends a lot on the forest fires. The situation is still very unpredictable. I thought it might be wiser to go cycling than hiking in that situation. John and me will cycle along the Great Ocean Road together and probably even all the way to Adelaide. That will probably take 2 weeks. After that John flies on to the US and I will do some more hiking in Australia - all depending on the fire situation. Cross your fingers for me!

Tassie, where things are getting better

Port Arthur

After Mark left me I went back to the youth hostel in Hobart to recover from the shock and make new plans. After I had treated myself to wonderful food in a great Indian Restaurant and having had a good night's sleep I decided to start my tour around Tasmania by cycling to Port Arthur to learn about Australian convict history. I really liked historic Port Arthur, but was still not too enthusiastic about cycling. Everything seemed to be so difficult: Getting water, finding campsites, dealing with the weather - I did not feel in my element.

Wielangta Forest Drive

 On my way back I ran into another cyclist going the opposite direction. There are not many cyclists around, so we both stopped to talk. We talked quite a while and even longer and then decided to camp together. We got along so well that John gave up on his plan to go to Port Arther and decided to cycle with me in Tasmania. John is cycling around the world and has been on tour now for 22 months. So we have many stories to tell each other. He loves stealth camping like me so we are in for an adventure every night. Actually we are having so much fun that I will follow him back to Melbourne from where we will cycle to Adelaide together. There are so many forest fires in the bush now that hiking does not make much sense.

Waiting for the ferry

Our first day of cycling brought us to Wielangta Forest Drive, a dirt road through thick forest with even some primeval forest left. Although very interesting cycling on rutted dirt roads was too much for me. John had to wait for me a lot. We cycled to Freycenit National Park to see the famous Wine Glass Bay and in order get there you can either take a long detour on roads or take a pedestrian and cyclist only ferry. We opted for the ferry which turned out to be a one man operation with a sports boat - but it worked.

John looking over Wineglass Bay

We even did a cheesy touristy thing and visited a zoo where you could feed kangaroos. It was expensive and tacky, but so much fun! I really start to enjoy cycling now and thanks to the adjustments Alan made on my bike and have not had any hand problems any more. I even start looking forward to cycle in Japan! Life is good again.

Bad start in Tassie

Cycling in Tasmania

I arrived in Hobart after a long and almost sleepless night flight. My future cycling partner Mark met me at the airport and helped me to put the bike together. Next day we left for Bruny Island - bad idea!
As we found out on arrival there is no water on Bruny Island, so many locals are on tank water. And that means they are extremely anal about their water. We arrived with one liter of water left and were refused any water by the first shop owner. Which did not make any sense to me because there was a public FLUSH toilet. I got really annoyed, just sneaked in the toilet and got some water anyway. Unfortunately, Mark was not very happy with that - apparently he rather dehydrated.

Next day the problem re-occured: We went to a shop, even bought some stuff but where again denied any water. I had one liter left for 40 km in the heat and was not happy. Mark turned out to be a real pain in the ass - he flatly refused to ask people for water, because he wanted to avoid confrontation. After a short argument he then just left me ("You are on your own now!" - he seemed to like theatrical appearances). I felt much better on my own...

While I was still sitting in the cloud of dust Mark had left me in while cycling away a car full of locals stopped to ask me if I was ok - and 10 minutes later I had all the water I needed. I love Australians! I left this un-hospitable island immediately. While waiting for the ferry I unfortunately run into the first shop owner again who accused me of stealing his water and calling me all sorts of names. And then Mark was on the same ferry but we happily ignored each other. I was glad to be off Bruny Island and without Mark in the end....

Leaving Perth

Wild flower

Leaving Perth I had another example of great trail magic.
My roadside friend Alan sent me an email telling me he would be in Perth the day I left. Nice surprise!
We met in Perth and had a wonderful day including a great seafood lunch. It does help to give yourself a treat in a while.
Alan did not only drive me and all my crap to the airport (my bike was strapped to the top of his vehicle next to a kayak and various surfboards nearly causing me a heart attack), but he also helped me to get a bike box, disassemble and pack the damn thing.
Best of all he helped me to do some adjustments with the bike to avoid further carpal tunnel problems. Hope it helps! I guess Alan has become my own little private guardian bike angel!

Tassie - here I come!

After spending 2 months in Western Australia it is time to leave now. I will fly to Tasmania on the 27th of January and start cycling around there. After 40 C heat Tasmania will be nice and cool (hopefully not wet and cold!). I even found a cycling partner for Tasmania! I had posted a "trip partner wanted" ad on an American website for my upcoming trip to Japan and Mark answered. To both our surprise it turned out that I am travelling around Australia and he is living here in Sidney. So we decided to have a try-out trip in Tasmania. I wanted to go there anyway and he was very easily convinced. I will meet him in Hobart on the 27th. This will be a very interesting "blind date". He has already offered me his long johns... (well, this is quite innocent: Tassie will be very cold and my warm gear is still in Melbourne). So now I am quite excited to have a cycling partner...

Trail magic in Australia

When I was preparing for the CDT back in 2007 there were 2 British guys also planning to do the CDT. We were emailing back and forth and even planning on starting out together. I saw both of them in Britain, but things did not work out: George had to cancel the CDT because of health reasons and John decided to hike the AT instead. But George (his trail name is Highlander) and me had always stayed in contact. He had even sent me all his AT maps and guidebooks for my AT thruhike - thank you again for that.

So you cannot believe my surprise when I had already arrived in Australia and received an email from George telling me that he had left his wife and lived with his girlfriend in Australia now. And of all places in Australia he lived in Collie where both the Bibbulmun Track and the Munda Biddi Track pass through!

George and Debbie

I missed George when I came through Collie on the Bibbulmun Track, but now I am staying with him and his girlfriend Debbie. And they are treating me so well. I am fed 3 meals per day, sleep in a real bed and can use the computer - this is the reason why I am posting so much! I decided to have a rest day in Collie (I deserve that after a week long trip to hell on dirt roads!) and visited all the sights. Collie is not actually a major tourist attraction (I am trying to be polite here), but I got a private tour through the mining museum (I asked so many questions that the tour took 2 hours), visited the local museums full of all sorts of knick-knack from sewing machines to mining drills and ended up in the local swimming pool. Life is very good in Collie. And hiker friends are worth gold!!!

Why mountain biking is not for me....

Reference tree

My original plan was to cycle the Munda Biddi trail - the tourist brochure called it a "world class, off-road long-distance bike track". Sounded good to me. What the brochure did not tell is the following:
All roads here consist of pea gravel. That is loose gravel the size of a pea. This pea gravel can be ankle deep. And it is slippery as hell. The Munda Biddi trails has descents that are so steep that I could hardly walk my bike down there. Combine that with loose pea gravel and ruts as deep as the Grand Canyon and you are up for a trip to hell. I realized after 2 minutes that the only way to enjoy that bloody track is to be an 18 year old hard core mountain bike freak wanting to prove his manhood on a mountain bike with 5 kg suspensions and no panniers at all. If you are a more mature female with a sort of disturbed sense of equilibrium, no imminent death wish and panniers on your back wheel this is not the trail for you.
I decided to do "Munda Biddi light" and go around it on dirt roads just using the Munda Biddi shelters. I bought what thought would be a good map and set off. I soon had to realize that pea gravel is not a Munda Biddi phenomenom - it is everywhere. Cycling on bitumen I usually do between 15 to 20 km/hour. On pea gravel you are lucky to do 6 - 8 km/hour. 40 C heat is not very helpful there either.
I did not bring a GPS assuming that there would be road signs. No such luck. There seems to be an Australian law that forbids road sign on dirt roads. And because this is Western Australia (it has the size of Europe with a population of 2.2 million) there is no traffic either, e.g. no one you could ask for directions. And if you assume your map is right you are wrong again. My map (2008 edition) showed all sorts of roads - some of which did not exist at all.
As you can see, I was having a great time and a wonderful adventure. But there is a happy ending: I survived without any serious injuries, dehydration or snake bites.

Why I love Australia - part 3

Alan in front of his camper

The next day I had recovered from my misery and continued cycling on in just 40 C heat. Cycling along a major road I was surprised to see that a campervan had stopped right in front of me and the driver came out to start talking to me. Turned out that he was an outdoor person as well - he even had a kayak on top of his camper. We ended up talking for more than an hour at the side of the road about cycling, hiking and paddling and the rest of the world. He asked me if I needed some help and I mentioned my missing spare tube. He turned on the most impressive laptop computer I have ever seen (water, dust and shock proof - maybe that is something for my next trip) and tried to locate the next bike shop. But in vain - the closest one had recently gone out of business. He even offered to bring me a spare tube to my next campsite. But the situation was not life threatening, so I declined that and after exchanging email addresses we parted company.

You cannot believe my surprise 2 days later at 7 am when I was just about to leave a trail campsite and my roadside friend Alan showed up - with a spare tube!!! He had gone to Perth, done his business there, bought a spare tube and come to look for me on his way back. He had even walked into the bush for a km to find me - just to bring me the spare tube! Whow! Maybe you understand now why I love Australia!

I changed my plans for the day and we ended up chatting the whole morning. There were so many interesting stories (camel hunting in the bush, Aboriginal culture and paddling around Australia among others) that it was hard for me to leave 5 hours later. But I am pretty sure I will meet Alan again - cycling, paddling or hiking in whatever part of the world....

Cycling the hard way - part 2

Dirt road in WA

When I had finished my last post I thought things could not get worse: I had fallen off my bike, cycled in 45 C and ended in a forest fire. But after I had left the library, things did get worse: I had a flat tyre! Exactly what I needed at that moment.
But then Aussie mentality came in. I was still contemplating my misery staring at my bike when the first Aussie guy offered to help me. I was still pretending to be brave and told him I could manage on my own. I dragged my bike into a corner where hopefully nobody would see me fiddling around with it like a rookie when the second Aussie guy turned up. He did not even ask whether I needed help - he just started repairing it. And I have to admit that I needed help - after a long day I was a little bit shaken. We were already applying a patch on the hole when a third guy turned up - not an Aussie, but Swiss, even German-speaking Swiss. He was a mechanic and father of 4 children, so he had the technical know-how and the patience for an absolute beginner like me. But it was so hot (or whatever was the reason), that the patch would not stay on. The minute we had re-assembled the bike it went flat again. This is when I decided that I would not go on cycling that day.... We put in the spare tube (me actually doing it and my Swiss friend giving me instructions) and then I followed him to the local campground. And that campground had a swimming pool! And that was the happy ending of that day. Life was good again lying in a cool pool when it has 45 C outside...

Cycling the hard way - part 1

Lunch break in the heat

Yesterday was my first day of cycling - and I had a very tough start. First of all Western Australia is suffering from a heat wave. It was over 40 Celsius yesterday and even at night the temperature never fell below 27 Celsius. Unfortunately I had brought chocolate as trail food - the chocolate ended up as Nutella. It even did not get solid at night - still too hot.
The biggest problem though was the track. I was cycling on the so called Kep Track on dirt tracks to avoid traffic. Very bad idea. All the tracks consist of loose gravel and in this heat the gravel becomes very loose. After one hour on my bike I fell the first time and hurt my knee badly. But I am a brave girl: I put on iodine and cycled on. But cycling on gravel tracks is very time and energy consuming, so I did not cover much distance and collapsed at night.
Today I changed strategy and tried to avoid dirt roads whenever possible. The temperature outside is 45 Celsius right now - I am not kidding. I have sought shelter in an airconditioned library where I am writing this. I am constantly drinking, but the water gets very hot after 1 hour in a plastic bottle on my bike.
And to make things worse, there is a forest fire in this area. Apparantly it is just a small one, but all the smoke in the sky makes me really nervous.
Seems like I am in for a real adventure here...