Australia West Coast Bike Ride
Newletter No 5
3rd August 2004

Hello to everyone
I write this prior to arriving in Carnarvon WA on Mon 2nd August. Very pleased to announce another milestone - on Friday 30th (July) we passed the 3,000 km mark since leaving Darwin - isn't that fantastic! And today (31/7) we crossed the Tropic of Capricorn marker so are definitely leaving behind our lovely summer weather and heading into cooler climes. Actually, wetter would be more accurate - already we can see the effects of all the rain that has hit the Gascoyne region in the past fortnight - Carnarvon last week had a dumper of 170 mls of rain - not much shorter than their average yearly rainfall and there's been flooding throughout and crop damage. We have heard lots of tales from north-bound travellers of delays due to flooding and indeed caravan parks closed as a result, but we have been so lucky and not affected at all as yet. Just the last couple of days we have struck a little fog and drizzle but the biggest effect has been on a house-keeping matter - one of the first jobs on setting up camp of an evening has always been to hang out the washing to dry overnight - we have a drum on board - our "washing machine" - in the caravan which swishes away as we travel each day and boy, does that water get black. At times we have looked like a gypsy camp - washing on fences, laid out on scrub or hanging off the rear vision mirrors when there's no shrubs to tie to, and to date it has always been dry by morning, but here the air is so heavy with moisture, it looks as if it has rained - everything is soaked by morning - tents, loo, chairs etc dripping wet. We are going to have to learn better clothes drying skills the further south we go. The temperature is dropping too, but still pleasant.

Karratha's welcome

Every Rotary town so far has been marvellous - Port Hedland couldn't give us any time but kindly accommodated us in a motel - a bit awkward being 10 kms out of town but John will tell you of the "egg lady" who put he and Ted in her car and escorted them round on a Cook's tour in between doing her rounds - apparently quite a character. We were spoilt at Karratha - John and Ted given lovely motel rooms at the Karratha International and all of us collected in two vehicles on the Sunday morning and given a most interesting tour of both Karratha and Dampier - the industry there is mind boggling and it was great to have locals explain it all to us. A wonderful BBQ at one of the Rotarian's home followed - about 30 attended - a fantastic effort for a weekend. The Club there donated $500 and had the Shire President come and match that with a Shire donation also of $500 - absolutely fabulous. We left Karratha last Monday, 26th July, and it has been an eight day pedal to Carnarvon. The cyclists are finding the road surface a bit tough - they use rough screenings on the surface obviously great traction for road-trains but not kind to little recumbent bikes. The fellas have to pedal all the way - no such thing as a roll. We will be able to attend a meeting in Carnarvon - it is always so much better if the meeting date coincides, but as any traveller knows, it doesn't always happen. Our contact there is looking forward to our arrival.

From there we only have one more stop - at Geraldton, then it is the last bit to Perth. Still a fair mileage, but sounds so much closer now. For the last two weeks we haven't had the mobile phone, it decided to die on us but Telstra have been very good and we believe a replacement is to be waiting for us in Carnarvon.

Till next time
John, Ted, Terry & Lois