|
Day: |
011 |
|
Date: |
Monday, 7 August 2006 |
|
Summary |
Riding from Cobar to Bourke. |
|
Start: |
Cobar |
|
Finish: |
Bourke |
|
Daily
Kilometres: |
161 |
|
Total
Kilometres: |
1301 |
|
Weather: |
Cold early but mild and sunny for the rest
of the day with a light, mostly cross wind. |
|
Accommodation: |
Motel in Bourke, NSW. |
|
Nutrition: |
Breakfast: Donuts
Lunch: Two
bread rolls and peanut butter
Dinner: Chicken schnitzel. |
|
Encounters: |
Saw a couple of families of feral goats. |
|
Highlights: |
Yet another enjoyable day cycling through
lightly timbered outback grazing land in beautiful weather on a road
with little or no traffic. |
|
Lowlights: |
A near miss involving an emu and a road
train. I had startled two emus who began running in the scrub on
the other side of the road parallel with me and slightly ahead of
me. They were prevented from running off into the bush by a fence.
This continued for about a kilometre when a road train appeared
travelling in the opposite direction at high speed. Just before the
road train reached me, one of the emus took a sharp left turn to try
and cross the road between me and the road train. The road train
driver barely had time to sound his horn before he slammed into the
emu about 20 metres ahead of me. Just prior to the impact I turned
sharply left off the road, expecting to get hit by bits of emu
travelling at 120kph. Fortunately, I didn’t, but there wasn’t much
of that emu left! |
|
Journal: |
I left the motel at about 7:30am and
stopped in at a bakery on the way out of town to pick up some donuts
for breakfast and some rolls for lunch. It wasn’t as cold as the
two previous mornings although I still needed to wear extra clothing
for the first 20km. Thereafter it was T-shirt weather again and the
riding was very pleasant. I saw a number of emus (see “Lowlights”
above) and feral goats. The road was slightly undulating with some
very long straight stretches. The vegetation was low scrubby timber
with little undergrowth covering the red soil. There were
occasional puddles and traces of new green grass in many places.
Later in the day, the vegetation became sparser, the road
flatter and in the far distance I could see some mountain ranges. I
reached Bourke around 4:00pm and checked into a budget motel on the
edge of town. After a shower I went for a walk around the town
centre which almost seemed to be almost under siege. Most
shopfronts were boarded up or had heavy security shutters. There
must be a serious petty crime problem here. |
|
ADVENTURE LIST
Round Ireland
(2016)
Hume & Hovell Walking Track
(2013)
Via Alpina
(2012)
Australian Alps Walking
Track
(2011)
Land's End to John O'Groats
(2010)
Round Oz Bike Record Attempt
(2009)
Round Oz Bike Record Attempt
(2008)
Round Oz Bike Record Attempt
(2007)
Australia Tip to Top MTB
(2006)
Adelaide to Darwin MTB
(2005)
Sydney to Melbourne MTB
(2004)
Three Peaks Race
(2004)
Appalachian Trail
(1986)
Alpine Track
(1983)
|
