Today weather was sunny all day but cool? at only 21C. The wind was again a strong 25mph SE headwind all the way. The days ride may have been only just over 50 miles but due to the wind the effort was like climbing a hill for 50 miles.
Very wisely Peter W decided to get the bus and was able to book his bike on and all went well. His bus left at 1.30 and his bus passed us at our tea stop.
We started the day with breakfast in Beachport at a restaurant called Bompas. They produced our best breakfast of the trip to date. I had Museli drizzled with honey and covered with fruit and cream. Second course was Pancakes with maple syrup and cream!
We headed back across the Beachport Causeway and along a flat straight road exposed to the fierce wind. Further up the road we spotted 2 more Emu and stopped for pictures. As we rode on I noticed a lot of trees at the side of the road bent to one side by the force of the wind (we were starting to feel the same!!)
After 20 miles we reached the town of Millicent and stopped at a takeaway and caf? for lunch. The entrance had the common Australian door system of strips of plastic hanging down to keep out the flies. We started an after lunch conversation on the coolest way to get thought them and watched the locals in action.
After lunch it was more hard riding into the wind until we gained a little shelter among pine forests and hills up to 200ft.
After Millicent we joined the Princes Highway and came across a lot more traffic. One big difference between Victoria and South Australia was the wide tarred hard shoulders in Victoria which were good for cycling while
in South Australia outside main towns the hard shoulders were rough and gravelled and could not be cycled on.
The big road train lorries generally gave us plenty of room. However they seemed to have no idea where the brake was. When they overtook us if traffic was coming the other way the other traffic drove onto the gravelled verge to get out of the way. Another part of the system seemed to be that if a smaller vehicle noticed a Road train coming from behind they would drive onto the gravelled shoulder to let it past.
Today this combination led to a situation where we were cycling on the edge of the tarmac on the white line when a road train came past on the road. A smaller lorry meanwhile had pulled into the hard shoulder, saw us at the last minute and came by us on the gravel and verge at the same time that the road train passed us on the road. Braking didn't seem to occur to the driver of the smaller lorry, Durrr!!!
When we got to Mount Gambier we checked into the Motel Avalon and a gigantic 4 bedroom cottage with a very large lounge.
52 miles for the day and 666ft of climb.
Edwin
Posted by Edwin
at 10:25 PM EADT
