The Cycling Adventurer
Perth-Adelaide 1997
Introduction
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The Cycling Adventurer |
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Perth-Adelaide 1997 |
Introduction |
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A few things to guide you through
This journal, when compared with those for my other cycling trips, is the only one I have kept in such detail. I recall how I would lie each evening in my tent, and enjoy the process of recording my day's memories, often by torchlight. The detail may also have arisen from my thoughts that this would be my one and only big adventure in cycling... even my one big adventure in life. In recasting it for this website, I was struck by how naive I was about quite a few things. Even so, I hope that you find it interesting, and if you are thinking of undertaking a significant cycling challenge like this, it will inspire you. You should find the story easy to navigate. You can use the index here as a base to link to each day's page, or you can use the "Next" and "Previous" links on each page to progress through the story. |
| Shows route from start to finish. NB: This is a 433kB file |
| Dead or Alive? This vexing question got my attention | ||
| Motor vehicles and I go our separate ways | ||
| Retail therapy in a bike shop helps to heal the heart | ||
| Getting it all together and packed away | ||
| Ready to hit the road... now where's the cat! | ||
| I finally find a campsite, but what's all the noise? | ||
| Out of the fog, over the hills and into Club Hotel bar | ||
| A day of dieting makes me feel so much better | ||
| Record distance becomes my maiden metric century | ||
| Another distance record then a nice place to camp | ||
| The road goes down but I miss seeing it | ||
| A day off the bike to reflect and look forward | ||
| The winds of change sing their siren call | ||
| The wind brings curses and blessings all at once | ||
| A day to potter around and say 'thank you' | ||
| Salmon Gums turns out to be a gem of a place | ||
| Football, emus and an open-air lounge-room | ||
| The Nullarbor flat and boring? You must be joking! | ||
| Unpleasant for more reasons than roadkill | ||
| 90-mile straight and a dream ride | ||
| Kindred spirits walk into my life... and out again | ||
| Madura appears from the sea plain as an oasis | ||
| Against the wind makes me tired and grumpy | ||
| White 'mountains' announce Eucla's presence | ||
| I like Eucla so much I stay another day | ||
| Ahhhh... this is the night life! | ||
| I cross the Nullarbor Plain in 15 minutes! | ||
| The learning curve steepens on and off the road | ||
| Mechanical disaster strikes on the hottest day | ||
| A false start adds to my frustrations | ||
| On the move again then holed up in Ceduna | ||
| Maintenance day for the bike... and me | ||
| Bikes of all sorts become a recurring theme | ||
| Headwinds sap my energy, but I win at darts | ||
| A rough but pleasant ride of survival to Wudinna | ||
| Bang! And I limp into half-way Kimba | ||
| Country teamwork gets me back on the road | ||
| Woohoo! What a day... and a real century to boot | ||
| An ally becomes the frustrating enemy | ||
| Celebrating an end to the roadtrain battle | ||
| A day dedicated to buses and a job interview | ||
| I'm here... finally... at last... in Adelaide... | ||
| What happened after the adventure |
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© 2005-2006 Rowan Burns — The Cycling Adventurer
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