Road Trip 1

26 June 2015
After a very long count down today finally arrived. We left Yarragon a little later than I had hoped, around 4:45 pm. We said goodbye to our home and Yarragon and headed to Catherine and Peter's. I dropped Cate, Ethan and Aisha off and began the long drive.

Getting through the city proved to be difficult with traffic a major problem from when I entered the freeway. Once I got past Essendon airport the rest of the night was very cruseie.

I spend my first night 6.6 km North of Jerilderie, at a truck stop, with 456.8 kms travelled. I got here at 10:46 and now it is just after 11:00pm.

Tonight is very clear, no clouds and it is absolutely freezing. I'm typing this under the doona and my hands are freezing from getting the bikes off the trailer and setting up, I'm tipping it's going to be a very cold night.


27 June 2015
Last night I said it was going to be cold and, oh my god, was it cold. Last night I had the doona wrapped around me as much as it could and at times I woke with the cold I even slept with my socks on. Well it could have been the cold or the fact that not long after I went to bed 2 trucks rocked up and decided to keep their motors running all night. That or the bleating sheep in the paddock right next to the tent. Either way I woke a lot last night.

This morning there was ice on the camper, in parts it was 1cm thick and I can't remember the last time I was that cold. I started the car before I put the bike on the trailer to defrost the windscreen. Bitterly cold.

Bikes on and strapped on and I pulled out at 6:51am. There was a little fog to begin with, not enough to to slow progress as it was just off the ground. I had breaky in Nerrandera and filled up with fuel.
Not long out of Nerrandera the fog got very thick, it was just after 8:00 am. So thick I had to slow down because of visibility. Indeed it wasn't long before I came upon some traffic. Visibility was so bad that at times the car 50m in front of me disappeared and needless to say progress was very slow. From Nerrandera to West Wyalong I must have averaged less than 70 km/h.

With the fog still persisting just north of West Wyalong there were police and ambulance diverting traffic and had closed the Newell Hwy. The traffic went through Caragabel, a tiny town with about 10 people living in it, and Piney Ridge then on to Forbes. It put an extra hour onto the entire trip. Just as I was getting into Forbes the fog finally lifted, it was 10:33.

I grabbed a coffee from the Forbes bakery and lunch at Gilgandra where I turned off the Newell and up the Castlereagh Hwy through Coonamble and towards Walgett.

Walgett is a very interesting place. I hadn't seen a police car all day and saw 2 in Walgett. The windows on the shops were all barred and there were only indigenous people in town, around 60. Needless to say I decided not to stop.

The last 150km to the QLD boarder were very interesting. I crossed a cattle grid and noticed several dead sheep. Then noticed the flock of sheep and herd of cattle. It was an area that isn't fenced and the herds and flocks can roam at their leisure. The same can be said for the kangaroos. There was a definite increase in the numbers killed on the roads.

Hebel is the town just over the boarder and where I wanted to get fuel. It was just on dusk and the road headed directly into the sun. There are no hills and very few trees so the sun looked like it was coming out of the road. Again visibility was difficult. Whilst trying to see where I was going the local wildlife increased dramatically and I had several near misses with kangaroos and emus. I knew the Hwy made a right angle at Hebel so was very much looking forward to getting there getting fuel and moving on only to find out there is no fuel in Hebel and I needed to get to Dirranbandi 65 kms away. I was very close to empty when I got there.

From Dirranbandi to St. George was a difficult drive the road was narrow and the bush was quite high immediately next to the road which made spotting the roos quite difficult.

From St. George I headed thought Rome and Ijune eventually pulling over tonight at 11:04 about 100kms from Rolleston. The only mishap was collecting an echidna about 30 mins before I stopped, made an awful thud but I'm grateful it wasn't a roo.

Today I covered 1465km. 1921 km down 1195 to go.

28 June 2015
It was definitely more pleasant waking this morning. The weather was quite mild and the sun was up earlier than yesterday. I packed up and left at 6:51 again.

About 5 minutes into the drive I came across more fog. Luckily it only lasted about 5 km and wasn't at all heavy like yesterday. I was in Rolleston just before 8, fuelled up and headed towards Springsure. I grabbed a coffee and a toasty and stopped to take some pictures, then to Claremont. I refuelled there and then headed to Charters Towers. That was the longest part of the entire trip so far. It was 375 km of straight road, no hills, no towns, few trees, the only thing to look at was the road kill. You name it, from roos to boars, it was dead. It seemed to take forever to get there.

The rest of the day was a dream. I arrived in Townsville around 4:00, I rang the caravan park in Cairns to see if they had a spot for me tonight and the did.

So I arrived here at my final destination at 7:45 this evening, a total of 3122 km covered in exactly 50 hours.

It really was a great trip, thank god for music on the phone and podcasts. The podcasts were a highlight, I think I have listened to all the ones I have so I'll need to so others for the trip home. I have listened to several things more than once, although I wanted not to but that was by choice. I am really looking forward to a good night sleep not having to get up and sit in the car, and I do look forward to a similar trip home.

I'm a little weary but have really enjoyed the ride and now I look forward to the best part, Cate, Ethan and Aisha arriving on Tuesday.