Friday, September 29, 2017

Darling and Down

Darling to Wentworth 69km Silver City Highway.

Paul here updating our blog at 4am while the others are sleeping by the Murray river, a real milestone.

Well, after Conrads 117km day he was in no shape to ride so he took Eds place in the Troupie, and Ed rode my Greenspeed Magnum (on of the first produced) that I used in Tibet. He was so excited after a month of driving and set off like lightening. The wind was mostly favourable and we seemed to go from arid desert to the lush green Riverina in a matter of hours. We all noticed this one vibrant green field high on the left and

Wally choked up on his way into Wentworth. It felt like a real milestone had been reached. Meanwhile the tandem crew, me and Duncan where racing with Ed the last 10km into town, but we let the TAB (temporarily able bodied) win, as we were now super fit.  We had the joy of sleeping on grass for the first time in a month.

Wentworth to Robinvale 113km Sturt Highway

After some discussion over the route we opted for the Sturt Highway. We rode through orange groves and vineyards. School holiday traffic plus double container fruit trucks made conditions on the road very dangerous.


We stopped at Gol Gol Shell because my Pritchard patented Knee Bungee had begun to wear and I needed a new one. Because of my hemiplegia I have a mountain of adductor muscles but almost no abductors which means my knee falls in a full 30cm while riding. It ends up being very painful feeling of dislocation in my hip. So I connect my knee to the mirror post with an elastic bungee which keeps my knee in line.

It is hard for Duncan not seeing the traffic ahead or behind and he does have to literally put his life in my hands. Conrad thought it too dangerous to navigate and also thought that the codeine he is taking for his chronic pain might adversely affect his judgement, so he went ahead with Ed to find this free camp spot on the NSW side of the river opposite holiday campers galore on the Victorian side at the paid camp. Magpies and Kookaburras are the dawn chorus....

1 comment:

  1. Great to follow your progress. Keep that nurse on the team she might be needed on this leg of the journey (or knee). Sounds wonderful being near the river after so much dirt and dust. really inspired by you guys

    ReplyDelete

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