Goodbye Darwin! The cycle leg begins.

Hello from a small ‘village’ some 220km form Darwin. Yesterday at 0720hrs I departed Cullen Bay Marina on ‘Stephanie’s Donkey’ laden with enough gear I hope, to get me the 4000+km across Australia to Coff’s Harbour.

I was lucky to be accompanied by fellow Kiwi ‘Rob’ a soldier with the Australian Army for the first 50km out of Darwin. I was pretty happy when he turned off as I could have a break as we rode non stop and him being on a light road bike and me on the loaded up Donkey was a mid match even though he rode nice and slowly for me. Day one went generally well although I was I introduced to the afternoon heat of 35 degrees and road trains which are huge! They have upto three massive trailers and roar along at 100 over KM per hour but generally give me lots of room which is nice.

Most Drivers are very friendly and will wave and beep their horns in support which I sometime wish they would not do as it scares the shit out of me.

I had a lovely sleep last night in my bivvy bag – it got cold enough that I had to get into my sleeping bag in the middle of the night.

The landscape on day one was boring, scrubby land but today I rode 113km to a small place called Pine Creek and the landscape became beautiful. Lots of boulders and burnt undergrowth with some small ranges and cuttings which made the scenery nice. Also lots of termite mounds. I am averaging one pie and two ice blocks per day as well as two beers. This afternoon was lots of rolling hills which made my average slow down to about 15 – 16km per hour.

I miss my girls a lot and have imaginary conversations with them while riding. I can’t wait to introduce them to this life. Cycling through a country is a much more intimate experience which connects me with the landscape than I ever feel from driving.

Tomorrow I head for Katherine – 90km only. I need to do at least 100km per day on average to make it over within my time frame so days less than 100km are only options if I do extra on other days.