Adelaide again

Back in Adelaide - buses to Mt Gambier and then on to here were all fine. Although the Mt G bus broke down near Dartmoor, about 45k out of Mt G, and the driver had to phone the town disabled minibus to get transport for all of us + luggage + my bike into town. Given that someone on the bus had had a heart attack earlier (ambulance called; it was before I got on the bus but I gather she was as OK as could be hoped in the circs when they carted her off), the driver was Not Having A Good Day. He kept saying, plaintively "This is only my second day on this job! I'm only here as a relief driver!" and frantically counting heads in case someone had gone wandering off into the road and gotten themselves run over.

Mt Gambier was incredibly windy, and when I woke up yesterday morning there were *hailstones* in the lee of my tent. The Blue Lake is, however, as advertised, blue, very.

And now the library is closing & kicking me out, so I will finish here. Off to Perth in an hr or two.

[edit] Heh, the free wifi extends *outside* the library, so I can finish off the entry out here! Where it is sunny (at last...) but still a bit windy.

Where was I? Mt Gambier and the blue lake. It's grey in winter, and then during a few days in spring (which is right now this year) goes through a beautiful, bright, insanely vivid turquoise colour. Really extraordinary - it looks like all those Photoshopped-up pictures of tropical beaches. Later on it'll go deep blue and stay that way for the summer, before changing back in autumn. It was well worth dragging myself all the way up the hill (it and the other lakes are part of an ex-volcano) and nearly getting blown straight off the viewing platform to see.

The other lake, Valley Lake, is regular-lake-colour but has a wildlife reserve next to it, where they've reintroduced various native species and fenced the feral cats, dogs, foxes, etc out. Lots and lots of birds; I also saw a snake! Black back, yellow/red belly, and really quite large. And then, around another corner, a group of kangaroos having a nap. They got up and looked a bit wary when they saw me, but settled down again when I sat down on a nearby bench and didn't do anything for a while. Real live kangaroos! As opposed to real dead kangaroos, which I have seen several of on various roads, sadly. So I am doing pretty well on the native animals front now, having clocked wallabies, kangaroos, an echnida, koalas, a SNAKE, and several squillion birds of different varieties.

Right, now I really am off, to feed this machine some electrons before I get on the train, and buy some junk food from the supermarket, and get myself and Cepheus down to the station.

BTW, I have been wearing my helmet, because I am a good law-abiding citizen (albeit of another country, one where they don't have stupid mandatory helmet laws). I even find myself able to live with it. But I am no more convinced about the whole business than I was before I started, and it will be staying right here when I return. I don't even get the one advantage I thought I might, that of being prepared to go downhill faster; because I am fully aware that if I come off the bike doing 65kph, the helmet will be about as much use as the proverbial chocolate teapot.

On the upside, I have discovered that if one is barrelling downhill at 65kph, and slightly uncertain about one's stability (say, just for example, that it is v windy and the bike is carrying about 20kg spread fore and aft), then putting one's dominant foot backwards and the other one forwards, cranks horizontal, is very steadying, especially if you pretend you're on a snowboard. Whoosh!

Adelaide again

Back in Adelaide - buses to Mt Gambier and then on to here were all fine. Although the Mt G bus broke down near Dartmoor, about 45k out of Mt G, and the driver had to phone the town disabled minibus to get transport for all of us + luggage + my bike into town. Given that someone on the bus had had a heart attack earlier (ambulance called; it was before I got on the bus but I gather she was as OK as could be hoped in the circs when they carted her off), the driver was Not Having A Good Day. He kept saying, plaintively "This is only my second day on this job! I'm only here as a relief driver!" and frantically counting heads in case someone had gone wandering off into the road and gotten themselves run over.

Mt Gambier was incredibly windy, and when I woke up yesterday morning there were *hailstones* in the lee of my tent. The Blue Lake is, however, as advertised, blue, very.

And now the library is closing & kicking me out, so I will finish here. Off to Perth in an hr or two.

[edit] Heh, the free wifi extends *outside* the library, so I can finish off the entry out here! Where it is sunny (at last...) but still a bit windy.

Where was I? Mt Gambier and the blue lake. It's grey in winter, and then during a few days in spring (which is right now this year) goes through a beautiful, bright, insanely vivid turquoise colour. Really extraordinary - it looks like all those Photoshopped-up pictures of tropical beaches. Later on it'll go deep blue and stay that way for the summer, before changing back in autumn. It was well worth dragging myself all the way up the hill (it and the other lakes are part of an ex-volcano) and nearly getting blown straight off the viewing platform to see.

The other lake, Valley Lake, is regular-lake-colour but has a wildlife reserve next to it, where they've reintroduced various native species and fenced the feral cats, dogs, foxes, etc out. Lots and lots of birds; I also saw a snake! Black back, yellow/red belly, and really quite large. And then, around another corner, a group of kangaroos having a nap. They got up and looked a bit wary when they saw me, but settled down again when I sat down on a nearby bench and didn't do anything for a while. Real live kangaroos! As opposed to real dead kangaroos, which I have seen several of on various roads, sadly. So I am doing pretty well on the native animals front now, having clocked wallabies, kangaroos, an echnida, koalas, a SNAKE, and several squillion birds of different varieties.

Right, now I really am off, to feed this machine some electrons before I get on the train, and buy some junk food from the supermarket, and get myself and Cepheus down to the station.

BTW, I have been wearing my helmet, because I am a good law-abiding citizen (albeit of another country, one where they don't have stupid mandatory helmet laws). I even find myself able to live with it. But I am no more convinced about the whole business than I was before I started, and it will be staying right here when I return. I don't even get the one advantage I thought I might, that of being prepared to go downhill faster; because I am fully aware that if I come off the bike doing 65kph, the helmet will be about as much use as the proverbial chocolate teapot.

On the upside, I have discovered that if one is barrelling downhill at 65kph, and slightly uncertain about one's stability (say, just for example, that it is v windy and the bike is carrying about 20kg spread fore and aft), then putting one's dominant foot backwards and the other one forwards, cranks horizontal, is very steadying, especially if you pretend you're on a snowboard. Whoosh!