Friday, 31 October 2014
Thursday, 30 October 2014
Nullarbor crossing Part II: Caiguna to Ceduna (END)
Caiguna - Cocklebiddy - Madura - Mundrabilla - Eucla - Border-Village - Nullarbor Roadhouse - Nundroo - Penong - Ceduna (total distance Norseman to Ceduna: 1200 km, Nullarbor: lat.: nulla arbor => no tree)
After three weeks of medical treatment and recovering in Norseman, on Oct. 16th the trucker took me and my stuff back to Caiguna. what a great help and hospitality !
I will miss him, his wife and their funny dog very much ! hope to see them again!
After such a long time of doing nothing, my endurance was very bad. first day then was only a 65 km ride to Cocklebiddy Roadhouse.
I wanna be honest, but cycling through the Nullarbor desert/on the Eyre Highway is a very boring event. Every 100 or 200 k a roadhouse, the whole highway is sealed. The only challenge are the bloody headwinds. I always checked the weather forecasts, but most of the time they were wrong. Those headwinds and strong gusts make the day very bad, and if a roadtrain is coming from the opposite direction, his headwind is like a hammer.70 % of my whole Nullarbor crossing was with strong gusts and headwinds. at Border Village I left Western Australia, entered South Australia and cycling becomes more difficult, because there is only a very small sealed shoulder. If a roadtrain or a caravan approaches, I have to leave the comfortable road and cycle into the gravelled shoulder; this is not funny if you are too fast. yes, it was a tough trip.
In 2012 I already cycled through the desert of Kazachstan, from Aktau to the border of Uzbekistan, where there was no sealed track, only smooth rock, sand-and dustholes, sometimes gravel, and temperatures up to 48 degrees Celsius. this was much tougher, but more exciting.
I do not complain, it is only a statement. I had always big fun with the people who I met on the road or in the roadhouses. After a hard day of cycling this was a very relaxing and important part for me.
After three weeks of medical treatment and recovering in Norseman, on Oct. 16th the trucker took me and my stuff back to Caiguna. what a great help and hospitality !
I will miss him, his wife and their funny dog very much ! hope to see them again!
After such a long time of doing nothing, my endurance was very bad. first day then was only a 65 km ride to Cocklebiddy Roadhouse.
I wanna be honest, but cycling through the Nullarbor desert/on the Eyre Highway is a very boring event. Every 100 or 200 k a roadhouse, the whole highway is sealed. The only challenge are the bloody headwinds. I always checked the weather forecasts, but most of the time they were wrong. Those headwinds and strong gusts make the day very bad, and if a roadtrain is coming from the opposite direction, his headwind is like a hammer.70 % of my whole Nullarbor crossing was with strong gusts and headwinds. at Border Village I left Western Australia, entered South Australia and cycling becomes more difficult, because there is only a very small sealed shoulder. If a roadtrain or a caravan approaches, I have to leave the comfortable road and cycle into the gravelled shoulder; this is not funny if you are too fast. yes, it was a tough trip.
In 2012 I already cycled through the desert of Kazachstan, from Aktau to the border of Uzbekistan, where there was no sealed track, only smooth rock, sand-and dustholes, sometimes gravel, and temperatures up to 48 degrees Celsius. this was much tougher, but more exciting.
I do not complain, it is only a statement. I had always big fun with the people who I met on the road or in the roadhouses. After a hard day of cycling this was a very relaxing and important part for me.
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| Caiguna Roadhouse |
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| big load |
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| rescue eagle at Cocklebiddy Roadhouse |
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| German meeting at Madura Roadhouse with Mathias from Bremen and Stefan from Dresden |
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| Madura Roadhouse |
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| Roe Plain |
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| this car must be from the movie "Mad Max" with Mel Gibson ;-) |
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| Mundrabilla Roadhouse |
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| Museum at Eucla Roadhouse |
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| first iPhone ;-) |
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| still some kilometers to cycle . |
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| camel , wombatr and roos.... |
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| giant load ..... |
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| leave the road as much you can ;-) |
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| with purifying tablets no problem. |
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| short 2nd German meeting. |
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| campsite at a rest area. |
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| quick pic, bloody marchflies (in German: Bremsen) were chasing me.... |
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| Aboriginal land, no access without a permit ! |
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| new asphalt. |
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| landscape is changing. now huge sheep farms. |
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| windmills pumping groundwater |
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| Takashita Sokichi, walking from Perth to Sydney ! |
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| Ceduna and the end of the Nullarbor crossing ! yeah ! |
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| Ceduna is famous for oysters. |
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| hosting Takashita was a big honour and pleasure for me. |
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| Goodbye my friend and keep safe ! |
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| he forget his shampoo, and when I brought it to him , a Japanese couple had a small talk with him... such a small world :-) |
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| a fridge as postbox, the owner lives 40km far away in the outback. |
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| on the truck to Caiguna |
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| another walker, he is from New Zealand. |
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| demonstration of an outback caravan. |
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| so true :-) |
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Sam from Great Britain, with a single-speed bike.  |
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