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Journal: |
I woke at 2:30am and prepared to leave extremely quietly.
The wall of the Donga were extremely thin and I had woken several
times during the night to hear the guy in the next room talking in
his sleep.
I left at 3:15am in cool weather and pedalled
south west out into the scrubby plains. Off to my left I could
see a small patch of reflected light in the sky which was probably
the town of Broome. About 4:30am the sky behind me began to
lighten and an hour later I was treated to a brilliant red sun
rising in my rear view mirror.
I made reasonable progress,
stopping every 40km for a snack and drink while it was still cool.
A pimple on my butt (I know, too much information!) was causing me
considerable discomfort and at times I found it hard to sit
comfortably while pedalling. Around 100km I began to notice
some pain in the front of my left leg just above the knee, but
didn’t take too much notice of it as it has been quite common to get
occasional niggles which come and go.
The scenery was pretty
much unchanging scrub on both sides of the road, although high
enough that you couldn’t really see for any distance, even at the
top of the many gradual ascents. It was hard to believe that
the Indian Ocean was only about 10 or 20 kilometres to the east.
I never saw it.
As the temperature rose, I began stopping my
frequently for drinks and snacks. My sore leg muscle was
gradually getting worse, to the point where is was quite painful to
pedal, but I had no choice but to keep pedalling. There was
nowhere to stop and I needed to get to Sandfire Roadhouse before
they closed at 7pm.
By 200km I was in real trouble with the
leg, which was painful to bend and to push on the pedal with.
My average speed dropped to around 15kph as I pedalled with my right
leg with my left leg just going through the motions. Even that
was painful and I spent some kilometres with the left foot off the
pedal and dangling while I pedalled with the right.
My
spirits nose-dived as I realised there was no way I could continue
my quest with a leg this damaged. I couldn’t imagine riding
the 290km I had scheduled for tomorrow, let alone another 28 days.
In the short-term, my attention turned to making enough progress to
get to Sandfire before they closed. I was stopping every few
kilometres to rest and stretch the leg and pedalling single-legged
in between as the sun set and the road entered a vast open saltbush
plain. Eventually I reached Sandfire Roadhouse at 6:50pm,
about two hours later than intended, after a very painful and
arduous afternoon.
The Roadhouse burnt down four months ago
and has been temporarily replaced with a prefabricated shed from
where they offer a limited range of supplies and sell fuel.
The attached caravan park and cabins survived the fire and there are
some nice large tropical trees to provide shade during the day and
the odd peacock wandering the grounds. No grass, just red dust
everywhere, and this little oasis is surrounded by a vast saltbush
plain stretching in every direction like the sea.
I got the
keys to a cabin and a pie and pastie and some drinks for dinner, and
retired to my cabin to consider my riding future. I was very
relieved to have reached Sandfire, but now was trying to deal the
full impact of the injured leg on the balance of my trip.
There was no mobile phone reception, but I just managed to get some
wireless connectivity for my laptop using the special aerial I was
carrying and so was able to discuss my plight via Instant Messaging
with Sharon.
In the end I have resolved to have up to three
days off in the faint hope that the leg repairs itself sufficiently
to keep riding. Losing three days will still leave me an
outside chance of breaking the record, provided that the leg stands
up to the rest of the trip. This seems a bit unlikely.
If I had a similar injury as a runner, I would be taking three weeks
off to allow the soft tissue repair necessary. I’m not sure I
will continue the trip if I have no chance of breaking the record,
especially if it is painful to do so. I can ride around
Australia as a tourist another time. The real goal of this
venture was to see if I could break the record. I was starting
to believe that I could, perhaps unwisely feeling a little
indestructible as the weeks passed and I made good progress, so
continuing on at a leisurely pace does not really appeal.
Sandfire Roadhouse will be an interesting place to spend three days.
There’s no TV, no reading matter, only pies, toasted sandwiches and
some confectionary for food, no mobile phone coverage and only
occasional wireless internet connectivity. At least the time
off will allow me to catch up on sleep.
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