Cycling Trip - Day 4

August 19th
Birdsall - Trudeau Park (Tweed)

Pretty strange cycling day. It all started with P's steering wheel. We tried to raise its angle but could only make it looser with the tools that we had. A friendly chap who noticed our predicament gave us another Allen key. Everything was fixed, we were on our way at 10.10am. The result of the steering wheel adjustment is less numbness in P's hand :)

Today we felt far from home. Our lunch stop was a gravel road after many grueling hills which included the first we walked to the top of because of the combination of steep gradient and loose gravel. Then there was a desert-like rocky landscape and a crappy trail. Off-road motorbikes turned onto it just before us - we could have known that was not a good sign.

Hastings and Campbelford were pretty towns that we came through today. On the other hand: Springbrook - butt ugly! Had to stop counting cows because it became a safety hazard because of the bad tarmac and trucks driving so fast we were sucked into their slipstream. We did not empirically research this but we expect that there is a correlation between the large size of the truck, the little space it leaves for cyclists, the noise of its engine and the tininess of the manhood of the driver.

Sigmund says 88km in 5hrs.

Coldest day so far, but both of us got sunburnt (we did not bring the effective suncream). We are now staying at a creepy "resort" - an excellent setting for a horror movie. It's a huge mansion that looks like it was abondoned. It claims it's a campsite too and we're camping but we're the only ones and there's no taps or wastebins outside. Amazing sun set whilst sitting on a bench, on an outcrop overlooking the lake. For dinner we went for a double package of pasta today plus lots of snacking!

Because of our experiences on the bad trail we need to re-think the next stages of the route.