I'm booked in to the Rusty Horse pub at Bribaree tonight, hoping to arrive around dark. Got ~28km to go from where the camp was last night.
Have to decide whether to take dirt lanes at 27km, and save about 3km, or go bitumen all the way and have about 30km. Might depend on whether it has rained there.
I'll have to get more water at Bribaree.
Well it sprinkled a bit this morning. I didn't get away till 8:30am. But I'm on the road.
Oh oh.. another one..
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Hope it's no worse than the last.
Through, no problems. Water on both sides and running in the culvert under the road, but just puddles on top! I'm wondering how many times this mught happen. And whether one might be deeper.
Wander along listening to "chapter 2" of that First Century document (translated into English) about the bloke whom I consider to be both the best leader, and best teacher humanity has records of.
Maybe about 9:20am, a white Four Wheel Drive, going in the opposite direction pulls up beside me. We talk a bit, and they pull off the road.
Paula a geologist and Tom a lawyer on their way throughout Australia, to see landowners regarding assaying for copper and gold on their land, to "get this country carbon free by 2050!" "We'll need both copper and gold for .. electric cars ..." Paula said.
Two humans working within the machinery of corporate business, who were listening to John Williamson, then, they said, they looked up, and here's a modern swaggy. So, they stopped, and we chatted briefly, about life and carbon neutral living. They got my blogspot.
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Paula (very mothering she said), gave me two of her meusli bars for breaky, tucking them under the tie of the trolley.
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She said she liked Banjo Paterson. I suggested Wallace & Matilda, as a singer & band who've put much of his stuff to music.
And off we all went. Just like that.
Humans are gold!
(Paula and Tom, feel free to comment, to "fix up" any blunders I made in this. And if necessary I can edit it)
At the Grogan Road junction I have to decide, to the right,
dirt lanes, and not much traffic & 30 min less walking distance,
or, to the left,
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bitumen all the way (easier to pull), possibly more traffic (which slows me down, and I can't get so engrossed in writing).
I choose the "right", the dirt,
but 300m down the track I see ..
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I think to myself "If I can't get through here without getting wet, I'm going back."
But i do get through. (View looking back)
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And it is only 1km further up that I turn off this main dirt Road onto a dirt lane.
When I got there, this is what I saw, first on Google maps. (The blue dots indicate where I am to go, by this route)
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Then looking up the dirt tyre tracks the right hand one had a distinct shine on it in a few places, while the left was more covered with grass.
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I turned back.
10:30am, and I'm back at the juction where I went right. Now going left.
I think this is very like a lot of life to me. I used to think of ways as "one way was the best, or rightest or easiest, and the other was not". Now I've got other ideas. It's more about the company you keep, and the overall purposes of your trip, either way, the other choices are real, but insignificant in comparison.
10:55am a couple from Forbes stop to say G'day, check if eberything is ok. No they haven't got time for a cuppa, if I boil the billy, but they warn me about continued rain in Qld.
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And they're off.
Might be time for one of those muesli bars eh? (11am) ok.
At 11:34am I turn right onto Mary Gilmore Way, the sign says 21km to Bribaree,
and am welcomed into Bland Shire,
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and cross Bland Creek.
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About 20km to go.
I was about to stop at a rest area, just after the creek, but I am loathe to stop until I'm over half way. Better push on.
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Stopped and sat down, checked and we were right on half way (minus the "wrong turn"), so this half should be a bit easier.. half an hour break and going again around 1:15,pm.
That was a shortlived visit to the Shire of Bland. About 1:40pm I am welcomed into another, by a "sign".
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It's not quite the same to be wecomed by a sign, as it is to be welcomed by a person is it? (Boundaries have even been know to change, and some signs that haven't been adjusted, at that point don't match reality). Still, especially if it is right, it's something.
Another motorist, a lady in a yellow car, stops to ask if I'm ok, even though I've waved a recognition. How thoughtful.
Around 2:30pm Gilbert Murphy (with a property near Bribaree) slowed down, and we talked as we moved down the road for a bit together. He used to ride his pushbike 50km to .. school or work?. He seemed heartened that people would still want to get to know our country, and take the time (out of the "rat race"), to do it.
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I was disappointed, I must have smeared the lens, but you might be able to make out his face. Sorry Gilbert. Another car came, and that was it.
Then it was a matter of keeping on. I listened to a podcast, & took the part of that first Century document i been thinking about (about the best leader and best teacher this world has a record of) and made it up into a song. It is a sort of ballad, it was fun, and i remembered how effective it is to do creative things with anything you really want to get into you.
A new Shire boundary.
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The township of Bribaree.
A long way to walk past the school to the pub. Lovely rooms. With a shared toilet shower, but a sink and aircon in my room. Friendly. Had a drink and chat to some folk outside, and left my trolley behind the bar in the beer garden. Shower (& carefully washed clothes from today) rebandaid-ed all my wounds from a sprawl on the bitumen before Coolum. Hope they will dry somewhat. (Maybe have to finish drying tomorrow arvo, or the next night at Grenfell)
After dinner, around the fire i met some fellows, and one of them (Daniel, on my right, left of the photo) offered to help me by dropping my trolley off around half way to Grenfell, and his mate (Brent, on my left, the right of the photo) can help him unload it at the other end.
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Thanks fellows!
Which means I'll get to walk without it tomorrow, in the rain. How good is that. It's putting up the tent in the rain that I'll have to get used to.
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