Day 21
Wednesday 5th March
Border Village – Mundrabilla
90kms
I slept but not too well. I had to rise during the night from pains in my stomach, and had to head to the toilet to try and get rid of whatever it was inside me making me feel sick. I had some serious diarrhoea, and wasn’t looking forward to the ride later that day.
For breakfast I had some toast, and bought a Gatorade to try and restore some fluids. We did some washing, had a swim in the pool, and I had to fix 3 spokes on the back wheel of my bike. By this stage in the trip the wheel of my bike was looking a bit ordinary. We still couldn’t get the tools to take the disc or the cassette off he wheel to put the spokes in correctly. So we bent the hell out of them to get them in. They didn’t look to flash, but the wheel was in one piece.
The temperature was so hot. Around 47 degrees. We sat inside the roadhouse for most of the day contemplating what to do. We had a session of killing flies, squashing them and making a pile on the table. A pretty grose game, but it was fun at the time. The roadhouses are really expensive, and we got sick of giving them money.
During the day 3 other lads rolled up on road bikes. They were riding from Perth to Sydney to raise money for some kind of Quadriplegics Association. They had a support vehicle with them, and it was quite envious listening to the way they were riding. The driver would go ahead with an esky full of food, make them lunch before they turn up, and then cleans up for them while they ride ahead. He also fills their drink bottles with cold water every hour. We told them about the way we were doing it and they did gave us a fair bit of credit for what we were doing.
I was feeling good around 3pm. So for some stupid reason I decided to order another burger for some lunch. It went straight through me again, and it was back and forth to the toilet for quite a while. Harv was in top shape, and looking forward to hitting the road.
We packed up everything that we had laying around the campsite. I threw my bike back together, pumped up my tires, loaded the gear on the trailer and then headed to the shop one more time. I bought a couple of Gatorades and lemonade to get some hydration and energy for the ride.
At about 6:30pm we let the roadhouse. We got a couple of photos with the welcome to WA sign, and a lady at the border entrance asked us some questions about what we were carrying as we crossed the border.
We stopped in Eucla for some dinner. Harv got a full feed and I had a couple of chips. I hit the toilet there a couple of times, and then we left for the open road of WA.
Just out of Eucla we went down a massive hill, which led to into a flat straight section of road. The wind was well behind us, it was cooling down, and the flies started to let up a bit. I knew the drinks I had wouldn’t last long in the system, and within 20 mins of riding I hit up Harv for the toilet paper, and ran off into the bushes for some business. Having a stomach bug and diarrhoea is no good anywhere you are, but its not the time or place to have it in the middle of the desert, with 80kms of riding to get through. I will say though, I think it’s the best and only sunset I will get to watch while going to the toilet in the desert.
The sunset was amazing again, and soon faded into the night sky. We made really good speed, and were sitting between 25-30kms for most of the ride.
I stopped for a few country toilet calls along the way, but we did make good time, and turned up at Mundrabilla about just before 10pm. The tents we up in a flash and we went to bed.
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