Western Australia!
Made it to W.A.
Today I crossed the border into Western Australia the largest state in the country. Along the way I met the other cyclist, a guy from Perth riding to Darwin and then flying home. He had a pretty sweet set up, a mountain bike with a suspension fork and a B.O.B. trailer. The more I see these things the more I wish I had one. It would make carrying 20 litres of water so much easier. Not saying that I’m unhappy with my beast, it’s doing a much better job that I anticipated it would but on some of the longer stretches of road ahead I’m not sure I’ll be able to carry enough water.
Fellow Cyclist
Matt, the guy from Perth had plenty of info about the conditions ahead. I found out that in W.A. none of the rest areas have water tanks. As almost all of them that I have passed since I started have water, I wasn’t taking them for granted but I guess I was starting to depend on them for my water needs. Some of the distances between roadhouses is over 300km out here, which is the bones of two days riding all going well and thats a lot of water. I’ve been needing almost 15 litres the last few days and I’m drinking every drop of that. He also had good news about the temperatures I have to face, 49 degrees celcius in the shade – joy. After chating for an hour or so we took off again. I have to admit I was a little envious that his trip will be finished in a few days. It’s getting pretty hard for me out here.
A little earlier on the day I stopped for breakfast number 2. As I was cooking two caravas pulled up for a break. Wonder of wonders these were not part of the grey nomads but two young families and all the children. They’d been travelling (surfing) all around Australia for the last 11 months, which I think is brilliant. Just goes to show you can still do it even if you have a family and all the responsibility thats involved. They had a glorious cold can of Pepsi Max, and I scored a few breakfast bars and some lamington cake too. Not a bad and all I had to do in exchange was pose for a picture. I’m not sure that it was a good trade for them but I couldn’t complain.
Juat as it started to get dark I arrived in Kununurra. My choice of backpackers was based purely on the fact that it was the closest and ment all of one minute less on the saddle 
As I pulld up there were a few Japanese guys sitting outside. I joined them and they were telling me about their friend who was doing the same thing as I was. This country is bigger than Europe so what are the chances that I meet Dais friends? Pretty good in fact. I keep meeting people I’ve met before or friends of people I know.