little ' incedent ' with a road tran

every time I get into, or near, or think about Kathrine something seems to break. after no breakages for, 800km or so ( since I left Kathrine.) 10km out a road train comes up behind me ( I was in cruse control doing about 28 down the hill). It was a clear run in front of me and, their was a little white thing. about when I saw it I saw the train pull back in towards me, he'd seen it to.
 glancing to the side I saw a beautifully arranged section of dirt. No worries, I thought.
the trick with road trains is not to look back, but count the trailers, to work out when to think about pulling back in. I guessed this one had 4, a good guess. after trailer 2 or 3 I glanced from the slowly moving truck ( who had slowed down when he saw the car) to the 'good edge in front of me. my good surface had become a sires of canyons to rival the grand canyon, it should be a tourist destination. In slow motion, unwilling to pull into/ under trailer 3 and 4, and not confident of the trikes gliding ability's, I took the only option remaining, flicking out of cruse I swerved ( to fast for comfort) into the unknown of the mown edge of the road. I smashed threw a few of the smaller crevasses and swung around a bit before finally coming to rest on the side of the road, upright, and apparently still rolling. I was so glad to have replaced my suspension in Darwin.
I was expecting multiple f**ed wheels broken spokes, stuff fallen of and perhaps broken welds, just lots of broken s**t.
I was pleasantly surprised to find, only one badly warped wheel, the front right.no other damage, I hadn't even broken any spokes on the back. Amazing. I will be dropping back into the Kathrine tip for a new wheel on the way west tomorrow, but that's it.

irrelevant photo, from before my, incident

darwin to kathrine.

I made it to darwin, and discoverd that dispite glorious markets, and great beaches, darwins hidden gem is, well the tip. or to give it justice the shoal bay waste and recycling fecility. and what a fecility it is. Every peice of shite imagenable, a large commercal kitchen was backed by fashen shop and a bookstore comparible to the melboure libery. Further oult in the estate a arge workshop of metelworking and woodworking tools were supplyed for thoose wanting to work in the caryard, boatyard, bikeshop or tire joint. and then thier was the micelanious section. having trekked several kilometers loocking arond I finally viseted bike world and replaced suspenchon joints forks and  fromt wheels from the bike. a tio noch tip. thanks to ross and sharon for putting me up in darwin and bacholar.
heading down from darwin was a little more senic than the tip, I rediscoverd the fundemental land manegment practice here. if in dout, burn the f**** oult of it.

still the bush dose seem to recover pretty well.

dispite a crappy headwind all the way I finally made it to edith falls. it is a butifull gorge and sieries of pristene waterfalls, but it as well have been a vietnamiase water park. people swalmed everywhere like ants arond a drop of honey.

but the rangers kindly left a map showing a nice secluded gorge between the upper and lower waterholes. a spectacular, easelly acsesable gorge with knoone in it. and no do not proceed sighns arond it. it just (hyperthiticly) takes just a couple of small water jumps, some swimming and a bit of scrambling to get along it. inevetably I had to walk 1km back along the track in a piar of undys, a t shirt  sandals. ( to get my pants) 

 .

 

having finally got the bike running happerly I headed on to lichfield national park, dispite the swalms of turists it was great.

 

 

 

 having viseted lichfield I headed to up to darwin, nothing broke.woo hoo.

 

 great markets, walm weather nice beaches but the standoult is, for me atleast the shoal bay waste manegment fecility. the best tip shop I have ever been to. this place has everything, cars, boats, trailers, heaps of bikes, power tools, books, kichen aplyences, and clothing. well orginised and resnably priced, not super cheep but cheeper than many outher smaller shops. Ive now got new forkes on boath sides ( suspenchon on boath sides now) new bushings and spring for the rear suspenchon, a critical linkage that I have been worryd about since before I left. I still have the old ones, just in case.

 

serial f***ing breakdowns

having finally made it to kathrine ( with the bike) and done a day of mantenence I headed oult only to find 13km up the road that the frame where the rear spring mounts onto the main frame. so I headed back to town and cocos backpackers ( where I was kindly allowd to camp free) where I knew there was a welder.

40km up the road my ( short) chain starts jumping of even though its tight, ( i had stoped and tenchoned it just after leaving Kathrine) f******** under closer inspection I find that the drivin sprocket is bent an...d worn, badly. not worth bending back agean, itd done nearly 4000km so I pulled oult the spare and changed it. having done that I went to put a bit of pressure in one of my tires that seemed to have a gradual leek and f************ the valve was gone. so in with a new tube. and back on the road. but that was 150km or so agoe now.

now heading towards darwin its intresting to watch the vegetation become wetter, there are palms and ferel bamboo in the creks.

Ive finally made it to Kathrine, with the bike, after eliot I only had a couple of flats to slow me down witch has been a great relief. I stayd last night free at cocos witch was great, its a little backpackers/ camp aria.

bit of a drama for the last week or so

so, the story for the last couple of days, in short, I was kindly donated a mutch needed set of new tires in tennent ck, the last set in tennent creek to I only left with one spare, its worth noting that the tires dident have an ideal tread... patten. a combenation of harsh roads, poor quaity tires and slightly misalighned wheels I had compleatly eaten front right and back tires by renner springs ( 160km) knowing that my next posable bike shop was kathrane ( about 500km) and knowing that my one spare wouldent be enough, I parked the bike at renner springs ( thankyou to the manegment for all your help and support) and in the morning hiched up to kathrane with some fellow travelers ( about 500km) discoverd all the shops closed because of the local show. I spent the night at a backpacers (I had almost nothing with me so no camping), the next morning ( satterday) I was thankfull that the shops were open and got 4 spare tires ( better tread patten but cheep) and hiched back. this morning I realighned my front wheels, fitterd tires and hedded off.
after 90km r so the tires showed almost only normal where for that distence. but
about 5km before eliot the rear pannel mount snapped off. fuck. atleast it was close to town and will be a streghtforward weld, but being sunday the local mecanics wont be able to do untill tomorrow. so now Im camped down a tiy little sandy side track just oult of eliot pretending Im not here.

atleast the sunset was great

 

into tennent creak

sorry I havent got mutch up for a wile, ive had eather little time or no internet, for more freaquent updates see faceboock.com/solarshift. and for a map of my travels see https://maps.google.com.au/maps?hl=en&tab=wl

I made it threw up the range, said godbie to the east coast and made it to normanton withoult any dramas, well one flat tire but thats nothing.

and now ive made it to tenent creek, most of the pictures are farly self explanetry, so no need to comment. garey from the local viseter info senter has been kind enough to sponser me a desperatly needed new set of tires, thanks heaps for that gary. there have been swalms of grey nomads all along the road, between them and roadtrains they make up the magorety of the traffic, sutch a contrast to my bike.

Ive been vearry happy with how the bikes gone, no mecanical dramas, give or take a few flats and waln tires, a little chain jumping frount wheell bearings and a couple of broken spokes. really not that mutch for 2000km or so. so im happy.