DAY 74 - WIRRULLA SA

WIRRULLA SA

DAY 74

CEDUNA - WIRRULLA

102.62 km

Total Time: 09.00 – 15.30 (6h 30m)

Time on Bike: 5h 22m 02s

Max. Speed: 40.3 km/h

Av. Speed: 19.1 km/h


I pray and I receive.

My metaphorical prayer delivered yet another day of fantastic tailwinds.

I also believe “Wirrulla” to be an Aboriginal word for “the challenge of staying dry when you ride all day to be caught short 10 kilometres from your destination and it rains and you have to set up your tent in the rain and because there is nowhere else to try and stay dry, you spend most of the evening in your tent, except for the time when you go to the pub for dinner and there is a log fire there and it is very warm but sooner or later you have to go back into your tent and go to sleep”.

I have checked with some local Koori translators and this is an extremely close proximity of the word….

My next destination is likely to be the town of Wudinna, another Aboriginal word, which I believe has a very close meaning to “riding a bicycle through the rain for 120 kilometres and arriving not in the least bit dry”.

I will need to check this meaning more closely when I arrive but I have it on good knowledge…..

The overnight wind was scary.

I often felt it possible that I would awaken with just me and my sleeping bag and everything else halfway across the Nullabor….or in the sea…..or heading up to Alice Springs in a hurry.

So to hit the road this morning and realise that this mini-cyclone was actually in my favour was nothing besides a miracle.

Well to be accurate, the opening 25 kilometres were mainly cross, but the highway deviated in a southeast direction beyond this and the wind swung around to the northwest this afternoon – so get your compass out….

It was a howler as well, cold and gale-force. I would not have wanted to be heading across the Nullabor into this.

And that’s just it.

The wind in this part of the world literally shifts by the hour – and radically.

One day’s westerly is tomorrow’s nor-easterly.

And today’s nor-westerly is tomorrow’s southerly, I believe.

I have thereby formed the opinion that in time, Australia must become home to the world’s biggest wind farm.

Wind stations will line the entire length of the Great Australian Bight from Ceduna in the east to approximately Esperance in the west and this will effectively power the southern hemisphere and beyond until the end of time as we know it.

The technology is developed and demand will catch up rapidly the way things are going, so it is but a matter of time…..

I am hoping to bring next weather report and more Aboriginal translations direct from Wudinna.