Arrrival in Adelaide

Hi Everybody,

So we have completed the first major leg of our journey. Adelaide! We have made it to Pete's house, where we will be staying for a few days. It's going to be good to get a break from riding. It's been fun mostly, but long treks since we left Wangaratta. One of these days I'll put up what distances we travel, but until then i'll just keep updating the google map lol.

After we set out from 'Wang' we had breakfast in Glenrowan and checked out Ned Kelly's Last Stand. It was pretty cool how they laid out the positions where everything went down wiith descriptions etc. Worth a look if you're ever down that way. They had some kind of animated show as well, but we were out of time and it's always better to picture it in your head anyway.

After that it was pretty much trying to find the least boring way to travel west. A whole lot of straight bits and a whole lot more wind. If you've ever watched those guys counterbalancing their boats against the wind, it felt a little like that. I'm very happy that we decided to stop in Wagaratta rather than continue on, because the winds from the day before were supposed to be twice as bad. We stopped in a tiny little place called Karang, which had the traditional 5 pubs in close proximity with little else to speak of. Stayed in one of the pubs and had a good night. Great food and a pretty barmaid to serve it up with a smile and good conversation.

Thursday was similar, in that there was a lot more straight bits but at least it had a few nice curves. Coming up to the South Australian border there was some strange corners we were warned about. For whatever reason, when coming close to train tracks they switched into moderately tight S bends. I heard its supposed to be about lining up the road with the track. A great break for us Motorcycle riders, but quite dangerous for trucks if they are not paying attention. They have had a few run off the roads on the second bend apparently.

Another strange attraction was a sign telling us about the 'Pink lakes'. Of course we had to find out what they were on about, so ended up travelling down about 13kms of dirt off the main road to the first one. Sure enough, a pink lake appeared.

I must admit, I was a little disapointed that it wasn't a pink water lake, but it was cool nonetheless. There is something intruiging about a thick layer of pink salt covering that much ground .

The great thing about travelling on roads in this fashion is that sometimes you find stuff like that which you didn't know about. Travelling through towns where their only claim to fame is that one famous person was born there. Passing by the 'Australian Willow for cricket bats project' was particularly humorous for me. Another highlight was when Guy almost hit two huge Eagles who had decided to rest next to the road. Not because he almost hit them, but because we were so close when they were taking flight. Also, take a look at a map of Victoria sometime. I swear, naming towns is what people did before they could make up names for World of Warcraft characters.

As I discovered to my delight, I had forgotten that the Adelaide Fringe festival is on! We went out last night to check it out and the city was packed. There were a few cool things to see but becuase we just couldn't be bothered waiting in lines, we just had a look around. We saw some buskers performing which was pretty cool amongst other things, but we were still pretty buggered from the ride, so didn't stay oput too late. We will be heading into the city again today to grab a few things and will have another look.

Apologies for the length of this blog. I assume I'll get lazier as the trip goes on, but for now you can just skim through lol.