The evening stars were out of this world. The twinkles appeared individually and en masse. Like sages of the past, we pieced together stars to make pictures and stories.
I woke up early on my own to watch the sunrise. It was incredibly peacefully quiet. The birds and bugs were not awake either. It was just me and the slowly rising rays of the sun. Below, I have doubled the speed of the video. Note the birds started to sing at the end.
After breakfast, Kim found and spoke to Park Ranger Grumps* about riding on the Lakebed Trail. It was closed due to lack of maintenance; and there were many potholes. (*Apparently he was one of the grumpiest ranger Kim had ever met.). Kim and I discussed it; and decided we would go ahead as we were no speed demons and were experienced enough to know when to turn back.
It was a beautiful and perfect day of blue skies and a slight breeze. We started the ride with Ella Mae at the front. She had the fright of her life as a couple of kangaroos appeared magically over the path as she rode over the ridge. Kim gallantly sacrificed himself; and went ahead first. The kangaroos jumped away and our nerves returned to carry on.
As we comfortably retraced our weaving path towards Zanzi Homestead, flanked by grasses, shrubs, and trees; I spotted a pair of emus running clumsily at great speed towards Kim. Their flexible necks were swinging wildly as they ran. I screamed out "Emus!". Kim and the children managed to stop in time and let the emus pass. I was not sure what spooked them in the first place; as they were spooked for the second time and dashed across the path again.
We carried on with our ride, past the "Trail closed" sign. The trail was very flat and the ground felt quite damp still but not wet. As it was a cool day, there were many animals about but they were mainly eating in the distance.
At the 7km mark, we stopped for a breather. Suddenly, Thomas heard a hissing noise. Upon inspection, we noticed Ella Mae's bike front wheel had a puncture! Kim went about fixing it, whilst we hung out for a bit. Luckily, it was not a hot day; and we could sit on the dry gravel; surveying our surroundings and...emu poo. These green round circles glistened in the sun like reflectors on the darkest roads.
Landscape was as flat as a pancake; spotted with blue salt bush, and silver bush. It seemed like an easy ride but the ground surface was as soft and slippery as melted butter in many parts of the ride. It was a mental challenge to keep going as we couldn't see obvious landmarks. We sometimes felt it was easier to walk our bikes instead of riding.
We had our eyes peeled for gallivanting kangaroos and eccentric emus; and trying to segregate visually the echidnas from the spinifex bushes. Sadly, we didn't manage to spot any echidnas; but we saw a flock of emus.
We had lunch at Red Top stop. The sun was hot by then; and the wind had picked up. We were grateful for the green shelter that looked like a bus stop. The water tank was empty.
There were a stretch of path where we rode next to a fence line. Ella Mae ran over a couple of rusty fence wire with her bike. Lucky for her the wire didn't puncture her bike nor her body. It could've been disastrous. While unraveling the wire, the kids observed my bike was thoughtlessly parked on an anthill in that emergency situation. It would not have been a pretty sight if my bike and I were engulfed by giant ants with razor sharp pincers.
Near the end of our ride, the path was bombarded randomly with potholes. Some of these were by erosion; and some were dug up animals in search for food and water.
The change of terrain to uphill towards Mungo Lookout was welcomed as it marked near the end of our journey. This area was lined with she-oaks.
We were lucky not to encounter any vehicles when we rode on the road back to Shearer's Quarters.
We rested for a little while with another show stopping sunset.
We had dinner at Mungo Lodge. The food was not great but we were glad someone else was cooking and cleaning up after us. We met Meg's husband Kin. We had dinner separately but we hung out in front of the fire after for chat.
I slept very well that evening.
Comments
Post a Comment