West Wyalong to Mildura
6 June 2014
Master Map
Day 3 dawned foggy. And cold, of course. But we had 500+ kms ahead of us and needed to get moving.
Given the small range of the CB1100, the infrequency of petrol stops in this part of Australia and the difficulty of finding reliable information about whether there will or will not be fuel available, we had done some fairly careful planning about where we would get fuel so we didn't end up shivering in the middle of nowhere wondering whether we could persuade a passing kangaroo to get us a few litres of juice. The plan was to get fuel on the outskirts of West Wyalong at a station Pterodactyl assured me we'd pass. Of course we never saw it because we were out of West Wyalong before reaching third gear, but we were (or pretended to be) reasonably confident of being able to refuel at a tiny town called Weethalle a mere 57 kms away.
It was not a particularly pleasant ride: gently downhill, and still cold and foggy so I had no idea whether it was interesting or not. I sat behind Pterodactyl hoping like hell Weethalle would have a petrol station. It did. But it wasn't open when we arrived. Fortunately action was not far away. With the odometer showing 200 kms (I reckon the CB will get around 230 on a good run) and the next place where petrol was certain being 198 kms away we filled up and rode on into the fog.
The Fog!
Eventually it cleared and we found ourselves on the Hay Plain — flat as far as the eye can see with a view interrupted only by the odd tree. We stopped somewhere in the middle of it because I was so cold I had to get off and warm up. Amazingly we met a couple of kangaroos which can be made out in the background of these photos. These were the only live specimens I saw till the final morning of the trip.
The blobs behind and to the right are kangaroos on the Hay Plain
You can see the roos again just at the back of the bike
Not much to see out here
Me enjoying the sun
Pterodactyl
Breakfast at Hay, more flat stuff before we crossed the Murray River and arrived at the Mildura Motorcycle Club the very place to which we had come for a weekend rally and some speedway action. There was beer and wine and an indifferent steak sandwich and a not so comfortable camping ground where we set up our tents.
Did I mention it was cold?
