Tues Feb 24 – Tathra.
Spent the day in Tathra. Unfortunately the weather was cool and overcast. As I cycled along the small parade of shops I noticed a charity shop with a surfboard for $4. I bought it and went down to the sea. I needn’t have bothered. The sea temperature had plummeted overnight from a cool 20ºC to a very cold 14ºC!! There was no-one in the water. I was soon donating the board back to the charity shop.
Wed Feb 25 – Tathra to Cathcart – 68 miles. R/T 15205 mls. 335 mls to go.
I left Tathra at 7.30am and cycled to Pambula Beach. It was still overcast and a cool 15º. I was going to stay there for the day before heading up into the mountains but as it looked like weather wasn’t going to improve I pressed on. The small town of Pambula was a short distance from the beach and I asked a local cafe owner about the road up to Wyndham. He said it was fine but mostly uphill. There was a small park where I could camp. I arrived in Wyndham around 12.30pm after c47mls. There was a general store and a hotel/pub. Outside the store was a loaded bike – another long distance cyclist. It turned out he was Australian, Simon, making his way to Perth. He was cycling up into the Snowy Mountains before getting a canoe and paddling down the Murray River. He was then going to run to Perth.Brave chap!
As it was still early I decided to carry on and cycle with Simon to Cathcart. This was 20 mls of steady uphill climbing to around 900mtrs. It was cold with drizzly rain. Arriving at 5.30pm we found the only shop which was a general store. The sign outside said it stocked all things required by the locals. I asked for beers. The shop owner said she didn’t have any beers but she did have a bottle of red wine that a friend had given her about 5 yrs ago. She went to the stock room and came back with the wine. It didnt have a label and it had a cork. Neither of us had a corkscrew and the shop didn’t sell one. The owner said the wine was $5 (£2.50). We bought some other provisions for dinner and went in search of somewhere to camp. Just past the fire hut there was the village memorial hall with a covered area. We pitched our tents under the cover in case it rained. Luckily there was a toilet block with hot showers. I was feeling very cold so a hot shower was very welcome. At the back of the hall we found the bottom half of a 5 gallon drum – perfect for a fire. Some dry wood was found and we soon had a great little fire going. Dinner was fried onion, tomato with 2 tins of tuna and a tin of tomatoes mixed with black bean pasta. The pasta looked like a bunch of twigs but tasted ok. We had to knock on a locals door to get a corkscrew to open the wine. It too was ok! The meal and wine was finished by 8pm so I went in search of some beer. I knocked on another locals door and he kindly gave us two bottles of beer. A nice evening spent in front of a camp fire drinking beer.
Thurs Feb 26 Cathcart to Bombala 13 miles. R/T 15218 mls. 322 mls to go.
As I was loading my bike in the morning I noticed a broken spoke in the rear wheel. This would have to be fixed and I hoped there might be a cycle shop in Bombala. We cycled the short 13mls to town. There was no cycle shop. I had thought I may have to leave the bike in Bombala and hitch a lift to the nearest large town of Cooma where there was a large bike shop. But as we were having a coffee and pie in a bakery/cafe a woman told me to go and see the tyre service place just down the street. She thought they may stock bicycle spares.They didnt but they knew a man who might. They phoned Jake who had once had a cycle shop and might have a spare 26 inch wheel. In fact he had 2. One of the tyre service guys drove out to get them. I managed to adapt one of them to fit my bike. RESULT! By this time it was 12.45pm and I decided to stop in Bombala for the night.
Video blog :- http://youtu.be/BKZz0NPeR98
Justpoppingoutforacycleride 