Back on the Road

Our day in Foster was worth the wait. After spending the day
wandering around town and exploring some paths through the woods,
we headed back to the bike/gift/watch/camp/everything store at
7:30pm to see about Mally's bike. The whole street was dark and all
the stores had long closed shop... including this one. We waited
outside for a bit, and as we pulled out the dental floss and
tooth brush for some early dental hygiene, Tim (the bike mechanic
who had already worked a full day at his regular job), his wife (the
store owner), and Shadow (their cute poodle puppy!) arrived.
Unphased by our early evening teeth brushing in the street, they
opened up shop and invited us in. Tim led us to the back room
where he had a little bike shop, took a look at Mally's wheel and
said it could be fixed (yay!). After about an hour of changing
the spoke and trying to get the wobble out of Mally's misshapen
wheel, Tim took a look at our tired eyes and said we could head
on home and pick up the bike in the morning. With confidence,
Tim said the bike would be fixed one way or another. What
service!

The next morning, we awoke and ate a leisurely breakfast since
we had a while before the shop opened. As we began to pack up
camp, we witnessed a strange incident... a lady walked out of a
nearby cabin, walked around a candle that had been lit on the ground
all night, crumpled an empty water bottle and dropped it to the
ground, and then began singing some eery sounding chants and
headed back inside. At this point Mally and I picked up the pace
on our packing! The lady came back out a few times (partly
clothed one time) and continued to chant and yell over the loud
music of one of her neighbors (an attempt to drown out her chants
I think). Mally and I were soon hustling out of our campground.

Since we arrived to town early, we had nothing to do but check
out our favorite local bakery (mmm!). As we sat on a bench and
munched on our snack, Tim's wife arrived to open up shop and give
us a working bike - Yay! It wasn't long until Mally and I were
back on the road making our way towards Sydney once again.

We started out riding along an empty side street for the first
15 km... the sun was out and distant hills dotted with windmills
filled the landscape. As we turned off the side street onto the
Gippsland highway, the beautiful skies started looking grey ahead
and the winds picked up the pace. The scenery was still
lovely... with distant hills to our left and farms filling the
coastal plains to our right. Mally and I kept our fingers
crossed that the skies would clear and the rain would hold off.
Apparently crossing one's fingers doesn't work well in Australia!
It wasn't long until the rain started coming down... sprinkling
at first... then raining steadily... then coming down in sheets
along with gusts of wind in our face... at times the rain was
coming down so hard we thought it might be hailing (ouch!). Why
did we have to be riding through the country? Where 'o where is
the next town? Couldn't there be a little side store with
shelter? Unfortunately, we could do nothing but continue
riding... so we took turns leading the way through walls of
water. After we were thoroughly soaked, the rains stopped and
bits of sunlight peaked through the grey skies... but the winds
continued... we pedalled and pedalled and barely moved.

Finally, we arrived to the town of Yarrum where we decided to
call it a day and pray for better weather in the future. We took
a walk through the small town where the leave covered grounds
signalled the arrival of fall... then relaxed and cleaned clothes
back at the campsite before cuddling up early in our sleeping
bags for a long nights rest.

We awoke to an orchestra of assorted bird songs and chirps and a
beautiful sunny day (yay!). We headed off back on the Gippsland
for a pleasant, dry ride towards Sale. After a bit of riding on
the Gippsland highway, we turned off on Giffard road to avoid the
light stream of traffic. Boy did we avoid traffic! Giffard road
is a two-way, one-lane road that seemed to us like a giant bike
path. It led us right into the heart of the "middle of nowhere". Tan fields covered the coastal plains as far as we could see. The only signs of life over this 40km stretch of road included about 5 cars, 3 farm-houses, and a few flocks of cows. We also saw a kangaroo, but it certainly didn't show signs of life. We passed through the town of Giffard... apparently... the town consisted of a sign and some more endless fields.

Eventually, we joined back up with the Gippsland highway which led us right into the bustling metropolis of Sale... perhaps not quite as bustling as Melbourne, but it does have multiple shop-lines streets... and word on the street says there is an ice-cream shop somewhere... gotto go!