Day 97

Date:- 19 June 2010
Distance:- 99.37 Km
Distance to Date:- 4680 Km
Start:- Flinders Rest Area
Finish:- Caravan Park - Julia Creek
Comment:- Chatted with various travellers through the afternoon before cooking tea about 6pm. More chatting before going to bed about 8.15pm. I woke about 2.10am with the sound of rain on the tent. It lasted about 20 minutes and stopped as if someone turned the tap off. Everything was dry when I got up in the morning.

Up at 6am, had breakfast, sent a birthday greeting to future son in law. On the road by 7.30am. Nice cool morning with some good cloud cover. Good road and very little traffic.

About 9am the clouds started to burn off and the sun is starting to warm everything up. A nice 5 - 10 knot SE wind is blowing and since I am heading west I am getting quite a bit of assistance.

Stopped for my break about 10.30am, 50 km out from the rest area. The wind seems to have increased to about 10 - 15 knots and it is making life easy, except when the road swings south and I have a side wind pushing me into the traffic.

Quite a few dead animals along the road today. There have been dead animals every day but there seems to be more than usual today. Mainly kangaroos, two foxes, one wild pig and a few unidentifiable remains.

The last 30 km into Julia Creek the road was very rough and I was happy to arrive in Julia Creek. Booked into the Caravan Park then went for a walk down town. Being a weekend everything is shut. The town is “dead” The two pubs were open and a club and service station.

I was hoping to buy something for tea so it looks like I may have a counter tea.

Tomorrow I will head for Oorindi Rest Area which is 69 km west of Julia Creek.