Day 158

Date:- 19 August 2010
Distance:- 72.70 Km
Distance to Date:- 9420.20 Km
Start:- Nerrin Nerrin Rest Area
Finish:- Galena Bridge Rest Area
Comment:- I was up about 6.30 am this morning after a cold night. I was quite comfortable in my sleeping bag in my tent under a steel roof. I was a bit reluctant to get up. Had breakfast in the tent, washed up then slowly packed up. My fingers were frozen. A number of people came over for a chat and Paul kept making cups of coffee for me.

I finally got away about 9 am. Beautiful morning, cloudless skies and no wind to speak of.

There seems to be more varieties of wildflowers scattered here and there but no real concentrations as I remember them.

The scenery is just wonderful, all the shades of green with the occasional glimpses of colour, pink, white, yellow, red, etc. Another week or two and it is going to be magnificent through here.

Stopped for my break 40 km out about 12 pm.

About 55 km out from the rest area cropping is visible on the right hand side of the road and a bit further down the road a whole new vista opens up with paddocks of cropping, a few sheep grazing here and there. The whole place looks quite prosperous.

Everlastings (wildflowers) everywhere looks like snow on the ground and then we get a change of colour and pink is the dominant colour. The camera got a real workout but unfortunately a camera cant do justice to what you can see by being here.

All of a sudden Galena Bridge Rest Area loomed up on my left. This is my destination for today. So in I went and found a nice little spot to put my tent up and settle down for the day. Dennis, a gentleman I had met at a previous rest area came over and invited me over for a cup of coffee to which I had accepted.

While I was with Dennis a Motor home pull up to empty a toilet cassette and the person looked familiar, so I went over to check to find it was Coral, a lady I had met firstly in Bega, then a number of times since. Coral rode her bike from Cairns to Cape York with a company called All Trails.

Coral was booked into a caravan park further down the road so we organised a meeting in Geraldton on Saturday when I hope to arrive.

Settled in my tent and doing my diary before I have tea and retire for the night

Tomorrow I would like to get to Geraldton but may have to settle for Northampton as I hear there are a few hills in front of me.