Vanderpants Oz Tour

95km’s

Hello everyone – thanks for logging in and reading this unfiltered and basic blog of a cuttla red heads pushing some pedals around and just talking shit and having lolz – ok and suffering a bit 🙂

Today was half bliss / half suffer but all in all – TOTAL BLISS. It was a good intro into a tiny bit of suffer and what is to come and a tiny bit of joy. it was a brilliant start to day 2 and let me unpack some (if you can be bothered reading through my multiple change of subjects and butterfly chasing) – bare with me whilst I sidetrack, get off the rails, get back on, take you through the roundabout, tell you a story, digress but then get abck on the rails again 🙂

here we go…..

The day started with a massive tailwind and a beautiful sunrise. It was calm and enjoyable. We just talked shit for a couple hours and took some pics and enjoyed the beginning talking all important things such as…………………..’Hey Adrian, do you think pelicans compare dick sizes with each other’? This then went on for half an hour about why and if they do. My thoughts were, no they dont, however, they would compare how far they fly or how wide their wingspan is but just quietly, the female pelicans would be squabbling about it 🙂

Along the ride today we were discussing about yesterday and had a big laugh about how much we actually hung shit on EVERYTHING – the whole day we just hung shit on everything in our lives and how much awesome we are than everything we discussed. Any cyclist we saw, every driver, everyone and everything – what’s wrong with us hahahaha

Sooo the day started with an awesome tailwind…..lols, good pics, easy cycling and I was starting to think Alex was getting it too good. This isn’t REALLY touring hahahaha – well it is but perfect weather, no niggles, lolz, water supplies ok, food supplies ok, no bugs etc etc hahahaha this is too good lolz. My saying is normally ‘there’s always something that annoys you it hardly ever is perfect’. It’s always either wind, mosquitos, heat, wind, rain, hunger, pain, flies – the list goes on – there’s at least ONE thing in Australia whilst touring that ANNOYS YOU or should I say, that challenges you hahaha but the first 50 was BLISS and LOLZ…….

We got to Wellington so easily and hopped on the ferry which was up and running since the floods so that was good. A little bit of logistics were undertaken the night before so we knew where supplies would be because we are about to head into a few days of NOTHING along the cooring so we knew where we need to stock up. When I say stock up i’m talking pasties and water hahahaha. The next couple day will be camping and dehy meals so I’m pumped to show Alex how this shit works. I must admit, I wanted to shout out to Alex because I know it’s only been two days BUT i’m super impressed at his attitude and willingness to take all the experiences in. Sometimes in this game you have a plan for water, food, wind, sleeping etc etc but sometimes it turns to shit many times in one day and you have to shift your mindset multiple times in one day regardless of your energy levels. Yes it’s early days however, he has been a soldier. We smashed 95 km’s today and he smashed it and we are planning the days ahead together with curiosity and team work – I haven’t had such help before – it’s refreshing. Fast forward two weeks – lets revisit this post shall we hahahahaha

Ok so back on the ferry, Alex said I should whip my drone out (lol) – so within 3 minutes out it came, up it popped in the sky and OMG it wasn’t calibrated for some reason so it was going all over the place so I cut about 2 minutes of footage and somehow landed it back on the ferry ahhaah. I didn’t know that the operator was watching me the whole time and commented ‘oh that’s yours is it, I was wondering what was going on’ hahahahaha.

Packed the drone away, cycled off the ferry and away we went again. I could talk all day about why I love bicycle touring and all the things it teaches me however, one thing I loved about today was the fact that we shot the breeze about silly things, funny things, serious things, random stupid things, laughed a lot, cycled hard, enjoyed the sunrise and spent 10 minutes talking about it – we experieced a whole day today however, it felt like 20 + unique experiences in one. When you setle down for the day, there’s so much that went on regardless of how hard the day is (or easy) haha

Welllllll we were smashing the k’s and then turned south INTO THE SMASHING HEADWIND. My bro in law Ned warned me about the weather coming up so we took that in our stride and have planned our days based on that damn headwind which is soul destroying. Give me hills ANYDAY over headwind. It was crushing. I could see the smile dissapear from Alex’s face pretty quickly and that turned into quietness (from both of us) which then turned into putting my headphones in which then turned into a few more rest stops hehehehe. It was ok though – just a small challenge to get to Meningie and we ended up doing 95 clicks (50 into solid headwinds) – I’m super impressed at Alex’s effort today – I secretly wanted him to suffer a bit more though hahaha

The next two days are pretty much no supplies so we have to stock up on lots of water and food and camp – i’m really looking forward to this. It’s been nice for me to finish the day with a mate and go through literally 50-100 stories and then pick a few each day that keep rotating and make me lol – it’s nice to share it with someone as i haven’t had that before for a multi day touring journey.

Arrived at Meningie SPENT, happy and hungry

Smashed some food and a coffee (terrible but awesome coffee haha) and we were pretty quiet and I think that was from wind in our ears all day, loud traffic and 95km’s under our belt.

Went to the supermarket to overhear a bloke try to pick up the supermarket attendant and it went like this (made me LOL)

bloke ‘howdy love how are YAH’ (full aussie accent here)

Attendant ‘great darl how are things with you’?

bloke ‘Yeahhhhh not too bad hey, It’s been a tough week because the doctor told me to use this cream once but I found that this rash I have needs it twice a day so we are getting better’

Attendant ‘insert long silence and awkward look to co worker at next till’

attendant awkardly laughs ‘hahahahaha good luck with that have a nice day’

Bloke looks at me standing behind him, pauses, walks off’

attendant ‘next please’

Me ‘well i don’t have a rash but id’ just like these thanks’ BWhahahahahahaha

The day ended with us having a counter meal which was terrible but awesome, walking along the river, viewing kangaroo island from where we are and laughing about everything that happened in the day (and drinking a bottle of red from the bottle along the beach hahahaha)

Thanks so much everyone for tuning in and lolling with me – Instead of pictures today I put together a little 2 minute video so I can practice putting all the pics and vids together for my blog and give you an idea of the things we see so lets see how it goes – enjoy a day in the life peoples and

tuning out until tomorrows adventures begin again – have a great night all……

KM’s today – 95

Vertical Gain – 243 mtrs

KM’s to date – 158

Wind – EFFING ANNOYING 🙂

RED SIGNING OUT…..