Back to the beginning...

When we last updated the blog, we had just arrived at River Heads and had put Tim on a bus back to Brisbane. We planned to be there for a couple of days to recharge our batteries but shortly after we arrived we received word that Bryce's grandfather was dying and on October 20th, he did pass away. The whole family had just recently been together to celebrate his 90th birthday which had a wonderful tribute to his great life. Bryce's Grandpa Tim was a keen fisherman. When (Uncle) Tim was with us on the boat and fishing was a daily activity, not a day went by when stories about fishing with Grandpa and his various techniques were discussed. 

Part of the reason that I was reluctant to blog about this at the time was because I didn't want to advertise that we were leaving the boat. We were lucky that we were just a three hour drive away from Brisbane and that we were able to arrange to make our way back down there. Since both Bryce and I were going back we ended up hiring a car to drive down. No one would deliver a car to River Heads and since there is no bus system, I volunteered to bike to pick up the car in Hervey Bay. After all it was only a 50 minute bike ride on Google Maps!

Only the beginning. Batty in the background.

Famous last words as my bike ride did not go as expected. To start with, the bikes that we have are great for riding around town on nice flat roads but as they have no gears aren’t the best for hills. So of course, when I came to the top of the first hill and could see into the distance the ups and downs that I had yet to conquer, I knew it would be a fun ride! There were times when there was no shoulder and I had to walk the bike on the gravel slope next to the two lane road. It was great sailing weather so of course that meant I was also biking straight into a massive headwind. Rest assured that if it ever got too dangerous, I planned on calling a taxi. Once I got on the main road, things were much flatter though I still needed to walk the bike through the grass at several points so that I didn’t get hit by massive road trains that came flying by on the road. I should also mention that I left on my trip at 11am so was doing this in the scorching heat. While it was an absolutely beautiful ride, I did at times consider hitchhiking (not seriously). I thought about borrowing one the horses that I biked right passed, all of them looking up at me and following me with their heads as I passed their pasture as if to say “What does this crazy women think she’s doing?” Unfortunately, I have no photos of this little adventure because I just wanted to get there and planned to take photos on my ride back. Lucky for me, I didn’t get that chance.

Our wheels for the weekend.

Two and a half hours later, seeing the Avis (car rental) sign in the distance was one of the more welcoming signs I’d ever seen. After getting the car, I drove back to the boat to pick up Bryce and we headed back to Brisbane for the weekend. Due to threatening thunderstorms and rain, on the return trip we dropped off the car together and piled everything, outboard motor & bike included, into a maxitaxi to take us straight to the boat. I didn’t get to make the return bike trip! The moment we got back to river heads, the rain started to pour down. There were a few breaks in which we though we could make a go of it but by the time we started to get the dinghy ready to go back in the water it started again! We hid out under a shelter for a while waiting for it to stop, before eventually we were able to make our way back to the boat.