Back to plan ' A '

It looks like we will have to go back to plan A. Here is what happened over the last 1 ½ weeks.

After we arrived home from our short ride on Wednesday, I mentioned to Werner that was a bit sore in my left Hip but nothing to bad. When I got up on Thursday morning it hurt to walk, thinking that I must have pulled a muscle. I was limping around for the next few days and applying deep heat. By Saturday evening it had moved into the groin and by the next morning I was not able to lift my left without a lot of pain. So we decided to head to Joondalup and see the after hours GP. He was not sure what exactly the problem was, so he gave me a referral to have X-rays and an Ultrasound. The earliest I could it get done was Wednesday. We also arranged an appointment with our Doctor for Thursday as we had to wait to get the results back.

The results was bad news and after a long consultation with the Doctor we came to the decision that we can’t ride our Tandem around Australia and have to go back to our original plan.

I have Bursitis of the Hip and it could take at least 5-6 weeks to heal with no guarantee it

will not return in near future if we pursue our plan of riding our Tandem. The risk would be too great of something going wrong along the Nulaboor or if we would make it to Cairns and coming back to WA across the top.

At the moment I’m going to try Physio treatment. If it does not get better soon I have to consider Cortisone injections.

!!!!!!!!!HERE ARE THE NEW PLANS!!!!!!

We will be heading back to New Zealand on the 2^nd of August visiting Family and friends for 2 weeks.

After we are back we might head of a week earlier, somewhere around the 30^th of August. I will be driving the Van while Werner is riding his bike. Werner will be able to cover a lot more km’s a day by him self. Like this we are able to stay at places we like a lot longer and be able to go and do some side trips with the Van we could not do on the Tandem. We will be taking my bike with us and hopefully in time I can do small trips with Werner when we stay at places for a few days.

3 Days of riding

Windmill for pumping Water

Monday morning we had planned to ride along Brand H’way to Gingin. We also had in mind to have an early start, but it was freezing and when I had a look at temperatures on the net, it said that Gingin was -1.2 degrees. So a little delay was justified and by the time we left it was close to 10 o’clock. It took us just over 2 hours to get there. We had a light Southeasterly wind helping us all the way. From where we joined the Highway to the turn off to Gingin we traveled about 36 km. The Road had one bend, the rest was straight and flat with an incline of 30 m.

City Center in Gingin

Once we arrived in Gingin, we went to the very nice Park and sat down on one the many Picnic Tables. We had a Coffee and Sandwiches we again brought with us. By now it started to warm up and sitting in the sun was most enjoyable. I had a look at the Anglican Church right next to the Park, took some Photos but the sad thing was, there was a quite heavy steel gate with a chain and Padlock wrapped around it. What a sad time we are living in!

The ride home was straight forward without any problems with a light head wind.

The side of first School in Bindoon

Tuesday we decided to head to Ellenbrook and drop in for a quick visit at Corrina and Caleb. This morning the wind changed and was helping us on the way there, but it will be another story on the way back. We headed for a Park, because Corrina was still out. Just as we were ready to start heading back, we got a SMS from Corrina telling us that she arrived back. So we headed to the house to say hello, have a Coffee and some Biscuits. Riding the 40 km home into a steady headwind was hard and by the time we got back, we were glad that we made it.

Processing plant along Gt. Northern H'way

For Wednesday we only had in our minds to do a small ride clock wise along Muchea East Rd, Chittering Rd with refreshment stop in Bullsbrock before heading back along Gt. Northern H’way. The riding was very nice and easy, as for a change we had no wind at all.

Flowering Bush along the ride

We have been very pleased with the way we went over the last 3 days and it was planned to have about 3 days of the bike. The forecast for the next few days wasn’t the best.

Sunday get together.

Mike and I doing some Heavy Farm work.

A very nice Flower on the Porch.

On Sunday Mike had arranged for Allan, Corrina and Caleb to come out and that Allan installs a Power point and a connection point for the TV in the room. Also Caleb wanted to do some riding on his Bike while Allan was doing the work. The plan was, once he finished the job, we all go for a drive back to the Café I mentioned the other day and have something to eat and drink. Because it took longer than we anticipated and the Café closes at 4 pm, it was too late and we have to go there another weekend.

Parrot leaving Nest

Caleb riding his Bike!!!!

Nice week of cycling !

Jenny is having a well earned rest.

Wednesday morning it was cold and the easterly was again here in its full strength. We decided to have a late start again, so I carried on with trying to catch up on the Blog and the Journal. I hope by the end of this weekend I will have achieved that.



And the same is applying for me.

By 10.45 am we were ready to get going. We went along Gt. Northern H’way past Bullsbrock. I think it was another 7 km south of Bullsbrock when we reached the turn off to go into the Walyunga NP. From the turn off the entrance to the park was a steady climb of 2.5 km and a nice down hill run of about 1 km, quite steep, were we reached a speed of 64 km/h. We stopped at a picnic area, had a hot drink and some Lunch we bought with us. It was nice and warm as the Valley was like a shelter from the easterly that was still blowing. We spent about ¾ hour there before we started our climb out and heading back home along the way we rode here.

Amazing some of the loads and Trucks along Gt.Northern H'way !

Thursday morning we only could do a shorter ride of about 35 km. On the way home we stopped at a very nice Café that used to be a Roadhouse. It is situated at the intersection Brand H’way and Gt. Northern H’way.
Sometimes on the way home, we have a Coffee and Hot Chocolate, before we start riding uphill back to the house.
In the afternoon we went and meet Corrina at Caleb’s school, then back to their house for a Coffee. After we made a couple of phone calls on the house phone, we went to Warwick to catch up with Mark.

Friday was the day off cycling. Late morning we went and did some shopping. Brought some bright green material to make a cover for Bob the trailer, also some reflector tape Jenny will sew on the cover. Hopefully that will help make us more visible. With the rest of the green material we will make a couple of flags for Bob. We also got a spare Tire and Tube for Bob.
At 4.15 pm we met up with Jan and Tracey at The Royal Hotel in East Perth to catch up on the old and new News as we haven’t seen each other for a while.

Cold but Sunny Days

Monday has been our day off cycling. We are trying to get into a routine were we cycle 2 or 3 days, then have 1 day off the bike. Like this we will be easing our self into a routine that is similar to what we have planned for our trip.

We went late morning into Midland to get a few things from the Midland Surplus Store for the tour. After we had a good look around we went over to the big Shopping centre. Had some lunch in the fast food hall and I had a Hot dog. I was not very impressed with the taste of it, even 2 hours after it was still somewhere around my taste buts and annoying me. At least I learnt a lesson; don’t eat crap when there is Subway and another couple of healthy fast food outlets around. On the way back we stopped at a roadside stall and brought fresh Oranges and Mandarins. Later on that night I went with Mike to take Bernie, Moira and Isabel to the Airport. They have been booked in for 0.15 am flight to Sydney, then on to Tamworth to visit Family.

Tuesday was a bid of a slow start for our planned ride because the temperature was down to 3 degrees and a cold and strong easterly was blowing. It was about 10.45 am before we left. Went along Gt. Northern H’way to Bullsbrock were we turned left into Chittering Rd.

In one of the Parks we had a coffee we bought in a flask with us and a bite to eat. Because Bullsbrock is at the bottom of the Darling Ranges and our plan was to ride to Chittering Valley Rd, we had a steady climb of about 180 m ahead of us. Mike told us of a small Cafe just before the turnoff into CH V Rd. It is like a shed type building, but it was not our lucky day and it is only open on weekends. At least another good reason to ride back there on the weekend.