127.1km ri
dden today
69km to go
2196km ridden so far
1272m up
1029m down
4475 calories burnt
Pain factor: 7/10
Strava that shit: https://www.strava.com/activities/18341770266
YASS! MYASS! That place everyone knows but no one has been. Including me. Until now. I have done MYASS. It’s claim to fame is this sign.
So today was a big one. 127.1km. Lots of upsie daisies. It was a long gradual rise out of Cowra, barely noticed that I made it “up” to the elevation of MYASS of 500m. The road then decided to take me up to 600m then bounced between 5 and 600m for most of the way before a long gradual decent to MYASS.
More countryside views to take in. The Lachlan Valley Way was pretty good for riding. Not many trucks. Lots of cars. There was a generous shoulder most of the way. Unfortunately, the sleepy strips were in the middle of it (rather than on the white line). So a lot of the journey was juggling my time on each side of it. As I write this I can still feel the vibrations from crossing it upmteen times. I was also carrying a very slooooow punction up front. I noticed this in the morning in Cowra. Turns out each rest stop was enough just to give it a top up. It gets me 30-40km so I may just live with it tomorrow and make it work a bit more for its money.
Oh and the wind was kind today. All day. It came from the back over my left shoulder and stayed that way for pretty much the whole day. Which is lucky as it was a long day with plenty of climbing. Headwind would have made me get very cranky….
And here it from me. Microsoft has been lying to us. Bliss. The Windows XP wallpaper. It is apparently considered to be the most viewed photograph in history since it was on everyone’s wallpaper and XP had such long Longevity. IT WAS NOT photographed in California. It was photographed between Cowra and Yass. Yes. Join me in the uproar.
And then, just like that, I hit the Hume Highway. It was a moment of realisation of how far I have ridden. I only put in a cameo of about 2km before darting off to MYASS. As expected the shoulder was littered with all sorts of debris and I was glad to only be on it for a few minutes.
So it appears I am just a day (~69km) away from Canberra! What is interesting is I have been riding for 4 weeks and haven’t had a single drop of rain. Blue sunny skies the whole way. Except today. It got overcast and something was looming. I checked the forecast. 1-7mm of rain for Canberra tomorrow. Doh!
Song of the day. Time to get a bit reflective. Ponder. Think about life. So for my penultimate song, I’m going with the wizardry of Eddie Vedder and his merry men; Pearl Jam. This is up there as one of my favourite songs. I like it most for its lyrics. It sounds a bit gloomy(ish) but there is a lot of meaning in it.
“Me, I figure as each breath goes by,
I only own my mind.
The North is to South what the clock is to time,
There’s east and there’s west and there’s everywhere life,
I know I was born and I know that I’ll die,
The in between is mine.
I am mine”.
If you have never heard it, do yourself a favour…