Sunday 27th March 2022

There’s not a lot to do on a rest day in a Roadhouse on the Nullarbor, but it was sweet relief not to have to get on the bike.

Balladonia Roadhouse, at least, boasted TWO ‘attractions’! One is the Skylab crash (replica) display – from when Skylab came crashing to earth in 1979, scattering debris around Balladonia, and giving Balladonia its fifteen minutes of international fame.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-05-31/nasa-skylab-fell-to-earth-esperance-retrofocus/12282468

https://www.traveller.com.au/balladonia-skylab-crash-site-in-australia-how-a-fallen-space-station-caused-mayhem-in-the-outback-h1q49r

The other ‘attraction’ is that it has Hole 12 of the Nullarbor Links – longest golf course in the world!

We duly checked it out. Neither of us has much interest in golf (in my case I’m pretty averse to it) but I was kind of disappointed that my golf-obsessed father never got around to driving and playing golf across the Nullarbor and ticking playing the Nullarbor Links off his golfing bucket list.

Rest of the day – eating, resting. I wasn’t game to have a sleep because no matter how wrecked I am, a day-time nap makes it harder for me to get to sleep at night. (Another inconvenient mind/body function of mine.)

We probably did some washing, just can’t remember. Marc would have used the time to do some maintenance on the bike. Planned our proposed distances and stops for the coming days. The forecast was still not great, with the wind gods clearly having no plans to ease up that much or to swing around and give us a tailwind.

Tomorrow was another big one (for us). 180km to Caiguna, most of which is the Ninety Mile (146.6km) straight. “We’ll have to leave before sunrise” he says. Crap. But, yes, it made sense.

Meanwhile, the other riders still in it were plugging along (and doing more than a mere 180k a day). Otters reached Adelaide mid-afternoon Sunday and then continued out the other side. Bloody hell. Another four of them were well past Ceduna and tackling the stretch across the top of the Eyre Peninsula. Still, that was them, and this was us.