Monday 15th March 2010
It was a warm day yesterday and after going to a couple of garage sales and the market in the morning, Carolyn and Kristian were not in the mood to do much so we went home.
Carolyn decided that she was going to relax by doing the ironing, Kristian decided he was going to do as little as possible and Ian decided that there was no way he was going to sit indoors on a nice sunny day, specially when he is desperate to do a bit of exercise in an effort to build up his knee again after ages of struggling to walk let alone exercise.
So Ian got his cycling gear together and decided that he was going to do a decent length ride, but without pushing himself too much.
Ian was having a really good ride early on, cycling down deserted country lanes with the sun on his back and a gentle breeze blowing, as opposed to the gale force winds he normally rides in.
All of a sudden he got the fright of his life, he had been looking at the surrounding countryside rather than looking where he was going and glanced down at the ground in front of his wheel just in time to see that he was about to run over a Tiger Snake, not a very wise thing to do apparently when you’re on a pushbike, as they can apparently move very quickly and think nothing of giving an aggressor a venomous bite, apparently they don’t take into account the fact that it might have been a perfectly innocent mistake.
The Tiger Snake is probably the most poisonous snake in this part of Australia, closely followed by the Dugite, which coincidently, Ian nearly ran over one on his bike a couple of months ago whilst cycling near Port Geographe, you would have thought that he would have learned to look at where he was going after that close encounter, but if you can’t look around while cycling, you might as well stay at home on a treadmill, it would just be a little bit less worrying if they got rid of the snakes and the spiders and the flies and mozzies.
Anyway, back to the Tiger Snake, Ian managed to steer clear of it, but only by about 6 inches (15cm), it’s amazing how fast the brain and body can move in life threatening situations like this, because not only did he manage to steer the bike round the snake, but at the same time he managed to lift his left leg (which is the injured one just in case you’re interested) so that the snake would have one thing less to attack if it was going to and surprised himself as to how high he could lift it, he almost had to lever it off his shoulder to put it back down again, so as you see men can multitask when they have too, they just choose not to most of the time.
The snake didn’t try to attack him in the end and Ian carried on his merry way, in truth the snake was probably laughing his socks off watching this nutter cycling along with one leg over his shoulder and a look of panic on his face.
Further along the ride Ian saw a truly wonderful sight, in a field standing on her own with her baby was a mummy cow and she was trying to manoeuvre herself and her calf into a position where the calf could feed. The thing that made this so special was the fact that the calf was still covered in all that slimy stuff that calves are covered in when they are born, so this calf was obviously not very old and was still a little bit unsteady on its feet, Ian stopped for five minutes and watched, fascinated, while mummy and baby did this little dance together until they connected.
The rest of the ride was pretty uneventful apart from negotiating the morons driving in Busselton totally unaware that there is anyone other than them on the road, he got home safely after riding about 40km with some good memories and without any serious reaction to his injured leg.
While we’re on the subject of cycling, the other night while Ian was out on his bike he saw a Kangaroo by the side of the road, this wasn’t one of the dead ones that we would normally expect to see by the side of the road, this was one that looked like he was practising the Green Cross Code (how to cross a road safely for all of those who are too young to remember it), it was just standing on the verge looking, right, left, right again, saw Ian cycling towards him and thought, wait until the traffic has passed.
Ian however, not realising that Kangaroos did the Green Cross Code and that it would be safe to carry on as he was, decided to take defensive action in case the Kangaroo decided to jump on him as he went past and slowed down.
Now neither Ian or the Kangaroo seemed to like this scenario, the Kangaroo stood nervously by the side of the road looking left and right, wondering how long he was going to have to wait and thinking that if he had realised how slow Ian was moving he would have crossed the road ages ago and probably been eating his tea by the time Ian went past that point, Ian, unaware that the Kangaroo was getting pretty fed up with waiting for him to pass, waited until he was within a few yards of the Kangaroo before speeding up so as to get past the Kangaroo quickly.
The Kangaroo obviously saw the sudden speeding up of Ian on his bike as an act of aggression and decided to do a runner, the problem was that there was a fence a couple of yards back from the edge of the road so the Kangaroo had to follow the road, Ian had absolutely no intention of not following the road, so carried on cycling in the same direction as the Kangaroo, much to the distress of the Kangaroo.
A Kangaroo running is a really graceful animal, it reminded Ian of the TV pictures he had seen of a Gazelle or something similar, only the Kangaroo was doing it on two legs which just seemed move effortlessly as if on a couple of springs.
After a short distance and with the Kangaroo obviously not in the mood to race a pushbike, Ian decided to speed up and overtake it so as not to cause it any more distress, as he went past, the Kangaroo stopped and Ian could almost see it give a sigh of relief.
Late afternoon, Fraser and Marisa came back from Scout camp, both dirty, both smelly, both tired, but both happy, that was until Fraser had to do his homework, which had somehow appeared over the weekend, despite assurances by him that everything was up to date.
In the evening it was Veg out time before having an early night.
Showing posts with label Cycling. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Cycling. Show all posts
Tuesday, March 16, 2010
Friday, March 12, 2010
Twisted
Ian twisted his knee sometime in the middle of January, it turns out that it is a repetitive strain injury, he’s never had one of those before and if it hadn’t been so painful he would have been quite proud of it, after all he isn’t renowned for doing anything strenuous on a regular basis if he can help it.
Needless to say, the injury stuffed up his cycling routine and with it any ideas he had of cycling from Busselton to Augusta this side of the winter.
To make matters worse for him, the Café has remained busy all the way through the school holidays and is still ahead of last year on a week by week basis, so he has been working long days on his feet, when he should have been resting, but he has been resting when he can and the kids are getting quite adept at getting his beer from the fridge for him, so although the recovery is taking a lot longer than perhaps it should he has been able to get regular pain relief when he is not working.
He has been out on his bike twice this week without any problems, although he is taking it very easy, but he feels good about it and is determined to get out his winter gear when the time comes so that he is fit for next summer.
Needless to say, the injury stuffed up his cycling routine and with it any ideas he had of cycling from Busselton to Augusta this side of the winter.
To make matters worse for him, the Café has remained busy all the way through the school holidays and is still ahead of last year on a week by week basis, so he has been working long days on his feet, when he should have been resting, but he has been resting when he can and the kids are getting quite adept at getting his beer from the fridge for him, so although the recovery is taking a lot longer than perhaps it should he has been able to get regular pain relief when he is not working.
He has been out on his bike twice this week without any problems, although he is taking it very easy, but he feels good about it and is determined to get out his winter gear when the time comes so that he is fit for next summer.
Thursday, October 29, 2009
To The Jetty And Beyond
Monday 26th October 2009
It was a fairly quiet day in the Café again today, just as well really as one of our fryers has packed up, it did mean that Ian finished work early though so not all bad news.
Ian took the kids out for a bike ride this evening and thinking that they were only going as far as the jetty they were full of enthusiasm, Ian had other ideas and when they got to the jetty, informed them that they would be getting their ice cream from there, but not until they were on their way back from Port Geographe.
The kids whinged about it a bit, but once they had left it behind they cycled well, then on the way back they flew like the wind, the combination of an ice cream with their names on it and cycling with the wind meant that they made really good time.
In the evening after the kids went to bed, we watched a couple more episodes of guff that we had recorded, we have to watch on a regular basis otherwise the Foxtel memory thing fills up and starts deleting stuff
It was a fairly quiet day in the Café again today, just as well really as one of our fryers has packed up, it did mean that Ian finished work early though so not all bad news.
Ian took the kids out for a bike ride this evening and thinking that they were only going as far as the jetty they were full of enthusiasm, Ian had other ideas and when they got to the jetty, informed them that they would be getting their ice cream from there, but not until they were on their way back from Port Geographe.
The kids whinged about it a bit, but once they had left it behind they cycled well, then on the way back they flew like the wind, the combination of an ice cream with their names on it and cycling with the wind meant that they made really good time.
In the evening after the kids went to bed, we watched a couple more episodes of guff that we had recorded, we have to watch on a regular basis otherwise the Foxtel memory thing fills up and starts deleting stuff
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
Death on the Highway
Wednesday 21st October 2009
Today was probably the quietest day of the year so far at the Café, every shopkeeper in the centre was left wondering where the punters were, let’s hope it’s not a sign of things to come.
Fraser is getting rave reviews from some of his teachers at the moment, todays topic of the month was maths where he has been getting 100% for algebra and is generally getting an A grade for other maths.
This evening Ian and the kids went for a bike ride, this time the garage was open so they all had an ice cream and Kristian made sure they brought his mum home a mint Aero, her favourite.
Marisa got a phone call from one of her admirers tonight, it turns out that he is in the same Scout patrol as her, a patrol that has just been formed because of rising numbers and they are going to have a camp as their first patrol activity, in two weeks time.
The front page of the West Australian had a picture of a mangled car and lorry which had collided on the new bit of highway between Rockingham and Bunbury, it turns out that this is the first accident that involved a fatality on this new stretch of road since it opened, maybe a couple of months ago.
Now the reason we are bringing up this sad subject on the blog today is (1) we haven’t got much else to talk about, and (2) we have found it really hard to describe to people and put into writing how bad the driving is over here, but this time we have decided to bite the bullet and say it as it is.
Now everyone who has ever been to another country where they have roundabouts will recognise that in WA, they just don’t know what a roundabout is there for or how to negotiate it, but once you realise this fact, you can take evasive/precautionary measures and hopefully get from one side of the roundabout to the other unscathed.
The bit that really amazes us and that we can’t get to grips with, is accidents, accidents that quite often end in death or serious injury.
If your level of expertise at driving was based on not having an accident with another vehicle, then the drivers of WA would be the best in the world.
Maybe it’s because the car is their pride and joy, the thing that they cherish above all else, nice and shiny, preferably with a couple of stickers on the back which cause you to take offence and cover the kids eyes if ever you pull up behind one, and most importantly, a five or six litre engine under the bonnet, attached to a couple of girt big exhaust pipes so that it makes a lot of noise, and the funniest part is, it has about as much oomph as a Ford Transit with a blown exhaust and would be left standing by a 1300 Vauxhall Nova.
Anyway, we digress, the reason for this little rant is that you can almost guarantee that at the time of the accident and death on the new bit of highway, there was probably no other vehicle in sight and Ian has come up with a theory as to why this accident happened, it’s because they chopped all the trees down when they built the road.
What is he on about? You might be thinking.
Well it goes something like this, the roads over here are so quiet that you should be able to take a fairly accurate guess on how long it would take you to get from A to B so the chances of getting into any compromising situations is pretty remote.
Because the roads are so quiet and you are not likely to get into an awkward situation which might cause you to collide with another vehicle, you have to find something else to hit and WA drivers are good at that, there are umpteen small crosses by the side of the road that bear witness to it.
Today is the first time in we don’t know how long that we have heard about a fatal accident involving two vehicles that have collided, normally it’s a tree, the favourite pastime over here seems to be let’s see if we can knock a tree over.
Unfortunately for the driver and passengers concerned, they always seem to pick a girt big tree that’s probably been around for a couple of hundred years and intends to hang on for just a bit longer, hence dead occupants in the car and a tree that has got a couple of scratches in its bark.
Why can’t they aim the car at a bush, maybe scratch the paintwork a bit, but what the hell, they could still drive it home and tell their mates how you killed a bush by driving into it at 100kmph while it wasn’t looking and lived to tell the tale, but no they always go for the tree.
Hence, if they hadn’t chopped all the trees down by the side of the new highway, then the vehicles wouldn’t have had to collide because the one that wanted to collide, could have collided with a tree and left the other vehicle unscathed.
Many years ago, Ian had saw a comedian called Jasper Carrot on stage and part of his routine was about some statements received by insurance companies from people claiming for accidents in their cars, bearing in mind that this was probably about thirty years ago, the one claim which Jasper read out that stuck in Ians mind at the time was, “I had to swerve three times before I hit the tree”.
I know, you had to be there to really appreciate it, but it has got Ian wondering whether Australians are the human equivalent of lemmings, but instead of throwing themselves off cliffs, probably because there don’t seem to be many cliffs over here, they drive into trees.
Any death is a sorry tale, over here the roads are good, wide and relatively traffic free, there should be less fatal accidents per head of population than virtually anywhere in the world.
Today was probably the quietest day of the year so far at the Café, every shopkeeper in the centre was left wondering where the punters were, let’s hope it’s not a sign of things to come.
Fraser is getting rave reviews from some of his teachers at the moment, todays topic of the month was maths where he has been getting 100% for algebra and is generally getting an A grade for other maths.
This evening Ian and the kids went for a bike ride, this time the garage was open so they all had an ice cream and Kristian made sure they brought his mum home a mint Aero, her favourite.
Marisa got a phone call from one of her admirers tonight, it turns out that he is in the same Scout patrol as her, a patrol that has just been formed because of rising numbers and they are going to have a camp as their first patrol activity, in two weeks time.
The front page of the West Australian had a picture of a mangled car and lorry which had collided on the new bit of highway between Rockingham and Bunbury, it turns out that this is the first accident that involved a fatality on this new stretch of road since it opened, maybe a couple of months ago.
Now the reason we are bringing up this sad subject on the blog today is (1) we haven’t got much else to talk about, and (2) we have found it really hard to describe to people and put into writing how bad the driving is over here, but this time we have decided to bite the bullet and say it as it is.
Now everyone who has ever been to another country where they have roundabouts will recognise that in WA, they just don’t know what a roundabout is there for or how to negotiate it, but once you realise this fact, you can take evasive/precautionary measures and hopefully get from one side of the roundabout to the other unscathed.
The bit that really amazes us and that we can’t get to grips with, is accidents, accidents that quite often end in death or serious injury.
If your level of expertise at driving was based on not having an accident with another vehicle, then the drivers of WA would be the best in the world.
Maybe it’s because the car is their pride and joy, the thing that they cherish above all else, nice and shiny, preferably with a couple of stickers on the back which cause you to take offence and cover the kids eyes if ever you pull up behind one, and most importantly, a five or six litre engine under the bonnet, attached to a couple of girt big exhaust pipes so that it makes a lot of noise, and the funniest part is, it has about as much oomph as a Ford Transit with a blown exhaust and would be left standing by a 1300 Vauxhall Nova.
Anyway, we digress, the reason for this little rant is that you can almost guarantee that at the time of the accident and death on the new bit of highway, there was probably no other vehicle in sight and Ian has come up with a theory as to why this accident happened, it’s because they chopped all the trees down when they built the road.
What is he on about? You might be thinking.
Well it goes something like this, the roads over here are so quiet that you should be able to take a fairly accurate guess on how long it would take you to get from A to B so the chances of getting into any compromising situations is pretty remote.
Because the roads are so quiet and you are not likely to get into an awkward situation which might cause you to collide with another vehicle, you have to find something else to hit and WA drivers are good at that, there are umpteen small crosses by the side of the road that bear witness to it.
Today is the first time in we don’t know how long that we have heard about a fatal accident involving two vehicles that have collided, normally it’s a tree, the favourite pastime over here seems to be let’s see if we can knock a tree over.
Unfortunately for the driver and passengers concerned, they always seem to pick a girt big tree that’s probably been around for a couple of hundred years and intends to hang on for just a bit longer, hence dead occupants in the car and a tree that has got a couple of scratches in its bark.
Why can’t they aim the car at a bush, maybe scratch the paintwork a bit, but what the hell, they could still drive it home and tell their mates how you killed a bush by driving into it at 100kmph while it wasn’t looking and lived to tell the tale, but no they always go for the tree.
Hence, if they hadn’t chopped all the trees down by the side of the new highway, then the vehicles wouldn’t have had to collide because the one that wanted to collide, could have collided with a tree and left the other vehicle unscathed.
Many years ago, Ian had saw a comedian called Jasper Carrot on stage and part of his routine was about some statements received by insurance companies from people claiming for accidents in their cars, bearing in mind that this was probably about thirty years ago, the one claim which Jasper read out that stuck in Ians mind at the time was, “I had to swerve three times before I hit the tree”.
I know, you had to be there to really appreciate it, but it has got Ian wondering whether Australians are the human equivalent of lemmings, but instead of throwing themselves off cliffs, probably because there don’t seem to be many cliffs over here, they drive into trees.
Any death is a sorry tale, over here the roads are good, wide and relatively traffic free, there should be less fatal accidents per head of population than virtually anywhere in the world.
Monday, October 26, 2009
Acting Patrol Leader
Tuesday 20th October 2009
It was another quiet day at the Café today, so a bit more batch cooking and lots of cleaning, but only because the staff enjoy it.
Fraser and Marisa went to Scouts this evening and Fraser was made Acting Patrol Leader for the night, he did a good job of it by all accounts, even when he had to do his little speech bit at the end.
Because the big two were going to Scouts, Ian tried to get Kristian to go for a bike ride but he was having none of it, he’s not one to over exercise himself if he can help it.
It was another quiet day at the Café today, so a bit more batch cooking and lots of cleaning, but only because the staff enjoy it.
Fraser and Marisa went to Scouts this evening and Fraser was made Acting Patrol Leader for the night, he did a good job of it by all accounts, even when he had to do his little speech bit at the end.
Because the big two were going to Scouts, Ian tried to get Kristian to go for a bike ride but he was having none of it, he’s not one to over exercise himself if he can help it.
Wot No Ice Cream
Monday 19th October 2009
Carolyn managed to sell the five baby bunnies this morning, so we are back down to 13 bunnies, 2 puppies and a cat. We haven’t yet sold the kids.
The Café was fairly quiet today which gave us a chance to catch up with a little bit of the batch cooking, so that we can restock the shelves.
There was no Cubs on again tonight for Kristian, so Ian took all the kids for a bike ride along the cycle path to Siesta Park.
Shock, Horror, when they got there the garage was closed so they couldn’t get an ice cream, the only reason they go on these rides with Ian is because the get an ice cream for doing it, so the thought of having done the ride and not got an ice cream was something they couldn’t bear to think about.
Fortunately there is another shop about half way back where they could get an ice cream, all they had to do was find it as it wasn’t on the cycle path and it was in an area where they didn’t know where the roads went.
They found the shop in the end and after being forced to eat their ice cream quickly because it was getting dark, rode back as quick as they could because they had no lights, if they had voted for daylight saving it would have still been light and they could have ridden back at their leisure.
When they got home, Ian fired up the Barbie and cooked up a load of sausages that we had got from the supermarket, they were pretty crap, like most of the sausages over here so we won’t bother getting them again.
How can a country with such good meat make such crap sausages?
Carolyn managed to sell the five baby bunnies this morning, so we are back down to 13 bunnies, 2 puppies and a cat. We haven’t yet sold the kids.
The Café was fairly quiet today which gave us a chance to catch up with a little bit of the batch cooking, so that we can restock the shelves.
There was no Cubs on again tonight for Kristian, so Ian took all the kids for a bike ride along the cycle path to Siesta Park.
Shock, Horror, when they got there the garage was closed so they couldn’t get an ice cream, the only reason they go on these rides with Ian is because the get an ice cream for doing it, so the thought of having done the ride and not got an ice cream was something they couldn’t bear to think about.
Fortunately there is another shop about half way back where they could get an ice cream, all they had to do was find it as it wasn’t on the cycle path and it was in an area where they didn’t know where the roads went.
They found the shop in the end and after being forced to eat their ice cream quickly because it was getting dark, rode back as quick as they could because they had no lights, if they had voted for daylight saving it would have still been light and they could have ridden back at their leisure.
When they got home, Ian fired up the Barbie and cooked up a load of sausages that we had got from the supermarket, they were pretty crap, like most of the sausages over here so we won’t bother getting them again.
How can a country with such good meat make such crap sausages?
Sunday, October 4, 2009
Girl in the Cafe
Sunday 27th September 2009
Geelong won the final final yesterday, apparently it was a good game played in bad weather conditions, but as we couldn’t see it until four hours after it had finished, we didn’t bother, so don’t know if they were telling the truth or not.
It was a nice day today, the weather was good with a top temperature of 25C and hardly a cloud in the sky.
Ian went out for a bike ride this morning, he left a bit later than he had wanted to but after checking out a map, headed for Dunsborough using the little used country roads.
The problem with reading maps in this country is that everything looks as close as it was in England, it is a concept that we are having great difficulty coming to terms with, and Ian was reminded of that fact today.
When Ian checked out the map before leaving we couldn’t see a road name for the road that would take him into Dunsborough, but we could see that it was the turning after Quindalup Siding so shouldn’t be a problem, Wrong!
When Ian got to Vasse he saw our local Speed Camera operator sitting in his car trying to catch the tourists speeding, so he stopped for a chat.
The Speed Camera Operator had a better map than ours and he proceeded to tell Ian where to turn off onto the unnamed road, now whether Ian got a bit confused by looking at his map and directions and remembering our own map, or he just had a senior moment remains open to debate, but he managed to miss the turnoff totally, not only did he manage to miss that turnoff but he missed the one after as well.
Ian thinks the problem was that the two turnings after Quindalup Siding were both on a minor incline, and as Ian was already feeling knackered by this point he probably had his head down, peddling for all he was worth in a desperate effort to finish before he ran out of steam.
At this point of course he would have done well to take note of that saying “more speed less haste” or was it “more haste less speed”, he can’t remember, but he knows what it means because every adult he ever met when he was a kid seemed to say it to him, but he didn’t and ended going to Dunsborough the long painful way.
Whilst still about 8km outside Dunsborough Ian was running out of water, which was a bit worrying as it is very easy out here to be a hundred miles from anywhere that might be able to let you have some water, combined with the fact that Mobile Phone signals can only be received in town, we don’t have a satellite phone and if we did Ian reckons the satellite wouldn’t fit on the crossbar anyway, and Carolyn didn’t have a clue where he was because neither did Ian, so couldn’t come to his rescue.
Fortunately he found a winery that hadn’t converted all its water to wine yet, he can’t remember the name of it, but it was something Woods and had a girt big wooden troll type statue, work of art, whatever you want to call it, in the driveway.
The lady that served him seemed to think that he must be mad cycling as far as he had but she filled his water bottles there and that was enough to help him finish the journey, he did promise to go back and try some wine next time so that will be another arduous task that we shall have to take on another day.
When Ian got to Dunsborough he chained his bike to a dustbin and parked himself in a chair outside our favourite breakfast café, Artizen, he ordered a coffee and then rang Carolyn to get her to come and pick him up.
After a while Carolyn arrived and we both had coffee and cake, it’s amazing how civilized it feels to relax in the sun with coffee, cake and no kids, so we took our time over it.
When we had finished we got into Carolyns car and drove home following the same route that Ian had ridden, the dustman hadn’t been by the time we left so we put Ians bike in the car as well and brought that back with us.
Ian had ridden about 46km which is about 30 miles, so he’s still got a lot of practice to do before he takes on Busselton to Augusta, but 30 miles was the minimum he used to ride on a training ride in the UK so it’s not a bad starting point after two years of very little riding.
The weather today has been so good that the kids have had their slip and slide game out which involves them sliding down a sheet of wet plastic, they had their water pistols which now resemble bazookas out and between them and their mates that had come round to play, got totally soaked.
The kids had to go to bed early tonight after packing all their gear for camping with the Scouts tomorrow, so it wasn’t very early by the time they went to bed because they couldn’t find anything that they were supposed to take with them, apparently this is a worldwide phenomenon and we aren’t the only people with kids who are so desperate to take part in these events that they can’t find anything that might make the stress and trauma of getting everything together just a little bit easier on the parents, if they could find their socks in the sock drawer it would be a start, pants in the pants drawer that sort of thing, but know they are so wrapped up in taking part they can’t possibly take part in the boring bit at the beginning and no doubt will not want to take part in the boring bit at the end when it all has to be cleaned and accounted for.
After the kids went to bed we watched a film called The Girl in the Café with Bill Nighy, we had never heard of it before but Bill Nighy stuff is normally pretty good and so we risked it for a biscuit.
It won’t go down as one of the best films ever made and it has very political overtones, but for a political film it was very watchable and we thoroughly enjoyed it.
We had a call from one of the staff today, she has got to go back home to see family and won’t be available for a couple of weeks, sods law as it is the school holidays and we are expecting to be busy.
Geelong won the final final yesterday, apparently it was a good game played in bad weather conditions, but as we couldn’t see it until four hours after it had finished, we didn’t bother, so don’t know if they were telling the truth or not.
It was a nice day today, the weather was good with a top temperature of 25C and hardly a cloud in the sky.
Ian went out for a bike ride this morning, he left a bit later than he had wanted to but after checking out a map, headed for Dunsborough using the little used country roads.
The problem with reading maps in this country is that everything looks as close as it was in England, it is a concept that we are having great difficulty coming to terms with, and Ian was reminded of that fact today.
When Ian checked out the map before leaving we couldn’t see a road name for the road that would take him into Dunsborough, but we could see that it was the turning after Quindalup Siding so shouldn’t be a problem, Wrong!
When Ian got to Vasse he saw our local Speed Camera operator sitting in his car trying to catch the tourists speeding, so he stopped for a chat.
The Speed Camera Operator had a better map than ours and he proceeded to tell Ian where to turn off onto the unnamed road, now whether Ian got a bit confused by looking at his map and directions and remembering our own map, or he just had a senior moment remains open to debate, but he managed to miss the turnoff totally, not only did he manage to miss that turnoff but he missed the one after as well.
Ian thinks the problem was that the two turnings after Quindalup Siding were both on a minor incline, and as Ian was already feeling knackered by this point he probably had his head down, peddling for all he was worth in a desperate effort to finish before he ran out of steam.
At this point of course he would have done well to take note of that saying “more speed less haste” or was it “more haste less speed”, he can’t remember, but he knows what it means because every adult he ever met when he was a kid seemed to say it to him, but he didn’t and ended going to Dunsborough the long painful way.
Whilst still about 8km outside Dunsborough Ian was running out of water, which was a bit worrying as it is very easy out here to be a hundred miles from anywhere that might be able to let you have some water, combined with the fact that Mobile Phone signals can only be received in town, we don’t have a satellite phone and if we did Ian reckons the satellite wouldn’t fit on the crossbar anyway, and Carolyn didn’t have a clue where he was because neither did Ian, so couldn’t come to his rescue.
Fortunately he found a winery that hadn’t converted all its water to wine yet, he can’t remember the name of it, but it was something Woods and had a girt big wooden troll type statue, work of art, whatever you want to call it, in the driveway.
The lady that served him seemed to think that he must be mad cycling as far as he had but she filled his water bottles there and that was enough to help him finish the journey, he did promise to go back and try some wine next time so that will be another arduous task that we shall have to take on another day.
When Ian got to Dunsborough he chained his bike to a dustbin and parked himself in a chair outside our favourite breakfast café, Artizen, he ordered a coffee and then rang Carolyn to get her to come and pick him up.
After a while Carolyn arrived and we both had coffee and cake, it’s amazing how civilized it feels to relax in the sun with coffee, cake and no kids, so we took our time over it.
When we had finished we got into Carolyns car and drove home following the same route that Ian had ridden, the dustman hadn’t been by the time we left so we put Ians bike in the car as well and brought that back with us.
Ian had ridden about 46km which is about 30 miles, so he’s still got a lot of practice to do before he takes on Busselton to Augusta, but 30 miles was the minimum he used to ride on a training ride in the UK so it’s not a bad starting point after two years of very little riding.
The weather today has been so good that the kids have had their slip and slide game out which involves them sliding down a sheet of wet plastic, they had their water pistols which now resemble bazookas out and between them and their mates that had come round to play, got totally soaked.
The kids had to go to bed early tonight after packing all their gear for camping with the Scouts tomorrow, so it wasn’t very early by the time they went to bed because they couldn’t find anything that they were supposed to take with them, apparently this is a worldwide phenomenon and we aren’t the only people with kids who are so desperate to take part in these events that they can’t find anything that might make the stress and trauma of getting everything together just a little bit easier on the parents, if they could find their socks in the sock drawer it would be a start, pants in the pants drawer that sort of thing, but know they are so wrapped up in taking part they can’t possibly take part in the boring bit at the beginning and no doubt will not want to take part in the boring bit at the end when it all has to be cleaned and accounted for.
After the kids went to bed we watched a film called The Girl in the Café with Bill Nighy, we had never heard of it before but Bill Nighy stuff is normally pretty good and so we risked it for a biscuit.
It won’t go down as one of the best films ever made and it has very political overtones, but for a political film it was very watchable and we thoroughly enjoyed it.
We had a call from one of the staff today, she has got to go back home to see family and won’t be available for a couple of weeks, sods law as it is the school holidays and we are expecting to be busy.
Friday, September 25, 2009
A Mother In Law Road
Sunday 13th September 2009
We were a bit late getting up this morning after our overindulgences last night, but it didn’t matter, the kids were happily glued to the telly and hadn’t noticed that we were missing.
Another one of our rabbits has had babies, this one has had five babies, so having got rid of four to the pet shop yesterday, we now have one more than we had yesterday, we reckon our rabbits can do it telepathically, she hasn’t been near a boy rabbit for weeks, or perhaps she/he is a hermaphrodite?
We went to the market at rotary park this morning, there wasn’t much there to speak of and there is a severe shortage of sweet seedless mandarins around at the moment, we did find a stall with Gluten free cakes on it though, so we bought a couple of those to try out in the Café but that was it.
From there we drove out to Capel, where according to a website we found, a market organised by the Lions was taking place, it was nowhere to be seen so we went to a local cheese shop for some free samples and a cup of coffee while we deciding what to do next.
On 29th November Ian intends to cycle from Busselton Jetty to Augusta lighthouse for fun, he has been advised by a cycling enthusiast who has said he will ride as well that the best route is to cycle down a road called Sues Road and on the way back from the cheese shop we were going to pass it, so we decided to take a look, just so that Ian could see what he had let himself in for.
What a dog of a road, as Ian and his old cycling partner from Axbridge would call it, it’s a mother in law road, basically it goes on and on and on. (Not that my Mother ever went on at him, understood? good)
This road was apparently built to service a mine, so it is wide and pretty straight so as to cope with the heavy lorries that would be using it.
It is about 60km in length and appears to be going uphill for most of it, there are trees and shrubs on either side, but nothing else until you are virtually at the end, at a place called Sues Bridge.
Ian is used to doing his longer bike rides on windy undulating roads where you have to concentrate in order to anticipate bends, hills and other obstacles that may appear at short notice, on this road you can see for miles and apart from the long hills which will be a slow hard slog, the rest of it is likely to be a test of endurance, trying to stay focussed on cycling in straight line for a couple of hours.
At least Ian knows what he’s up against now, the road from the end of Sues Road to Augusta is far more interesting so shouldn’t be a problem, assuming that is, that Ian gets off his backside and starts training.
Having driven to Augusta, we stopped for lunch at the Augusta Bakery, a renowned bakery within the area we are led to believe.
We had a cooked meal as opposed to having “Bakery”stuff, so we can’t really comment on the bread, other than Ian reckons that the toast that came with his dinner was probably toasted yesterday.
From Augusta we drove home and when we got there, Ian, Marisa and Kristian went out for a bike ride with one of the kids friends, while Fraser stayed home to do his homework and Carolyn did her girlie bits around the house, you know, washing, ironing, that sort of stuff.
We were a bit late getting up this morning after our overindulgences last night, but it didn’t matter, the kids were happily glued to the telly and hadn’t noticed that we were missing.
Another one of our rabbits has had babies, this one has had five babies, so having got rid of four to the pet shop yesterday, we now have one more than we had yesterday, we reckon our rabbits can do it telepathically, she hasn’t been near a boy rabbit for weeks, or perhaps she/he is a hermaphrodite?
We went to the market at rotary park this morning, there wasn’t much there to speak of and there is a severe shortage of sweet seedless mandarins around at the moment, we did find a stall with Gluten free cakes on it though, so we bought a couple of those to try out in the Café but that was it.
From there we drove out to Capel, where according to a website we found, a market organised by the Lions was taking place, it was nowhere to be seen so we went to a local cheese shop for some free samples and a cup of coffee while we deciding what to do next.
On 29th November Ian intends to cycle from Busselton Jetty to Augusta lighthouse for fun, he has been advised by a cycling enthusiast who has said he will ride as well that the best route is to cycle down a road called Sues Road and on the way back from the cheese shop we were going to pass it, so we decided to take a look, just so that Ian could see what he had let himself in for.
What a dog of a road, as Ian and his old cycling partner from Axbridge would call it, it’s a mother in law road, basically it goes on and on and on. (Not that my Mother ever went on at him, understood? good)
This road was apparently built to service a mine, so it is wide and pretty straight so as to cope with the heavy lorries that would be using it.
It is about 60km in length and appears to be going uphill for most of it, there are trees and shrubs on either side, but nothing else until you are virtually at the end, at a place called Sues Bridge.
Ian is used to doing his longer bike rides on windy undulating roads where you have to concentrate in order to anticipate bends, hills and other obstacles that may appear at short notice, on this road you can see for miles and apart from the long hills which will be a slow hard slog, the rest of it is likely to be a test of endurance, trying to stay focussed on cycling in straight line for a couple of hours.
At least Ian knows what he’s up against now, the road from the end of Sues Road to Augusta is far more interesting so shouldn’t be a problem, assuming that is, that Ian gets off his backside and starts training.
Having driven to Augusta, we stopped for lunch at the Augusta Bakery, a renowned bakery within the area we are led to believe.
We had a cooked meal as opposed to having “Bakery”stuff, so we can’t really comment on the bread, other than Ian reckons that the toast that came with his dinner was probably toasted yesterday.
From Augusta we drove home and when we got there, Ian, Marisa and Kristian went out for a bike ride with one of the kids friends, while Fraser stayed home to do his homework and Carolyn did her girlie bits around the house, you know, washing, ironing, that sort of stuff.
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