TANDEMS, TOADS & TYRE TROUBLE

Barry & Jean from Armidale (top photo) joined us on a couple of days. They are experienced BFB riders having ridden Perth to Sydney in 2006 amongst their other rides.

Lindy & Rosemary make a formidable team on the green and gold tandem. Lindy is blind (she rides the back in case you were worried) and has a number of medals from international cycling events including two from the Paralympics in Beijing. Lindy is from Sydney and Rosemary from Queanbeyan.

Bedlam reigned supreme when a cane toad was found by Mary amongst the bedding right on lights out! There wasn't much sleep for a while after that. Here Nigel (dark blue PJs) takes the offensive against the invader. How did he get into our luggage? Surely he didn't come from Charters Towers? Nigel is from England.

He seems a bit put out (excuse the pun.) I'm sure he'd have rather travelled with Mary and Lyn. You can see how easily the cane toads spread from one area to another.

A bit of tyre trouble for Barra. He NEVER gets a puncture he reckoned. Well, Kev, you're now in the real world... a world of flats etc. Notice the men are the ones to help fix the tyre.

Paul and John Gardiner lead their group - looking very neat and compact. Well done fellas & girls.

Carnarvon Range is magnificent. We really enjoyed seeing this on Wednesday as we cycled from Rolleston to Injune (169 km).

Eris took a bit of a car ride part way on Wednesday - a very hilly and somewhat nasty day. It paid dividends as she did extremely well today (Thursday) over a series of rolling hills. Some were even steepish!

Paul, Carlo and Ross roll into Roma where we'll have a rest day. Next rest day is Dubbo! Two of our team have booked themselves in for massages here tomorrow. There will be some bike repairs done as well.

GENEROSITY

When we were in Emerald a lovely builder bloke named Peter Vine arranged for the local bike shop to be opened to allow our riders to get bikes fixed and buy a few necessary bike bits. After it was done the bike manager told us that there would be no charge because Peter was going to pay for it! Awesome. Unreal. Then at night we went to the local sports club for a meal and found that our meal - food and drink - were going to be paid for. Just amazing the goodness of God's people.

When we reached Injune, the information place (lovely log building) gave us free coffee when we got in after a tough day in the saddle (Rolleston to Injune 169 km). Here in Roma Ken Jonsson at the Roma Health and Fitness Centre let us have free showers. Thanks Ken. What a lovely facility.