Day 100, Tuesday, 7 July 2009

Distance travelled – 83.9 km
Avg speed –  16.9 kph
Max speed – 31.4 kph

Terry Smith Lookout to Cloncurry

The wind came and went throughout the night so to celebrate our 100th day away we got up at 5.30am for an early start for what we thought could be another hard day. So the tent went up in the dark and came down in the dark, it neither saw the impressive sunset, the setting moon or sunrise.

We crossed a few flowing rivers today but the highlight was an early lunch at the Quamby Pub. A lot of creativity has gone into the design and restoration of this small hotel in the middle of nowhere. To enter the pub you walk across the tray of an old rusting truck.  The top of the bar is made from highly polished slabs cut from tree trunks and the place is full of items recovered from the old town. Quamby was once a gold mining town of 40 houses but the pub is the only building that remains. After three days of hard riding this was a great oasis for us to find. As I looked for more information about the pub I discovered this story on the ABC website – look at the bottom of the page for the audio story. 

About 15km from Quamby we came across a fellow from the UK walking from Port Augusta to Karumba – Gulf to Gulf – to raise funds for victims of landmines. He was on a mission to reach Quamby before night so he did not want to stick around and talk. We did not even get his name. As we rode away a car stopped next to him so I suspect his journey is broken each day by large numbers of people stopping to find out if he is OK and what he is doing out in the middle of nowhere by himself.  We are not the only strange travellers out here!

We arrived in Cloncurry totally spent.

Zoom into the map and use the 'Satellite' layer to see our new location.

View from the dunnies at Terry Smith Lookout

Dugald River

Quamby Pub

Quamby Pub

Quamby Pub bar

Quamby Pub gardens

Sitting in the shade watching the passing traffic

The long road ahead

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