Day 326 | Somewhere near Mt Cornish: not many landmarks here
69 km | zzOz total: 8209 km
What magazine are you from again, I asked Peter.
We’d been chatting, me tootling along on the right hand side of the highway, at my standard 11.3 km/hour but they sounded interested and interesting so I suggested a stop.
Luckily I’d had recent experience of the paparazzi, Ollie at Trephina Gorge, now Nigel was a portrait photographer.
I guess on Day 9 since leaving Alice, unshaven and accustomed to washing in a birdbath style, shirt now well caked in salt, I must be looking a sight, “suntan” embracing my feet.
Many may think of me akin to a Territory croc with a sore tooth snapping at the tourists, cranky old bloke but if the conversation is right I’m only too happy to tarry.
A can of sugarless Coke was whipped out, yay, a drink without salt as its predominant taste ingredient, a banana, Sarah worried I might consume the skin, and then that water issue was resolved, Pete patiently filling an endless, almost, stream of bottles and didn’t blink when a 10 litre water bag was produced as a finale.
Somehow I came to the conclusion I’d just snapped off the you-beaut connector for my solar panel.
Don’t happen to have a soldering iron?
Pete, who happens to be Gadget Man and knows how to use them plugged one into his power outlet, must have an inverter in there somewhere and after a bit of fiddling about, OK, a whole lot of fiddling the connector and wire were reunited more robustly and they were finally able to be on their way.
Might be a while before they stop for an idle chat with an itinerant long distance bike tourer again.