Betten On Bike: DAY 117 - 4 AUGUST 2013

Day 117 – 4 August 2013 – Bingara to Inverell

Cycling Stats: 74 kms

Cycling Average: 27.4 km per hour

Once again we had the luxury of a lazy morning as today’s ride is so short – time for scrambled eggs on sourdough toast.

It is a beautiful sunny morning with another brilliant blue sky but very cold. Walter left close to 9am and I only, around 20 minutes later.

We agreed to meet in Delungra is a distance of about 40 kms from Bingara. The countryside is once again rural, pastoral and very picturesque. I stopped once and went for a 20 minute walk along the road as it was very quiet – very little traffic and such a beautiful morning.

Once I arrived in Delungra I waited for Walter at the rest stop just before the turnoff to Inverell. There were a few couples there who I spoke with about their travels and they had just had their coffee stop. I told them about the shops being closed yesterday at Bingara and that it was tea for us today as we had run out of ground coffee. One of the ladies immediately went into her caravan and handed me a tin of coffee. She said I have a new one and this one is half full – take it. How very friendly and when Walter arrived we all had a big chat and they all put some money into our donations bucket.

After enjoying our lovely coffee we left for the 34km journey to Inverell. Lots of wattle in flower so a profusion of bright yellow trees. The road became a little busier but still relatively quiet. I popped up to the look-out just before Inverell as I had time. Inverell has a population of 12,000 and an elevation of 590 metres.

Walter said there were more uphills today so we are definitely getting closer to The Great Dividing Range and we climbed approximately another 300 metres so we are definitely still heading UP to Queensland. The sign at the lookout had a round dial showing distances to various places and its 300kms to Brisbane.

Walter says he finds it hard to believe that in exactly one week today and it will be his last day of cycling in this epic trip around Australia !!!

Thank you to the lovely friendly operator at Inverell Caravan Park who upon seeing Walter arrive and hearing about what we are doing donated our camping fees to our cause.