My First Cycle Tour - What Doesn’t Kill You Makes You Stronger

It was 10th April 2018, a grey Tuesday morning in the Australian coastal town of Terrigal and also the very first day - the very first day of my very first cycle tour. With a boyfriend like Tom, this day was an inevitability that I had been anticipating with excitement and abject horror. Somehow I had been convinced to cycle 1000km to Brisbane on a second-hand bike that cost me $30 having done little cycling previously. For those that know Tom, I know you won’t be surprised, for those that don’t, he’s remarkably convincing. So here I was panniers packed and thinking about the weeks leading up to this moment; the $500 I’d spent in the Kathmandu sale, the promise that I’d be ‘cycling fit’ in just 2 weeks, and most importantly the fortuitous meeting with Rod & Deb who took pity on me and upgraded my bike for free! With everything quite literally bought and paid for, the last thing to do was get on the bike and go.

Firsts

The first couple of days on the road led to yet more firsts and one of these was my first proper go at wild camping. Whether you love it or hate it, there’s nothing quite like sweating all day, washing in 1.5 litres of water wearing nothing but flip flops before eating your own body weight in spaghetti and snuggling up in your expensive sleeping bag hidden away from the rest of the world. The bathroom is replaced by a different kind of toilet – literally anywhere – which if nothing else is a truly liberating experience. To top it off, if you’re lucky there’s an unidentifiable spider 10cm from your face watching you sleep.

Please God Make It Stop

After 10 days of non-stop cycling I was beginning to feel the kilometres I’d gotten under my belt and the nights of sleepless camping were taking their toll. Negative thoughts start creeping into your mind- what the bloody hell was I thinking? You can’t make it to the next town let alone Brisbane! Grinding up hills began to feel like wading through sludge, the thrill of reaching the top replaced by nothing but pure relief. The downhill stretches feel few, far between and over much too quickly. One shaky morning resulted in a fair few tears and a number of choice swear words before pulling through to manage a modest 40km despite my mini breakdown. When you’re feeling like you’ve been put through the mill it’s easy to forget all the good times you’ve had and a good nights sleep and a day off saw me laughing at how dramatic I was being! If there’s one thing touring does for you it’s building resilience, I truly believe that if you can cycle tour successfully you can literally do anything.

Punctures, Punctures & Punctures

Of course cycle touring comes with it’s technical issues and 2 weeks on the road quickly turned into bike mechanics 101. So, after just 3 punctures in as many days I am pleased to announce that I can now successfully repair the issue myself!

The Best Bits

Perhaps my favourite part of the tour so far, despite being able to eat a mountain of jelly snakes every single day, is how welcome you feel everywhere you go. There’s nothing like standing next to 2 touring bikes outside a supermarket to spark a conversation and interact with the locals. The conversations run from ‘you’re absolutely mental’ to ‘I wish I could do something just like this’. Everywhere you go people ask whether you’ve got enough water, how far you’re going, how far you’ve come. I’ve never felt more looked after as a tourist. Cycling everywhere also means that you get to see and experience a whole lot more. As well as the previously mentioned spiders, we’ve seen plenty of snakes, bugs, and marsupials all with varying levels of danger. From the Eastern Brown snake to the Blue Bottle jelly, in Australia it’s safer to assume that most things will give you at least a little nip.

Final Remarks

So to summarize, my first week of cycle touring has made me laugh, made me cry, made me wonder why anyone in their right mind would want to do this, but most importantly made me realise that not everything that sounds mental in writing is as unachievable in practice.