11th February
Couldn’t quite bridge the final gap from where I sat under the shade of a eucalyptus tree to Norseman. I camped once again in the bush. The silhouette of the scrub and the bust scratched the night sky. The stars stood defiantly. We’re just an earth of no consequence.
So I arrived in Norseman: doll museum on the short High Street, an ICA supermarket, cafe where I sat writing, the Norseman Arms for dinner. Three streets away the council swimming pool was a glorious respite against the heat. I plugged in the bike, wrote, stood in the pool, I erected my tent, I slept and at 4am I would set off to bicycle 195kms to the Belladonia Roadhouse; it was a race against a rising temperature which at 44 degrees centigrade would wither me to a mindless standstill in some shade unable to move.
Norseman High Street
Residences were lined in a grid pattern and apart from a minimum of amenities there was no way an outsider like me would understood why anyone would live here.
“I wouldn’t live anywhere else,” said the elderly cashier operative at the ICA. “2 hours to a beach with the whitest sands in Australia, 2 hours to a big city, Kalgoorlie. It’s a paradise.”
I have my very first meal in a pub
in the famous Norseman Arms.
And my first pint of very cold Australia beer.
Map of the Day
I know what 44c and Australian heat is like. Could hardly cope on a little motorbike last year up north. I can't post a photo of a cyclist I saw there...he set off with his bike covered in plastic bottles of water. On another trip I crossed the Nullabor on same little bike. It was 44c in Port Lincoln but next day I nearly froze in the cold wind coming off the sea as I set off into the Nullabor and that lovely final 90 miles of straight road.!!