Wednesday, 15 August 2012

No riding today

Ian set his alarm and we got up at 4:45am.  AM!  Ugh!  Bill called at 5:15 to say he was on his way to pick us up.

The only good thing about being awake and up at this hour is the night sky.  Spectacular!  So many stars and planets and other twinkly things I almost never get to see in the city.  And there were two shooting stars.  Hooray!

Bill’s flat bed truck had lots more stuff on it than just our two scooters.  I guess he figured he might as well take advantage of the opportunity to deliver an assortment of stuff while he was making the trip north.  One other thing about being on the road before dawn is you get to see the sunrise.  And I did.  Plus, I got to see live kangaroos, their joeys and (we think) a wallaby.  Ok, so I guess I have to admit there are some advantages to being an early riser.  I don’t think I’m a convert, though.

After three stops to complete Bill’s deliveries, we arrived at R & M Motorcycles in Katherine.  Ian got a text from Allen saying that his belts are on the way to Katherine, too.  Fingers crossed that we’ll be underway quickly.

We sat at McDonald’s with an intermittent internet connection for a couple of hours.  I feel like I need to eat some vegetables.

I also needed to call NT Motorcycles in Darwin to push back our service / tire change appointment to Friday.  I spoke to a very kind and patient woman named Tina.  She told me we shouldn’t count on the belts arriving tomorrow.  NT, she said, means Not Today, Not Tomorrow.  (Ian said it also means Not Tuesday, Not Thursday.)   She reset our service & tire changes for Monday.  I cannot imagine it’ll take longer than that for the belts to arrive (fingers crossed and prayers sent up to the scooter gods).

Ian walked around town while I reconsidered our current circumstances and poured over the maps (again).  I’ve been worried about the time to complete the big lap around this lovely continent.  It’s about the same size as the USA, so the big lap is similar to doing a “four corners” ride.