On board Russ' bus

Date: 20-04-2010
Day 73: Balladonia, WA

It was early in the morning. Our alarm had not rung but we could hear some activities outside our tent. We walked over to Russ to make sure we were on time for departure. Soon we realised we were all running on 3 different time zones: Perth, CST and Adelaide time. On synchronization, we hurriedly packed up and were ready to be loaded on Russ’ bus.

The Royal Enfield Club members were heading west to attend the 40th anniversary year of the secession of the Principality of Hutt River, about 595km northwest of Perth and of comparable size to Hong Kong (excluding the New Territories). The Wheat Quota for the 18,500 acres property purchased by the Casley family in 1969 was the basis for formation of the principality.

“Under this new Quota, it would have taken 500 years to crop the same average amount of wheat that had been harvested in the previous 20 years. The gross proceeds would not have even paid the interest on the hire purchase on two 4WD tractors that were in use. This did not allow any return for maintenance of their homes and families, no income on which to survive let alone profit.” Interesting, heh?

Anyway, this group comprised of 4 Royal Enfield motorbikes and Russ’ bus towing a trailer in convoy. The bus, which is also equipped with a kitchen, was driven (and owned) by Russ and Meryl and is used usually to run motorbike tours based in Sunshine Coast, Queensland where they live. In the bus, not only were there 7 people, including the both of us, there were also 3 cute dogs. Interestingly, there was at least one representative from each state of the Australian east coast, including South Australia. As a result, many fun jokes and interesting stories were exchanged amongst this group of new acquaintances coming together on Russ’ bus. ; ) We took breaks and regrouped every couple of hundred kms. Before 4pm, we arrived at Balladonia where we camped for the night.

While it was heart-wrenching to accept the reality of the breakdown and not being able to ride all the way to Perth, we also felt that some things happen for a reason. As Lukas’s dad often says, “Es wird schon eine Richtigkeit haben.” At Balladonia, we found one of the reasons: we met Scott and Liz. David, at the Nullarbor, told us about Scott and Liz and said that we might catch up with them. If not for the breakdown and hitching a ride with Russ, we would not have met them as they pedalled southwest towards Esperance.

Scott and Liz are wonderful people and we both wished we could have spent more time chatting with them. After retiring from being school teachers, they embark on adventures in Australia as well as overseas and became avid hikers and cyclists. Scott was kind to offer tools and tips to repair Lukas’s bike, Trekkie while Liz was generously sharing their stories and experiences on bike routes like the TransAm trail in the USA that she said was one of the best biking experience they have ever had.

Apart from meeting the Enfield crew and Scott and Liz, we also got to meet Mitch! She is a frequent and familiar visitor to the Balladonia roadhouse. She hops in freely almost every evening and hangs out in front of the pub. She is the ‘resident’ kangaroo that has been affectionately named Mitch (before the locals knew she is a female and has a joey in her pouch). It was fascinating!

Destinations: [NSW] North Sydney - Heathcote - Coledale - Wollongong - Robertson - Moss Vale - Goulburn - Queanbeyan - Yass - Gundagai - Wagga Wagga - Narrandera - Darlington Point - Hay - Maude - Balranald - Euston - [VIC] Mildura - [SA] Renmark - Barmera - Morgan - Burra - Orroroo - Port Augusta - Kimba - Wudinna - Streaky Bay - Ceduna - Nundroo - Yalata - Nullarbor - Border Village - [WA] Eucla - Balladonia