Peter and Anna Kane of Henty recently completed a long bike ride on road bikes.
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Anna started in Darwin and rode through to Perth. Peter joined the tour in Coral Bay and also rode to Perth. The ride was organised by the bicycle tour organisation “AllTRails”. Peter and Anna have been on tours with them before. The ride was broken down into five stages as part of an “Australia Ride” which will resume from Perth next year. Some participants raised money for the organisers chosen charity “MS Australia”. Peter and Anna decided to raise money for this charity to help purchase expensive wheelchairs for people living with MS. They raised over $1,500 and are still collecting.
They stayed at many small roadhouses and some bush camps along the way because services are few and far between. The Dongas (huts) were very basic but weary riders sleep very well. The road surfaces varied from very ordinary to reasonably good. The Road Trains and caravans (Grey Nomads) were numerous but no-one was in any danger. Their support vehicle used the UHF to communicate with other road users the number and location of riders.
Their day usually commenced with breakfast at 0630 and they hit the road between 7am and 7.30am. Morning tea was on the roadside around the 50km mark and lunch anywhere between 80-120kms, depending on the total days riding distance and their destination. Their ride averaged 120km per day with the longest day being 195km. They were very fortunate to have excellent weather for the duration of the ride. It was warm to mild, some cool mornings through the Pilbara (lows of 5 degrees) and only one wet day - the last.
Anna’s ride took 47 days (39 ride days and 8 rest days). They had some great days with fantastic tail winds and some days of the complete opposite! When Peter joined Anna in Coral Bay, they had seven days of riding before a rest day and the first three days were into some pretty stiff head winds. The stages had
various numbers of participants, from 21 to 12.
Peter rode a total distance of 1,291kms (11 ride days and one rest day) with his longest day being 156km. Anna rode 4,875kms and her longest day was 195kms. Their highest daily average speed was 30kph and the lowest 18kph (into a nasty head wind).