After a cuppa and packing up the road north was beckoning, it was not long before I hit the expected sign

It started off all right, but some sections were very slippery and loose. There was a lot of roadworks, the water trucks made the job real hard going, the back end skating everywhere, but because I was loaded up, the bike kept digging in, not skipping across the top 😦

Another small bitumen section before Laura was the turn off to the Split Rock native rock art gallery

I took the half hour walk up the hill and had a decko

Then back on thrack up to Laura, this is a section of roadworks, very slippery and loose, I was getting tired already!!

Just before Laura a bad section nearly made me come off for the 10th time, front end washout, without the Scotts stabaliser I would have been a goner. I fuelled up at the pub and chatted to the owner there, he said it was just as bad or worse further on.

I made a tactical withdrawal.

Call me a chicken whatever you like, but there was no way I could handle the bike loaded that way it was for another 600km there, just to get to Wiepa, then the return. I had too much travel to accomplish, so I turned around and after some more scary moments, made the bitumen again and headed to Cooktown for the night to rethink.

On the way I stopped at Black Mountain, this is all naturally exploded granite

Then found a great campsite where if you were quick, tucker was around, NOT!!!

Cooktown is where Captain Cook beached his ship when he was exploring, some images

This is a musical ship, you can bang anything and it is in tune and musical

I went up the top for a look, very sharp hairpin turns up here and steep

I had a few beers at a pub and a great meal. Another traveller back at the campsite was on his way home after 5 days here, riding a Yamaha. It was very windy here, blowing a gale, but strangely, not like back home.

A 30knot gust of wind would start, blow for about 15 seconds then stop for a few minutes, then start again, very wierd!!! It did this all night and I was a bit anxious about the gum tree limbs crashing on me.

Anyway, I survived the night

See ya

Day – 208km
Trip – 2298km
top of page