Freycinet

It was bloody raining again this morning. What is the matter with this summer weather? So we togged up in all our wet weather gear about to set off, and Gordon’s bike wouldn’t start. He kicked it, we pushed it but to no avail. So we wheeled it under a tree and set about trying to work out what was going on.

The spark was ok, the fuel was going through nicely, then Gordon mentioned it wouldn’t rev when we’d pushed him. So could it be the air intake? Yes of course it could, and it was. But this time the air filter was soaked in fuel. 

We think what had happened was that the air intake was only partially blocked, allowing sufficient air to mix with the fuel to keep it going yesterday, but eventually the foam filter was soaked through stopping the air completely. So we sorted that out and it kicked over first time. And it had stopped raining. Bonus.

We refuelled in the little servo in Swansea, along with about 100 other bikes, all returning from the toy run in Hobart. 

Shorty and his wife were there too - we had met them in Waratah about ten days ago. They were on their way back home, up north, but were going the long way round.

By the time we arrived in Freycinet, the wind had got all blustery and cold so we found a hostel for the night, dumped our gear and went up to Tourville lighthouse because the road is going to be closed tomorrow for repairs as its been damaged by the recent heavy rain.

Whilst we were up there, we met Hannes, a German chap also travelling round Australia, and had a good old chat with him. He was riding a Transalp. We’ll catch up with him in Launceston in a few days.

This afternoon, the weather had improved so we walked up to the Wineglass Bay lookout, a steep path with many steps, through a boulder field. 

That took about 40 minutes but was well worth the effort.

The sun had come out by now but  unfortunately there were no snakes or lizards sunning themselves, at least not where we could see them. But there was one solitary beetle doing his thing in the middle of the path.

And a wallaby poking about in the bushes.

When we reached the car park, there were a couple more  very tame Bennetts wallabies by the bikes. 

They are tame because people feed them, which is not good and can lead to a condition called ‘lumpy jaw’ which one of them had. 

It does something to the calcium in their jaw bones, making it porous and crumbly, and also enlarged. It's a shame because there are signs everywhere explaining why its not good for them, but people still give them food directly, or leave food wrappers and scraps, which they then eat.