Parked up

You know what? Having spent the best part of a year travelling around a huge country on a very small bike, and now having completed the full lap, seeing loads, meeting great people ( I was fortunate to met only two arses on the whole trip, both were well practised experts long before I stumbled across either😃) and generally making things up as I go along, I'm sort of over it and need a change. That's why I've stayed put in Qld for a while.

I'm still out and about though, either on Gerty or on my pushie.  I went down to Emerald and Mackay a few weeks ago, over to Magnetic Island, up to Cairns, Cape Tribulation, the Daintree, The Atherton Tablelands, have visited friends, or have had friends visit me, worked out a viable plan to keep me occupied for the next few months, and have the beginnings of a longer term plan taking shape. And by longer term, I mean the next couple of years and it involves the Road of Bones.

But for the next few weeks, one of my sons is travelling with me, and it's great to have him here and catch up. He's always been good company but having not seen him for a year makes it even sweeter.

It's quite odd too, having another person around. I'd got so used to being on my own and doing my own thing, that I forget sometimes and am surprised when he speaks ( which he does ALL the time). Sort of makes me jump. I've had conversations every day of course, but not in that familiar, close friend or family way when random things make sense and all parties know instantly what you're going on about.

I've also been reading quite a bit of late, which I've needed to do to keep my brain ticking over. I'm not a fiction reader -information and factual stuff is more my thing, but I always fall asleep as soon as I get into my tent, so staying put has been great. Mind you, I now have to figure out a suitable charging system for my phone and laptop as I won't have a handy 12v on board socket.I also need to get an atlas - an on line version - as it's a bit difficult to plan how to get to some of the more remoter places in the world by guessing their location, even if I do have a fairly good idea of where they are.

I am going to be changing the way I do trip records too. It is important for me to log things that I see or wonder about as I go along, and I generally keep quite detailed notes and pictures. I condense some into a general blog but I have a growing collection of material that I will soon lose control of if I don't do something soon. Lots of stuff from around Europe, even more on Asia, Mongolia and China, as well as stuff from 

the Australian ride. I need to organise and collate it before I go off to NZ as it will be impossible to do when I'm moving again. And I'm quite keen to develop things and move away from reportage.