Homeward Bound

I was sat in Cairns umming and ahhhing about what to do with my post-cycle life.

Five months remained on my Australian visa and it's a massive country with endless possibilities...

But deep inside I knew there was no place like [make-shift] home...

It might not look like much, but it really is lovely(ish)

...Learning to walk again was much harder than I had imagined. It's amazing how much your muscles change during 2 months on a bicycle.

Fortunately I had a bit of time for my body to acclimatize before heading back to work. And what better way to readjust to normality than a 2400 km hitch hike?

It took me three rides (300 km of which I had a massive [cute] dog, Max, sat on my lap) to get back to these legends in Townsville. And with virtually no notice, they were happy (or at least pretended to be) to put me up in the camper van that was abandoned on their lawn all those years ago.

After dropping the 3 kids off at their 3 different schools, they dropped me on the highway so I could continue my quest home.

Despite having had bad experiences hitch-hiking inland Australia before, I decided I'd grown wiser and would give the inland route another go.

The first car that pulled over made me jump into the driver's seat as we sped towards Charter's Towers. After a beer at the pub another car drove me to the fork in the road where I waited some time for traffic going the right way.

I eventually met a friendly wanderer who offered me a ride to Tawoomba. He was great for the first few kilometers and we had a very intense discussion about the human race and how we had all let him down (apart from the son he wasn't allowed to see) and then he cracked open a bourbon. And another. He was friendly enough to offer me one too - but still buzzing from the morning beer, I declined.

When he asked me to pass him a third, I gave him the "what on earth are you doing?" look. 

He promised it was his last.

There was a pause in the drinking.

Then he resumed.

By this point I was over 100 km from anything on a 40 something degree day riding through the middle of the outback.

On bourbon the 7th he finally pulled over - down a massive bank and behind a scarce patch of trees. 

I'm not going to lie, I was poo-ing myself! 

He mumbled something, stepped out of the vehicle, and wondered off.

I sat pondering whether to make a run for it or to hold too.

A distant buzzing that sounded very much like a chain saw filled the air, and that's when I thought about stealing the car.
He'd taken the keys.
I found my knife and sat praying wondering what to do next.
How far was the next petrol station?
How long till the next car passed?

It felt like hours before he returned and opened the back of his pick-up.
I watched petrified and only breathed again when he simply retrieved a pair of shorts.
He'd shat himself.

He left again.
The chainsaw again (which must have, in retrospect, been an electric fence)
Forever again.

He reopened the back and pulled out a jerry can.
He drenched his shorts in diesel and left them burning on the road as we ramped up the escarpment and back on our way.
I was speechless after that little ordeal.
I was glad to still be alive.

The happiest thing I'd ever seen was a fuel stop on the side of the road.
I asked to stop for the bathroom and proceeded to remove all my belongings at the same time and bid him farewell.
He looked confused.
"I don't drive with drunks"

I found the bathroom and breathed a little before I sat down to a servo pie.
(I'd survived so much already that day - I was probably chancing my luck on the pie)
While I munched away, a man on a motorbike wondered over and asked me what I was doing in the middle of nowhere.
"You walking?"
""Hitching"
"Well you ain't going to get a ride from here, truckies never stop here"

He had barely finished his sentence when a truck pulled in.
The driver walked straight towards the store.
"I suppose you're heading north?"
"South actually" I replied

And minutes later I was on my way again with the friendly trucker who'd been thrown off his normal route due to a break down the previous day.
I was his first ever hitch hiker.
I made another 437 kilometers and hopped off in Emerald where I spent the night under a bridge.

It took me forever to make any real progress on day three, and then, stood at yet another lonely fuel stop, a police officer wondered over (even though I was pretending to not be hitch hiking at the time - I'm not sure which states it's illegal in) and offered me a ride when he'd finished his RBT shift. 

I knew my luck was changing.

He'd just driven away when a truck picked me up.

Kiwi Ian was headed for Sydney.

He was a good laugh and a great philosopher as we crossed the Queensland border and set up camp for the night.

While I slept the freezing dawn away he made pancakes and bacon and what a pleasant surprise it was as I stumbled out of my tent at 6 am!

A hundred kilometers further down the road, I hopped on out laden with bananas and fruits from his freight.

It didn't take long before I was in another truck sat patiently waiting for the driver to receive a phone call to find out whether or not we had to pick up a load or not... 

Ted's personal cabin

We drove 90 kilometers back in the direction I'd just come from to fill up the tanks with grain and then the journey resumed.

Dale was a good egg too:

He stopped off to show me the random sights he'd always wanted to check out, but never had reason to and to quote him:

"You're being cheuffer driven in a multi million dollar vehicle that's way bigger than a limo, all the way home."

12 hitch hikes, 39 and a half hours, 2490 kilometers later, I finally made it home to the beautiful shores of Port Stephens.

Back to the beach and the coffee I know.

And back to this lot.

Four days later I had massive withdrawl symptoms so I bought a bike.

As much as I love hitching, it's nice to have my own wheels and not have to rely on anyone else and that's why I called him "Transport."

He's going to take me everywhere.

Is this China? – Tales of a Mekong Stowaway

Bang Bang Bang! Bang Bang Bang! [there was definite urgency in the bangage]. I flung the door open in my PJs to find an exasperated Mike standing there: “Let’s go!” “What? Where?...” I jumped in his car with disgraceful hair and disgracefuller morning breath and sped off to immigration.

I knew there was a chance I’d be hoping on a boat sometime on Monday, possibly… but it was meant to be afternoonly and the reality of all the maybes made me half suspect it would never happen… But there I was at 8am, stamped out of Thailand with about half an hour to make it to the port to board some sort of boat that would allegedly take me to somewhere in China for a yet to be discussed cost… There was no turning back now!

I threw my belongings into my saddle bags, did a facebook update so people could know where my bodily remains could be located [if it came to that], got on my bike and pedaled like the wind [on a particularly breezy day].

I made three wrong stops on route, but there before me lay my glorious timber boat – Fengshun 3. Mike and May-ee, who I’d met on Saturday while trying to organize the non-existent, allegedly impossible vessel, met me onboard. Mike speaks some English and Thai, May-ee speaks Thai and Mandarin and the crew speak ONLY Mandarin… Through the various interpretation channels my 800 yuan ($125) fee was negotiated, and the rules were laid down:

1)   Under no circumstances am I allowed to go to the front, the roof, or the captains sector of the ship.

2)   If they point to my room, I need to go there as quickly as possible and close the curtains.

3)   I am not allowed to disembark in Laos or Myanmar

Mike and May-ee

And that was it – not a lot of rules considering it’s currently illegal to take passengers up the Mekong and that my mere presence onboard made them far more likely to be targeted by Mekong pirates, of which there have been a lot lately!

   

I bid my translation duo farewell and settled into life as a semi-stowaway. There was no need to have hurried though – it took hours before we eventually departed.

With the Golden Triangle drifting further and further away, the scenery became increasingly awe-spaculous! I met the crew in bits and pieces, but with only charades to communicate with I couldn’t even get their names.

The shower slash toilet....

Meal times bought with them table-fulls of delicious foods and plenty awkward conversation [I assume] about the stranger in their midst! At dinner I was overloaded with rice wine (I think) as they “Gambei-ed” me in rounds trying to out drink me. They did. I was honoured to share a room with the cook – she won the love and appreciation of both my heart and my stomach!

The rest of the 7-person crew included one man manning the wheel, 2 men who sat at the front of the boat with bamboo sticks to check the depth of the water, one man in the boiler room, one man keeping watch, and at any given time - for no apparent reason - there was always one person doing laundry. Geraldine was the only one who had any time to spare, so I spent a lot of time babbling to her – but I tried not to get too attached, I feared she too may be joining the dinner table soon!

Geraldine

Monday evening had me chased to my room for the first time where I sat for a couple of hours with the curtains drawn shut while the world went by outside, Tuesday morning again. On Tuesday afternoon, after I’d finished washing my bike (yup – I had to at least pretend to look busy), we had military board our ship with guns… but the excitement was short lived and they too departed.

Being the dry season and heading up stream is no easy task. Every time we hit rapids or a sand bank (which was quite frequently), 2 of the crew would swim to shore with ropes and tie us to the closest country where an intricate uber pulley rig would slowly lug us forward to easier waters. The crew didn’t mess around.

One section of rapids we conquored

The engines fired up by 5-30 am each morning, and we docked at the very last light – around 8pm. By 10pm (latest), the generators were off and a world of moonless darkness with no light anywhere engulfed us. The others, having worked a 14.5 hour day would all drift straight to sleep, I would lie awake feeling the bugs crawl on me and having a few unwarranted reunions with ‘the rat’.

I’d heard that the trip could take anything from 2 days to a week, so from the second afternoon, any time I saw any sign of civilization my heart would start beating – “is that China?” – I lost track of how many times I asked that question– it sucks to not know, not that it would have made much of a difference I suppose, but I had to ration my coffee and…

Is this China???

Eventually, by afternoon the third, we definitely crossed into Chinese waters – there was no mistaking the flashing lights and massive “Border police” sign. I packed up all my belongings in anticipation, but it would still be hours before we reached the port.

I climbed down the stairs to find Geraldine tied up and stick man number 2 holding her by the neck with something shiny in his hands. I went straight upstairs – I couldn’t watch – she’d come so close to surviving…  Minutes later I watched her be placed on the roof, along with her cage – stick man motioned a “shhhh!” to me and I breathed a massive sigh of relief and broke into smiledom!

When we eventually did arrive, border control were very surprised to find me there and, after they excessively searched some of my luggage, I touched dry land for the first time in three days. Because all the forms were in Chinese, it took me 5 attempts to fill in my immigration card, but apart from that it was problem free. Far too easy even.

I had arrived in China unmurdered, un-shot-at and unrobed; and my little Chinese bicycle [and probably most of the other belongings] was home!