Wednesday, April 09, 2008

DAY 166: Day 2 off in Cairns




Mon 7th April 2008
Distance to date 9918 km (6199 miles)

I slept very well again last night and was up in time to see Renee and Sarah go off to work as I slowly munched my muesli. I then uploaded to the blog and checked e-mails, of which two were of significant interest.
One was notification from Justgiving.com that another donation had been made but the amount leapt out at me - £275!! This was from someone in Perth (WA) who has recently been e-mailing me about his proposed cycle trip around Oz - I was thrilled! That will pay for clean water and sanitation for some 18 people in developing countries. With other, offline, contributions the total is now well over £1000 - many thanks again to everyone so far.
The other e-mail was from Lyn, who I know isn’t too happy with me going away for a year - I can understand that - and the gist of it is that our relationship is probably over now for good. I have thought and hoped that we would ‘be OK’ after I returned but now I’m not so sure, in fact I think it’s very unlikely. I feel very sad and upset about that; we have had some very good times together over the past 5 years, and although I probably didn’t show it very well, I do love and admire her.
Life must go on, in somewhat mundane ways, so I busied myself with getting the chainring and rear sprocket turned around at a local bike shop (I don’t have the tools), and buying a spare chain. The mechanic also changed the rear brake cable, which was very sticky, so I’m glad that’s sorted too. Later on I had a look at the Botanic Gardens some 3km on the other side of the town, but to be honest my heart wasn’t in it and I didn’t stay long. I went to a barber to get both hair and beard cut and this was good fun with the conversation going to and fro around the salon. The owner has hundreds of bank notes from all over the world pasted on the wall that customers have given him, so I added a Hong Kong $20 note which he didn’t have (it’s worth about £1 lol).
Cairns is a very easy place to get around in; it’s easy with the help of a street map to get to where you want to go and I seemed to be able to get there using just 2 streets, which makes planning a journey simple. There are a lot of cyclists around too, suggesting that it feels safe for cyclists. I have felt very safe here, but Sarah says that is can be quite dangerous with some traffic having very little regard for cyclists. Sarah was telling me about her work as an environmental consultant and she says that there is a big need for experienced people here (wonder if they could use a 59-year-old lol). I know that the QEPA were recruiting managers lately....he he...
Renee and Sarah have made me sooo welcome here I shall be very sorry to leave tomorrow, they are great company, great cooks, interesting to talk to, ethically and environmentally supercharged and well, just thoroughly nice people. My kind of people. I shall always remember them, and maybe see them in Bonny Scotland one day - who knows?! I hope so. Sarah cooked a nice stir fry so I was well contented again.

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