The CrossingYellowdine to Boorabbin
No Power Past Yellowdine
A planned day became 60.3 kilometres and carried the total beyond 500. We finished off the road with barely any signal, no power and just enough routine to make the night work.
Before I started, I warned people that updates might be sparse. We were heading for a night without power, phone signal was patchy and charging everything in the van was going to be limited. The tracker would do what it could while I aimed for another 55 kilometres.
There wasn’t a powered option close enough to make sense, so the plan was simple: keep moving and park off the road when the day was done.
I felt good enough to push beyond the plan and finished with 60.3 kilometres, the longest confirmed day so far. Better still, I reached the place where we would sleep. There was no drive forward at night and no return trip in the morning. I could step out of the van and start from where I’d stopped.
The rest and massage at Southern Cross had helped, but I wasn’t suddenly invincible. My body was learning and the crew routines were getting better. Ols’ steak pie, mash and veg the night before probably didn’t hurt either.
The day itself was signs, scrub, sky, tracks, warning notices, crew silliness and more walking. We had a “get orf my land” moment, Ols doing his fully fledged undiluted Pom thing with his shirt off in the sun, and a strange mark beside the road that was clearly not a roo. Naturally, it became a joke about trendy barefoot shoes.
Somewhere among all that, I passed 500 kilometres. I noticed milestones the whole way, but there was no time to stand around being profound. The next session still had to be walked.
The sessions came out at roughly 15, 20, 13, 8 and 5 kilometres. It wasn’t the later 15, 10, 5, lunch, 12, 8 and 5 rhythm yet, but we were already learning to change the plan around what actually happened.
Food, Tailwind, shoes, socks, batteries, check-ins, feet, dinner, sleep, repeat. I thanked Gav at Tailwind Nutrition Australia for the bucket of unflavoured Tailwind and Muz at Runwest for helping it reach us. It wasn’t decoration. It was fuel.
That night dinner could be cooked on gas, baby wipes could stand in for a shower and the phones would have to survive on whatever charge was left. Then we would get up and do it again.
Images From The Day
