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do, which, he would later say, was more valuable than any plan he’ d made before leaving.
By the time he reached Perth, three weeks after setting off, he hit his first mechanical hiccup.
“ Fouled spark plug,” he said.“ Running too rich. Lucky it was a simple fix.”
He changed it where he’ d parked, dust swirling around him in the late afternoon light, and kept moving.
Northbound, Western Australia opened itself to him in long, windswept stages. The headwinds were brutal, pushing against the front of the bike like an invisible hand trying to shove him backwards.
“ You don’ t realise how much the wind can beat you up until it’ s doing thirty knots right in your face,” he said.
But those same winds carried him to Monkey Mia, Exmouth, and to the travellers who would become brief companions. In the turquoise waters off the reef, he snorkelled with turtles and reef sharks, drifting beside creatures he’ d only ever seen in documentaries. Evenings were spent swapping stories with strangers, the kind of people who noticed the scruffy kid on the battered DR650 and saw a younger version of themselves.
“ The travelling community was great,” he said.“ The rougher someone was doing it, the more they understood a young guy, solo, on a bike. People would give me a beer or invite me for dinner. There’ s this friendliness that comes when you’ re all a bit dusty and tired and far from home.”
He cut inland into Karijini National Park where rust-red gorges dropped away into shadows, and vast flatlands flickered with heat at midday. Riding beside trains that stretched for kilometres, long metallic serpents crawling across the landscape, he felt small in a way that wasn’ t lonely, but grounding.
“ Those trains go on forever,” he said.“ You feel like you’ re riding next to something alive.”
The further he went, the more the country thinned out. North of Karratha the world seemed to widen and empty simultaneously. Space was no longer just something around him; it was something he travelled through. Wild horses flicked their tails in the scrub, donkeys wandered across the road without hurrying, cattle blinked slowly in the heat. The monotony could swallow hours, but it had its own stark beauty.
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