Low Darling Road

The planned multi-day bike camping trip was thwarted by some poor road conditions on the High Darling Road 50km south of Pooncarie. That said, the Low Darling road between Wentworth and Para Station was awesome fun! The black top ended 5km north of Pomoma with the unsealed road a beautiful, smooth grey clay surface.. very fast rolling and a dream to ride.

From Avoca Station the road surface was quickly deteriorating with only short patches of the grey clay, regular sand drifts, corrugations, and a heavy gravel unsuited to my lightweight cx tires. The vibrations from the road soon became that bad I was unable to feel my hands and bolts on my bike were being shaken loose. I had to stop more than once to tighten everything up.

Knocked out a solid 83km on the first day and decided to pull the pin at half 3 as a good camping spot had presented itself. Set up my bivy on the bank of the Darling River somewhere north of Hazeldel Station. The river was quite low but evidence of the recent floods was everywhere. 15 meters up a tree you could see flotsam lodged in the branches and a muddy high water mark! Crazy stuff and hard to visualise.

The overnight temperature dropped to well below 0c, and even with three layers of 200 weight merino and a fire going I froze by backside off!! During the night I was visited by a herd of feral goats, who fast ran away when I sat up in my bivy. Saw loads of animals on this ride, a mama Emu and her chicks, some Red Kangaroos, a whole raft of stumpy lizards, hawks, eagles, and nine freaking Magpies who all decided to try and take me out!!