{"id":756,"date":"2010-05-15T22:03:59","date_gmt":"2010-05-15T22:03:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ride4acure.com.au\/?p=756"},"modified":"2010-07-28T21:29:41","modified_gmt":"2010-07-28T21:29:41","slug":"daily-blog-13-16-may-gulgong-to-yeoval-while-out-of-phone-range","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/ride4acure.com.au\/?p=756","title":{"rendered":"DAILY BLOG 13-16 May Gulgong to Yeoval (while out of phone range)"},"content":{"rendered":"

BLOG Thursday 13th<\/sup> may 2010: Gulgong to Wellington via Ben Buckley Rd<\/strong><\/p>\n

I stayed last night at Guntawang Thoroughbred Stud just out of Gulgong with a lovely family, Deb and Jarrod. I arrived in the dark and was welcomed with a great little paddock for the Crew and then into a warm friendly home with hot chicken soup to tuck into! Bliss for this Trekker!<\/p>\n

I got up this morning at about 5.15am and had to sort through my gear yet again (I already had but through the night could think of a few other things I wouldn\u2019t need with me on the two day haul to Wellington. I am again a horse down, Wrangler can\u2019t have a saddle on for probably another week, which means I\u2019m yet again having to juggle gear ahead for e.g. spare saddle and saddle pads, extra horse feed, winter horse rugs. Wrangler can\u2019t have a rug on at the moment because of the position of his \u2018wound\u2019 which is right on the point of his wither. I swear his \u2018coat\u2019 has grown an inch in two nights without his rug on! He\u2019s improving each day. I rode about 35 kms today. Had a brilliant time of it and the horses were great.<\/p>\n

Had alpacas and lots of sheep today, Meg had a good look at each little herd but didn\u2019t fuss too much. Also a first for me today \u2018meals on wheels\u2019, a lovely young man, Mark Johnson from Narromine pulled up with a box of hot chicken nuggets, it was about noon and I hadn\u2019t had a thing to eat since before 6am and I\u2019d been riding for a good three hours! I was very happy to accept his offering. I thought Joe and Ezzie would be proud of me tucking into Macca\u2019s with gusto! Normally you\u2019d have to pay me a wad of money to eat it, but not today! I rode for about 5 hours then stopped for an hour on a lovely little creek just down the Ben Buckley Rd and let the horses have a pick of some good green grass and to rest their backs.\u00a0 Billy has the pack saddle back on and is going really well.<\/p>\n

My little Meg is a heart winner for me, she has so much grit and try, and will have a go at anything. She\u2019s a trooper with a big heart and oh so sensible. Marj and Bob Butler bred Meg and I think in fact may have been the last foal out of her good palomino stock horse mare \u2018Honey\u2019 by an Argyle cold at Skip McCarthy\u2019s, I reckon Marj would be very proud of this little mare. I didn\u2019t make it to the spot I wanted to camp at, so pulled up about 5kms short of it at a culvert that had water in it, and some rock free flat area for my tent. Got the horses tethered, treated with various concoctions, fed, rugged, then it was dark and I had to tackle putting up the tent in the dark-Success!. I am tucked up in it now warm as toast, typing up this blog entry. I\u2019ve had about ten people stop to chat, even now in the dark and I\u2019m in the tent! People worry about me, I had a lovely man Dan drop wood off for me, but I was already in bed at 7.30pm! He also bought hot soup for me. Another lady and her daughter called in with a thermos of soup and toast for me! Unfortunately I couldn\u2019t get the lid off the thermos! How frustrating\u2026so it was Deb mashed potatoes, a tin of tuna and peas and it was yummy!<\/p>\n

BLOG Friday 14th<\/sup> May 2010 Ben Buckley Rd-the long way to Wellington!<\/strong><\/p>\n

How much frost can be on one small tent and it\u2019s still upright? Well I think I found that out last night. I\u2019m told it was -3 degrees this morning\u2026.felt like minus 10! My minus 5 sleeping bag didn\u2019t quite do it\u2019s job\u2026.I froze to the bone. I ferreted around this morning about 1am and put on every piece of clothing and coat etc I had and still froze. I\u2019m in\u00a0 Dubbo on Monday to visit a school and will be visiting a camping shop to get a minus 15 bag. There is no way I\u2019ll be that cold again. My tent was white with frost and luckily all my gear was covered by a tarp.\u00a0 I\u2019d ridden down the Gulgong to Wellington main road for four hours then turned down the Ben Buckley Rd at about 2pm (I didn\u2019t get away from Gulgong til 10am. It takes me about two hours to get the horses ready at the moment with Wranglers back, he has to get hosed down, lymphatic drainage massage, reiki, poultice, oral anti inflammatory, honey TWICE a day!) But I have to say he\u2019s going really well and his wither and back is looking great.\u00a0 I am learning so much about long distance riding on so many levels. Billy is going really well now too, his back has healed and the new pack saddle is shaping up well to the job. Billy packed all yesterday, and I stopped for a 20 minute lunch break and unsaddled. When I\u2019m not actually \u2018packing\u2019 packs I can saddle all the horses up in about 30 minutes. So to have a twenty minute break it takes me 10 minutes to unsaddle Billy and Meg, then 30 minutes to resaddle them, but it\u2019s worth it to give their backs a break.<\/p>\n

Today\u00a0 I was on the road by 9am and rode for 4 hours then had a very short break and kept riding. It seemed to be taking a long time today, but the horses were happy as we were on a dirt road,\u00a0 there was next\u00a0 to no\u00a0 traffic and reasonable water. I rode for about six hours then found out I\u2019d miscalculated the kilometers and I was still 25kms from Wellington. Well I was never gonna be able to cover that distance, so at 3pm I saw a farm with people home and rode in and asked for a paddock for the night. And as luck would have it have met a fabulous young couple Norm and Pip Smith of Glendale Merino Stud and am staying the night with them. And as I\u2019m writing this tonight I am tucked up in a warm, dry, comfortable bed. Very different picture to last night!<\/p>\n

I am going to get on the road by 9am tomorrow and ride into Wellington.<\/p>\n

SATURDAY 15th<\/sup> May, Glenwood Merino Stud to Wellington\/Yeoval.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Well I didn\u2019t quite make the 9am start. I rode away from Glenwood at 10.15am. I am delighted to have met Pip and Norm and their wonderful kids.\u00a0 I felt like I\u2019ve known these guys forever. This morning over breakfast we discussed some very exciting fundraising possibilities. Watch this space! Also Norm and Pip are helping me out with friends of theirs along the route I\u2019m taking for paddocks\/beds etc for us Crew! After the camping episode and -3 degree experience I\u2019m happy to stay with people whenever possible.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m staying with\u00a0 Alf and Sharon Cantrall of Yeoval tomorrow and Monday. Yeoval is the birth place of Banjo Paterson. When I was coming into the town there\u2019s a heap of bikes hanging in trees, on signs and in the strangest places. I now know they are representative of Banjo\u2019s famous poem Mulga Bill\u2019s Bicycle. Each July they have the Mulga Bill Festival and last year had Jack Thompson as their special gues and he recited poetry to thousands at the sight of Banjo\u2019s homesite. Also at the moment Alf Cantrell is attempting to have the biggest billy collection in the world and is doing a trade in on old billy\u2019s. He\u2019s taken my sorry looking billy that has a hole pierced in the bottom of it where I put the pack down on a sharp rock and punctured the bottem, I\u2019ve been using it for a feed dipper, has no lid now (got mangled), took the handle off to use as a make shift tool for a job! It\u2019s a very sorry little billycan addition for the Yeoval \u00a0Billy collection.\u00a0 Alf and Sharon are very generously lending me a vehicle to drive to Dubbo to visit the Grammar College to present \u201cMela-What?\u201d and I also have an ABC interview.\u00a0 I\u2019m also definitely visiting camping shop for new sleeping bag and also on the hunt for a canvas waterbag. In the 70\u2019s we had a heap of them that used to hang on the bulbar of the truck. I haven\u2019t seen one for 20 years. It\u2019s a very practical way to carry water. I used about 3 litres a day for drinking water and tea. I have two days of camping when I leave here, then another 3 or 4 nights between Parkes and West Wyalong.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m thinking of how much work this little team of three Meg, Wrangler and Billy have done, they have now walked a good 750-800 kms \u00a0and I couldn\u2019t be prouder of them. Today is a \u2018rest day\u2019 however I\u2019m off to church in Yeoval soon, am currently doing a load of washing, updating the blog, then try and get cleaned up a little for church, then a lunch with members of Yeoval Pony Club. Tomorrow by car to Dubbo for a school visit and an ABC radio interview, then back tomorrow afternoon and prepare for the ride on Tuesday from Yeoval to Parkes (2 days to cover 68kms). At this point praying for a warm frost free bed and a paddock half way along! Have a few people with feelers out for me. People are amazing though, have met heaps of people through the Pony Club networks and they\u2019re so helpful, not to mention livestock producers, agents all putting their hands up where they can. So unlike the bike ride in Oct\/Nov last year where I had my trusty family with me with back up vehicle etc, this time my back up crew emerges as I ride. Definitely an exercise in trust and patience, the road unfolds ever so gently in front of me each day as I ride. The right people seem to meander in at the right time and I\u2019ve learnt to be bold and ask for what I need.<\/p>\n

My apologies for no photo’s had a few rippers on my iphone but can’t download them? Anyone out there have any idea why when I download onto computer the photos\u00a0are black? Maybe my good friend Jill Nolan is right and I froze my phone the night I camped out. When I got back in range there was a ‘very supportive’ message from her asking if I was out of range or had me and my phone froze! Both right Jillie!! LOL….<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

BLOG Thursday 13th may 2010: Gulgong to Wellington via Ben Buckley Rd I stayed last night at Guntawang Thoroughbred Stud just out of Gulgong with a lovely family, Deb and Jarrod. I arrived in the dark and was welcomed with a great little paddock for the Crew and then into a warm friendly home with […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-756","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/ride4acure.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/756","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/ride4acure.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/ride4acure.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ride4acure.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ride4acure.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=756"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/ride4acure.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/756\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":908,"href":"http:\/\/ride4acure.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/756\/revisions\/908"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/ride4acure.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=756"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ride4acure.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=756"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ride4acure.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=756"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}