Cycling The Globe

Distance: 55.2 km
Ride time: 4:27:44
Average: 12.4 km/h
Max speed: 43.6 km/h
Total: 44127 km

As I left the friendly couple at the Hanzu B&B in Lutzville, their goodbye warning was “watch out out there, the temperature will reach 44 degrees today”. I guess I should have checked the forecast myself as this was honestly much hotter than I expected. Down at the coast the ride had been perfectly comfortable, but since I’m now heading inland things are going to change.

After leaving the wine oasis of Lutzville, the first couple of hours of riding were fine enough. At 11 I turned into a dirt road, and this was were things started to get hot. Furthermore, finding shade was almost impossible. I managed to find a single tree under which I could eat a bit of lunch consisting of baked beans and bread with jam – not that my appetite was great in this kind of heat. The temperature was already 40 in the shade, and still rising.

I continued fighting the heat while cycling through a dry and barren landscape – once again reminding me of Outback Australia. It is clear that I will need a new strategy to cope for the coming days; start very early, ride until 11 am, take a break, and then continue at night.

Just as things were becoming really unbearable, I noticed a cattle water trough in a field next to the road. I saw birds flying around the trough, and from my time in the Australian outback I knew it meant there was water in it. Indeed, nice and fresh water and I simply jumped into the trough myself to cool down – just what I needed!

I was now in a better shape to continue the final hour into Nuwerus, a rather rough little village that had a bottle shop where I could buy a cold drink. There was also a tree under which the locals were gathering, so I joined them for an afternoon siesta while dark clouds were coming in.

The locals told me that it hadn’t rained in Nuwerus since November, so the thunder and rain that was coming this way was a big deal. With such weather I decided to check into the local guesthouse for the night.

Tomorrow I will be up for an early start, trying to beat the heat!