Day 9

A relaxing start to the day, fully fed and fuelled, I was on to Mount Isa, maybe. The road is straight with long rises and falls. The scenery is changing from orange to more of a red and the vegetation is thinning out, moving further away from the road edge and giving good clear vision. Maps says Longreach is 2hrs 40 mins away. With a time to beat, I got there in 2hrs 10mins. Just a quick fuel stop and straight out the other end on to the Landsborough Hwy. On the right is the airport, where the old Qantas Jumbo named Longreach, is a permanent fixture set up for tourists.

Another stop in Winton for a feed and fuel and I thought I should make Cloncurry which was about 350k’s. It was along here that I remembered that I had an iPad so I tried riding with music, which I had never done before. With one fuel stop, I reached Cloncurry in around 3hrs. It was just after 3pm. I knew I was heading into the sun and kangaroo time. Not much to see or happening in Cloncurry so thought too push on to Mount Isa which was 125k’s. I was now on the Barkly Hwy and I knew this to be the road to the Northern Territory. The traffic started to pick up as I rolled closer to Mount Isa, so backed it off a bit and went into ‘traffic mode’ from about 20k’s out of town.

It’s a big town based around a copper mine. Bloody ugly thing with smoke stacks puffing away.

It had been a long day in the end, around 900k’s in under 8.0hrs including stops. Into the servo, then a couple of blockies to sus’ the town out and the first place I decided to have a look at was the Ibis Hotel. Modern motel style room in a big pub with breakfast included, $90. Once in the room and settled, I thought that it was good to know I can get through a long day like that and more if I needed. I was feeling pretty good physically. I would have liked to have finished earlier as the sun in the face time of day can really hinder the vision and takes the relaxed out of it.

It was busy at the Ibis. The menu here seemed a bit pricey compared to other pubs I’d eaten at so I did a bit of a walk and ended up with a Domino’s pizza. In bed by 9, a good night sleep and brekky was buffet style with as much as I could eat. Another sunny crisp morning and I was back on the road and into it.