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Headwinds

Headwinds

A Book with Trucks, Thieving Marsupials and Unnecessary Exercise

by Andrew Bain
Paperback
Publication Date: 01/10/2003

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$29.99
'What I knew about Australia's Highway One: it was long, more than 16, 000 kilometres around if you included Tasmania; and it was full of trucks, missiles of destruction half the length of a soccer pitch with 62 wheels so that if one didn't get me, the other 61 might. What I knew about cycling: nothing. After two-and-a-half years fulfilling their backpacking 'tour of duty' in Europe, and on the eve of a forced return to Australia, self-confessed cycling 'frauds' Andrew and Janette Bain decided to embark on the ultimate adventure: to explore their own 'backyard' and cycle around Australia - the wrong way. Equipped with their weight in chocolate, panniers overpacked with All the Wrong Things and a solitary 'bike tool', Andrew and Janette redefine the 'Aussie Crawl', plagued by murderous trucks, psychotic cassowaries and aching limbs, they survive bushfires, food poisoning, Billy Joel songs and unwelcoming wildlife, to emerge saner than they thought they ever would. Along the way, they meet the eccentric 'Mad Phil'; Yoshi, the deepsleeping Japanese cyclist; Surf nazis; Grey Nomads; wallaby Mafia; and Adrian, the bible-thumping cyclist from Geraldton who was inspired to ride around Australia by - of all things - a bush-tucker book. "Headwinds" is as much a story of determination, adventure and chocolate as it is about life on the verges of roads in the Sunburnt Country. Not to mention what can go wrong when you get the wrong advice. *It is recommended that you cycle counter-clockwise around Australia, to minimise riding into headwinds.
ISBN:
9781740660921
9781740660921
Category:
Travel writing
Format:
Paperback
Publication Date:
01-10-2003
Publisher:
Hardie Grant Books
Country of origin:
Australia
Pages:
217
Dimensions (mm):
233x155x18mm
Weight:
0.31kg
Andrew Bain

Andrews passion for cycling was born the easy way - on a 20,000-kilometre ride around Australia (including Tasmania) a decade ago, a journey that became the book Headwinds.

Subsequent cycle journeys have seen him towing his children across Europe, cycle-surfing the corrugations to Cape York and lapping around Bali.

A former sportswriter who decided he preferred the open road to the half-forward flank, Andrew is also the author of A Year of Adventures and lead author of Lonely Planets Cycling Australia and Walking in Australia guidebooks. He lives in Hobart with his two children and three bikes, which might say something about his priorities.

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