Bourke to Louth 97km

• Left Bourke Friday morning about 9am instead of the Thursday as storms had closed segments of the dirt road I was going on.

• Apart from the ubiquitous burrs and the constant headwind, the riverside country was quite pretty, changing every 10 kilometres to a new landscape. I was feeling so refreshed after lazing in Bourke for so long that I rode all through the day during some mild heat, reaching Louth in the mid-afternoon.

• The Louth pub is a nice old building with a laconic but friendly and unassuming barman. After quickly drinking a can of cool lemonade, I walked across the road to the free shower block where only a donation to the Royal Flying Doctor Service is requested. Returning to the pub, I ordered some 'coke zero' and the barman put some long life milk (fresh unavailable) in the fridge for me.

• A local drinker came and sat at my table table and put in a great performance of cursing everything about me from my bike to my red hair. I soon realised there was no malice in the venom spraying from his mouth, just a threadbare pursuit of an identity of courageous 'truth talker'. The lack of malice was proved by his later demand that I stay at his place that night or he would 'slit my throat'. I did not, camping in the park across the road, and he forgot about it.