In 2000, Andrew Stretton was diagnosed with a very rare Chronic Bone Marrow Disorder called Essential Thrombocythemia. ‘ET’ affects approximately only 1 in 120,000 people, making it extremely rare. Being a disorder only recently discovered (in the past 20 years) its cause remains a mystery. The disorder causes the Bone Marrow to overproduce Platelets, cells that play a pivotal role in helping blood to clot. As a benign form of cancer, its major downside is the ability to cause a stroke or heart attack from internal clotting. In order to limit the production of Platelets, Andrew takes daily Chemotherapeutic tablets, which, due to their cytotoxic nature, have the ability to cause secondary Leukaemia. Whilst ET’s cause is unknown, it has a high prevalence in Motor Mechanics who have had long-term exposure to ‘Benzine’, a parts washing solvent, which is also a Carcinogen. Andrew initially started out as a Mechanic after leaving School in 1978, using Benzine regularly to wash Truck and Tractor parts during his Apprenticeship. Later in his career, as Sales & Marketing Director for an Australian Blood Bag Manufacturer, Andrew came across another disturbing Carcinogen, DEHP. Some blood bag manufacturers were using DEHP or DI-Ethyl-Hexyl-Pthalate as a plasticizer, helping the plastic blood bags to remain supple. It was discovered that this plasticizer, the same used to keep car dashboards soft, (it causes the white film on car windscreens), leached out of the plastic and into the blood where it surrounded Red Blood Cells and stopped them from rupturing. This ‘positive’ benefit helped to prolong the storage of Red Blood Cells meaning blood was more readily available for transfusions. DEHP is a known Carcinogen, however, whilst the Medical Community were aware of the leaching, they never discovered what happened to the DEHP after it was transfused, with the blood, into the body. As time has gone by, through his own illness and other experiences, such as his awareness of DEHP and Depleted Uranium, Andrew has become more and more convinced that much of what we are exposed to in our ‘modern day lifestyle’s’, has a major link to the increasing Cancer diagnosis rates. To build awareness of this and Men’s Cancer in general, Andrew set out on the 3rd of February 2008 on a four State Bicycle ride, covering 7,000km’s over 26 weeks. He is talking in communities across the country about Men, Work, & Cancer & discussing ways in which we can begin changing our lives for the better.
7,000 Kilometers On A Pushbike
'For Blokes Sake'!
(Second Leg - Sydney to Brisbane 676Km's)
Second Leg - Sydney to Brisbane 676Km's
Statistics
Detailed statistics covering Km's / day, Hours on Bike, Average Speed, Maximum Speed and Calories of Energy Expended are recorded below.
Thursday April 3rd - Train from Campbeltown to Sydney and Sydney to Newcastle
(Train caught due to ABC Radio National Interview booked for Wednesday 9th in Port Mac & madness of Sydney Traffic!)
April 3rd - Newcastle to Stockton, 15km's, Time on Bike 1hr, Avg 15km/h
Friday 4th - Stockton to Buladelah, 95km's, Time on Bike 4hrs 23min, Avg 21.5km/h, Max 48.2km/h, Calories 1546
Saturday 5th - Buladelah to Taree, 66km's, Time on Bike 3hrs 11min, Avg 20.7km/h, Max 52.8km/h, Cal 1178
Tuesday 8th - Taree to Port Macquarie, 84.2km's, Time on Bike 3hrs 55min, Avg 21.4, Max 44.5, Cal 1301
Friday 11th - Port Macquarie to Kempsey, 48Km's, Time on Bike 2Hrs 28min, Avg 19.4, Max 45.6, Cal 702
Saturday 12th - Kempsey to Urunga, 85.5Km's, Time on Bike 4Hrs 5min, Avg 20.9, Max 48.9, Cal 1299.5
Sunday 13th - Urunga to Glenreagh, 68.7Km's, Time on Bike 3Hrs 43min, Avg 18.4, Max 48.5, Cal 1023.5
Monday 14th - Glenreagh to Grafton, 54Km's, Time on Bike 3Hrs 12min, Avg 16.8, Max, 49.1, Cal 803
Tuesday 15th - Grafton to Casino, 97.1Km's, Time on Bike 4Hrs 59min, Avg 19.4, Max 43.8, Cal 1393.3
Wednesday 16th - Casino to Kyogle, 31.5Km's, Time on Bike 1Hr 36min, Avg 19.4, Max 43.1, Cal 424
Saturday 19th - 4.12 AM XPT Train from Kyogle to Brisbane, Arriving 6.30 AM
Saturday 19th - Bike trip to Kyogle Railway Station and from Brisbane Railway Station to Parkinson,
30.6Km's, Time on Bike 2Hrs 19min, Avg 13.1Km's Max 39.5Km/h, Calories 324
Total Second Leg Km's - 675.6
Total Days on Bike - 11
Average Km's Per Day - 61.42
Total Km's of 1st and 2nd Leg - 2,013
Total Days on Bike - 35
Average Km's Per Day - 57.5
First Leg - Central Victoria to Sydney
Third Leg - Brisbane to Gladstone
The same hill but a slightly better shot of the road into the distance. Whilst the mountain range in the very background of the photo looks big (and it is) the road managed to find its way through the valleys with only a small number of steep sections. These hills and the physical excercise that comes from them have taught me a lot about my own body. I simply wasn't eating enough in the early stages of the trip and as a consequence, began to feel the effects. So now I make sure that I schedule stops in between standard meal breaks where I can toss down extra sandwiches and I have also started to carry a good supply of jelly beans. It's amazing the immediate boost you get from eating three or four of these things just before a big hill!
The first of the very steep hills coming out of Buladelah. As you can see, the road just keeps climbing from way down the centre of the photo. This shoulder is wide enough for a truck to park in and the surface is as smooth as the proverbial. Whilst there were a number of these steep hills over the 66km's on this day, most of them occured over a reasonable distance making the ascent quite enjoyable. Despite the number of kilometres covered to date, you can see that the saddle hasn't worn out yet and the 'For Blokes Sake' flag continues to flutter in the wind.
The start of the Buladelah Ranges about 4km's out of Bula itself. The rock outcrop at the top of this initial range was spectacular. The 95km ride from Stockton (near Newcastle) was sensational with reasonably flat ground. Pretty much all the way along the Highway roadworks are taking place turning the current two lane road into dual carriage way. Many of the hills are simply being removed in an effort to make the route as flat as possible for traffic. The concrete slab method of road building in NSW, certainly makes for smooth bike riding, frequently with very wide shoulders that provide high safety factors and as a result a far more relaxed ride. As you can see from the picture, the weather was superb but this was not going to last!!
Yet another very steep hill, this time just out of Coolgoola. As you can see some of these hills go on for so long that you can't actually see the beginning. Riding conditions were superb with good cloud cover, reasonably cool conditions and no rain! (Yet).
We were held up in Taree for an extra day due to very heavy rain, this photo of the river inlet at Taree was taken just before things got really bad. Riding off from Taree for the 85km trip to Port Macquarie was a considerable worry, some 140mm of rain fell during the day making vision extremely difficult even on a pushbike! I had no choice but to do the trip because of the pre-booked media interview with ABC Radio National in Port Mac. It poured with rain for the entire 6 Hrs that it took to get there. After a while you just don't think about how soaking wet you are, or the fact that the water in your shoes squelches around your feet, that is until you get a puncture and shred a tyre only 20km from your destination. Luckily it happened not far from a rest area with shelter, but I can tell you that changing a tube and tyre whilst shaking madly from the wind and cold is one hell of a challenge!
The obvious question is, 'How do they reach the pedals?' Or perhaps, 'Which one is the Extra Terrestrial?' The sunshine in these photo's looks great but the day after they were taken, the weather turned grey, thundery and very, very wet.
These next two photo's are just sensational! I was simply blown away when Maria pulled Mr & Mrs ET out of the back seat of the FJ. My Bone Marrow Condition (Essential Thrombocythemia) is known as 'ET' for short and I couldn't miss the opportunity to exploit the irony! Here are the outer space citizens sitting in technology that would be far removed from anything they landed on Earth in. Bill and Maria donated generously to the 'For Blokes Sake' cause and gave us some very tasty Muffins for afternoon Tea and Breakfast along with a T-shirt. Thanks guys, we wish you all the very best on your travels, especially your'e upcoming trip to Broken Hill.
Along the road to Taree Kris spotted this rig and told me about it during lunch at Nabiac. When I got to the Taree Caravan Park later the same day I couldn't believe my eyes. This beautifully restored 1955 FJ and Caravan belongs to Bill and Maria, two of the nicest people you could wish to meet. The car and caravan are restored to perfection and in very original condition. It's amazing to see the difference between a caravan made in 1955 and the monoliths that get around on the road today. No such thing as double beds and ensuites!
I've been getting lots of requests for information about the bike. So here I am with 'Ortonomy', a bike that has started to become one of my very best friends. When you spend a lot of time challenging yourself in the middle of nowhere, you start to really depend on what gets you through and 'Ortonomy' has been exceptional at doing that. I have ridden through glass, large pot holes and into the gravel when I have had to get out of the way of large trucks and this bike just takes it all. 'Ortonomy' is a Cannondale T2, a bike made for long distance touring. The frame is hand made and is very 'beefy' in comparison to most bike frames today. It's designed this way to take the loads that are carried in panniers. It has 27 speed Shimano gears which means that I can get over most hills and cruise at high speed on flat ground.
Camping by the Urunga River where the little eagles were swooping over the surface and catching fish, it was an incredible sight. Add that to the fish jumping out of the water to catch low flying insects and the mozzies eating me and yes, the food chain was almost complete! The next day I headed off towards Coff's Harbour 24 Kilometres away. After a few hundred kilometres of Pacific Highway travel I was becoming very tired of the incessant noise of hundreds of vehicles madly racing from one destination to another and the increasingly 'plastic' tourist towns along the coast. The people too were changing. For the first time on the trip, several car loads of hoons had yelled abuse and thrown things at me as they passed. I decided not to stay in Coff's, instead I headed inland and it proved to be one of the best decisions I have made on the tour to date.
I took this photo not far from the top of Red Hill, part of the mountain range that surrounds Coff's Harbour. Despite the challenging 300 metre ascent over about 2 kilometres and the tougher terrain heading inland, the scenery became almost instantly stunning. Unlike all other forms of transport, apart from walking or maybe a sail boat, pushbike riding is all about the journey, not the destination. Because of this, you live in the moment not the future or the past. It means making decisions on the hop frequently with little or no information at all and accepting whatever comes your way good or bad as a result of that. Our modern day lives provide us with a myriad of false gaurantees and securities that often cheat us of some wonderful experiences. Our cars are a good example of that! Being diagnosed with Cancer sometimes wakes us up to the fact that there really are no gaurantees in life. Perhaps it is only when this realisation dawns; that we truly start to live.
This was one of the many great experiences that opened up from the decision to head inland. Some 70 Kilometres into the trip with another 54 to go before hitting Grafton, thunderous skies looming from the South, I came across the little town of Glenreagh and the Glenreagh Recreational Reserve. Whilst its a place where campers and caravaners can stay, there's no 'Grey Army' with their monolithic vans and four wheel drives here! This is what I call luxury accomodation, the old viewing platform overlooking what used to be the Cricket Pitch. At 3 in the morning it started to bucket with rain, so the tent was madly rushed in under the roof of this beautiful structure. Yes, that's a window behind me but the fresh air variety. At the back of the reserve was the home of the Glenreagh Historic Railway, complete with Steam Engine and Carriages, I was in piggy heaven!
The pictures above of the shower block, internal and external, give you a fair idea just why the 'Grey Army' was missing in action! It was one of the best showers I have ever had, especially without the hoardes of tourists! At eight bucks a night for an unpowered tent site, this is the sort of place that you could easily set up stumps in, maybe for a week or two, perhaps for a year or two. It certainly crossed my mind! With tourism on the increase though, I'll bet my bottom dollar that this beautiful little spot gets upgraded to caravan park status before too long, yet another HQ for the retirement brigade.
This photo of the road between Grafton and Casino gives you an idea of just why I was so pleased to head inland. Very few cars and trucks and almost 100 Kilometres of forest which shaded the road. There was only one very very small town, called Lawrence Road, located about 40km's out of Grafton, along this entire stretch.
A 'Grey Army' transport vehicle in Kyogle. If you look closely you can see the word 'Conquest' on its side, underneath a couple of curved lines that are supposed to represent mountains. The names on many of these homes away from home are quite interesting, 'Sun Seeker', 'Sun Chaser' and 'Leisure Seeker' to name but a few. Could it be that some of these names are suggesting that you will never quite achieve your goal? The amount of these and even bigger '5th wheel' variety transport vehicles that are on the roads is staggering. What's even more staggering is some of the armoury they have inside, equipment that is specifically designed to tackle the great outdoors. Things like washing machines, spin dryers, home theatre systems and air conditioners, everything a conquestador needs whilst grappling with the vagaries of Nature!
Did someone say something about the vagaries of nature? This is a picture of the Information Centre (IC) in Kyogle just 3 months ago and yes that's a yellow boat at the level of the rooftop. The caravan park above had 10 minutes notice to evacuate at about 11 o'clock at night just before this wall of water came crashing through the township. The guys at the IC gave me these photo's to put up on the web site. Malcolm (Manager), Rick and Joy (his assistants) were the best IC staff we have ever met in fact this little town which had suffered considerably because of these devastating floods was without question one of the friendliest and most supportive towns we have had the pleasure of stopping in. Not only did the IC Staff help us with accomodation and local topography of the roads North, but they also help set up at very short notice, a community performance for Kris.
Kyogle is the gateway to the Border Ranges Rainforests which is where most of this flood water came from and as you can see, the devastating nature of this flood was widespread. Incredibly, the people of this little town have bounced back with great vigour. Whilst shopping in 'Vinnies Op-Shop' for a T-Shirt, we had a chance meeting with one simply amazing resident, Betty Fitzgerald, who had organised a Senior Citizens Week Concert in the theatre building for the next day. One of her performers had unfortunately had to pull out leaving a vacancy. Kris volunteered her services to fill the gap and when I arrived the next day to help set up, I was absolutely stunned to see that Betty had organised for collection buckets to be placed at the door for people to donate to 'For Blokes Sake' if they wished to. This resulted in the second largest donation.............(more in next text box)
....of any community to date. The Senior Citizens of this town who had already suffered considerably through the floods, donated an amazing $98.30 to the 'For Blokes Sake' cause. There are times in life when the generosity of people can be extremely overwhelming and for me, this was simply one of them. Thank you to Betty and the Senior Citizens you are gems. Later that night, Kris performed at the Kyogle Roxy Art Gallery, the opening of an Exhibition entitled 'Healing With Art'. This exhibition is running over a number of weeks and part proceeds and donations from it are going to 'Relay for Life', the Cancer Councils fundraising for research. Kris donated $5 from every one of her CD's sold on the evening, raising $70 in total. Thank you Kris! Thanks also to the many Cancer Survivors who came and spoke to me on the evening and to Ruth, Jenny and Stuart for organising the event.
As if Kyogle hadn't had enough water, the Thursday and Friday we were there it did nothing but pour and all reports were that it was going to continue. I was really looking forward to the bike ride through the Border Ranges, but the amount of rain would have made it way too dangerous. Some 20 creek crossings of the road I was intending to take had been washed out in January and I wasn't prepared to take the risk. Not able to wait it out, I decided to book a ticket on the XPT Train to Brizzy. (Thanks Malcolm for your help!) Whilst the tent (photo centre) is four season capable, two days of almost constant rain were starting to take their toll. At around 6.30 PM we decided to move it under the BBQ shelter. No, those are not lights on 'Ortonomy', they are exceptionally good reflectors on my panniers and wheel rims, great for being seen! The night was very restless, would we have to evacuate?
When the frogs start taking refuge on top of your tent and under a BBQ shelter, perhaps it's time to get out! Luckily we didn't have to. The need to get to Port Macquarie at the beginning of this leg and the impact of the rain at the end of it has meant that some 260 Kilometres have been wiped off the planned total through train travel. I will be looking at where I can make this up in both the Brisbane to Cairns leg and the Central Victoria to Adelaide leg. The odometer to date reads 2,809.3 Kilometres, but this includes approximately 800 Kilometres of training done prior to the start of the tour. The next leg, Brisbane to Cairns will be approximately 1,700 Kilometres but this time with no major stop scheduled. Their is also the potential to go through to Port Douglas and the Daintree. Will the legs hold out? Only time will tell!
