I know I've only known you for 2 days, but I have quite a serious crush on you. Yes, I know my affections on this bike tour have proven fickle, thus I will wait a few more days before calling it L.O.V.E. But upon our first meeting, you offered me a 20k downhill on a road with hardly any traffic (and zero trucks!). Through magnificent rainforest. With bell miner birds sounding off the entire way. Then you rolled me through green farmland with a gentle tailwind. Then up over Mt. Barney View Road, which was rather steep, mind you, but empty! Well, save for the construction crew all along it, but they were mightily friendly: cracking jokes about me not being up to the speed limit, topping up my water, and all smiles, waves and encouragement. And even when traffic picked up just slightly on the road to Boonah, your motorists seem all too pleased to oblige by the new traffic law of giving cyclists 1-1.5m of space. What a delight!
And then! Today! I rode from Boonah up some rolling hills and was feeling rather week. Dizzy, even. "What's wrong with me?" I thought. "Must be tired from the 105k yesterday. All those hills. And it is rather hot though only 930 in the morning..." I wasn't feeling very fit at all. So to pass the time until the next little town, I started playing a game. A game I used to play with Adam when we were within an hour or so of the end of any big hiking trip. Simply explained, the game is this: "If you could eat ANYTHING when we get out of this wilderness, what would you eat?"
Yes, I played this game with the upcoming "town" of Kalbar. A risk, as I knew not what Kalbar might have on offer. Could be as little as a small, overpriced convenience store. or as big as a bakery making all of its own goods. A bit wishful in my thinking because, you see, in my survey of Australian bakeries on this bike tour, I have noticed that your country is having nothing short of a bakery crisis! Too many times to count, I walk in and there they are: shelves filled with the exact same items as the last bakery:
-sagging vanilla slices
-cakes with smurf blue icing
-big loaves of bread unwrapped on the back shelf as if hot from the oven. But no! Not hot!
All these items were made in a factory. Somewhere. All the same. All characterless.
You can be sure that once I caught on to this calamity (I admit, it took a 1-2 disappointing buys to realize what was going on!), I do not donate my dollars to such places.
Where have all the true bakeries gone, Queensland?
"A dying breed..." so say the BAKERS OF KALBAR!
Queensland! Exactly what I wished for in my game appeared! Big, warm, freshly made muffin! Veggie sandwich! A bakery with life! See, you are only getting me to like you more.
You've put your best foot forward. I know you are probably as complicated and moody as me and there is no telling how I will feel about you in 3 or 5 or 20 days time. But for now, I love you so.
xoxox,
Kelsey
more photos added on to this album here:
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