McCRAICKEN: Hello and welcome. In this hour we follow Sean on his journey south. And Barry Best, as always will tell us what's been happening on the weather front. Barry, the wind has been blowing strong this week.

BEST: It has indeed. That incredibly strong wind unique to Patagonia.

McCRAICKEN: Barry will tell us all about it later, but first the news with Robbie Bonnet.

BONNET: Cyclist Sean Kane has narrowly avoided serve injury when extremely strong wind blew him off his bike. It is understood the incident happened on route 40, sixty-five kilometres south of Gobernador Costa, just after an abandoned farmhouse called Nueva Lubeck.

We'll be hearing from Sean in a moment. Now back to JP.

McCRAICKEN: Thanks Rob. Well, to find out more about just what happened, Sean who is okay, joins me now by phone. Sean, are you there?

KANE: I'm here. Am I coming through clearly? It's very noisy here where I am. You might be able to hear the wind in the background, which is blowing a gale as I speak. (A storm is faintly heard in the background but the phone connection is good.)

McCRAICKEN: We hear you loud and clear Sean. Tell us about being blown off the bike.

KANE: Yes JP, it happened Thursday afternoon, not long after setting off from lunch sheltered against the garden wall of an abandoned farmhouse, Nueva Lubeck. The wind that had been blowing strongly since the previous day, had obviously become much stronger in the time I'd been sitting, apparent by the increased roar of the wind and violent bowing of trees about the house.

At this point route 40 aligns south-east for a long stretch, so the wind coming from the north-west, blew me along near enough without pedalling with the wind just a bit to the right of centre rather than being directly behind me. In other words I was experiencing a slight crosswind, which I'd all the time to be careful of as sudden gusts of wind tried pushing me out across the road, protentially into the path of oncoming traffic. I'll just mention traffic is light on this road and most of what traffic there is, are trucks, creating a lot of turbulants. So often I'd to pull off onto the gravel shoulder to a halt when a truck approached for fear of being blown into their path with fatal consequences.

But since lunchtime the instances where I had to just halt and hold onto the bike as the wind pushed hard against my right side, trying to force me out across the road, had got to the point where it was no longer safe to ride. Then I see orange signs ahead for roadworks. I just add here that although it was sunny and blue sky above, ahead visibility was not much more than two-hundred metres due to a windborne haze of dust, like fog. As I got nearer there was a "Fin Pavemento" sign, or end of the tarmacked road, and a sign for a divertion onto a temperary road alongside the road which they were resurfacing, most of which was finished newly tarmacked and soon would be opened again for traffic, although there was no objection to riding on it with a bicycle. This meant I could ride and be blown across the road without worrying about traffic.

However, now pushed along by the wind, or more accurately driven at an insane speed, I'd to constantly brake. Then a gust would come partly from by right side, angling me across the road and I'd instinctively lock the brake to stop for dear life. This only had the effect of the rear wheel skidding sideways, snaking as they say. It was like if you've every seen motorcycle dirt racing on the television, where the rider trails his inside foot on the ground as the bike slides around corners. That was me, my right foot was trailing on the road trying to save myself as the rear wheel skidded sideways across the road, let me add the road felt like an icerink, as my feet and wheels had little or no grip whatsoever, against the incredible force of the wind pushing from the right-hand side; until, in one instance I couldn't stop and crashed into a ridge on the left-hand side of the road. This is where I instinctively jumped to my feet to save myself, and the wind blew me further over the ridge and down the banked up side of the road.

Luckily there was no harm to me nor bike. I struggled against the wind with grit stinging me in the face back to the bike. Then couldn't pick the bike up because the press of the wind made it feel like it weight a tonne. But eventually do lift it. I push with severe difficulty, being blown to the ground a few times and getting up again for a short distance until, I come to a rough grassy layby in the lea of a mound. Here I lay the bike down and lay down to wait for the wind to drop, however long that took.

(There's a temperary break up...)

McCRAICKEN: We seem to have lost Sean.

KANE: Hello!

McCRAICKEN: Oh, you're still there. How long then, were you there waiting for the wind to drop?

KANE: I was there for a couple of hours, lain on the ground with my head propped against a pannier for some shelter. Then about six o'clock, the brown haze had cleared, and it seemed suddenly to be less windy, so I could go on, though with extreme care as gusts of wind still tried angling me across the road, but no way as bad as before.

I was extremely glad to reach the old abandoned petrol station-roadhouse, La Laurita, about seven, having descended down barrancas where the shell of the old building is on the right, tucked in against the east facing barrancas and surrounded by trees, so I'd shelter to camp. A good end to a very trying day you could say, as the location is surreal in a way only found in Patagonia. A five kilometre wide arroya, or seasonal river trough valley with barranca slopes either side, with a marshy aspect: the home to an array of birds. It was what makes wild camping a beautiful experience. Incidentally the wind settled. I heard pairs of Banderias, those big ibis quack and fly overhead, and Tauras screach, and numerous small birds flitter in and out of willows, as the evening drew in with nightfall not until quarter past nine.

In the morning I got on the road early. There was a light breeze from the north-west, which would strengthen as the morning progresses. The road leaving La Laurita veers east across the valley crossing bridges over many dry streams, I think it's called "Arroya Genoa", then does a curve-round to the right and climbs diagonally up the barrancas that rise back up to pampa on the valley's other side, beyond which are two semetrical round hills that add extra mystic to the area, from behind which the sun had just risen. I continue upon dry pampa for twelve kilometres to a right turn that according to plan I take for a place called Alto Rio Senguer. and a half kilometre in there's a downhill to cross Arroya Genoa again the opposite way, which continues on, joining the main river that drains the area, Rio Senguer, not far to the south-west. The whole area is an oasis with lush pasture dotted with cattle and sheep for miles in all directions.

There was a short rise up the barrancas on the far side of the Genoa-Rio Senguer confluence valley to a plain criss-crossed with irrigation channels, more lush cattle pasture, from which I fill my water-bottles, reckoning the water would be perfectly good for cooking with, as I had a headwind and worried that it would strengthen to the point where I'd be stranded at the side of the road today too. Though on this road there were culverts at regular intervals providing shelter enough to use a stove if the worse happens.

I keep on going. The effort it was taking to pedal against the headwind increasing by the hour. By one o'clock my stomach began to ache with hunger having had only a light breakfast at half six. I reckoned I wasn't too far from Alto Rio Senguer by now so decide to lunch in the shelter of a culvert.

Later when wheeling the bike out from the culvert back up to the road, the wind was too strong to ride, so I had to push the bike lurching forward as if pushing a car, the wind pushing back against me. However, I was closer to town than I'd invisaged, as a couple of kilometres ahead I come to a tee-junction with a sign "Alto Rio Senguer 7km" left. Now I had a direct crosswind pushing me across and off down the bank at the side of the road. I was heading toward a forest of tall Alamos trees, a windbreak that surround all Patagonian settlements, that seemed very close but almost unreachable as I lurched over the bike.

McCRAICKEN: You made it into town?

KANE: Yes. It's a village, a very timeless place that hasn't been spoiled by tourism, such as having cabanas everywhere. It's the sort of place author of "In Patagonia" a travel classic from 1975, Bruce Chatwin would recognize. There's one hotel in a lurid pink and a few very traditional amacens, or grocery shops. The shopkeeper where I topped up on essencials was very helpful. I needed somewhere to stay and asked was there a municipal campsite. He said no, but there's fogones, those concrete barbacues, along the river, it's possible to camp there. So here I am. I awoke early this morning to very strong wind, and knew it would be impossible to go on today.

McCRAICKEN: I was wondering at the quality of this phone connection. We can hear the storm, but you're coming through crystal clear.

KANE: Ah, well, all I can say it's a mystery how it works in this wind.

McCRAICKEN: And you're in the tent as you speak?

KANE: No, I'm sat outside on the grass. Where my tent is has good cover, tucked in among a clump of Andean Lenga trees, the whole riverbank where I've camped being a forest, another thing that makes me wonder at how well the phone is working.

McCRAICKEN: You'll be waiting in suspense to see what the weather will do tomorrow.

KANE: I'm having a rest day doing just that, resting. Tomorrow, I think it should be calm, it can't blow like this forever. I hope to make it to the border with Chile. I'm glad I'm not on that road today, as apart from the wind, the sky is black over the hills to the west. A real wet day.

McCRAICKEN: I hope the wind drops and you're on your way again. Sean, it's been a pleasure, thanks.

That was recorded last Saturday, the fifth of November, and we now have Sean in the studio.

KANE: Hello.

McCRAICKEN: We are now in Coyhaique, in southern Chile, after nine weeks on the road. What were your aspirations when you set off from Salta on the tenth of September?

KANE: I had no idea I'd be in Patagonia now. In that first week the plan was to go east to Uruguay, but then the thought of riding on a lot of busy roads to get there sunk in, so when riding south out of Chilecito, I came to a fork in the road and had to decide, do I go left toward Cordoba, or right toward San Juan and Mendoza. I chose the later, meaning ultimately my route was now down to Patagonia, and about that time I decided on a plan to ride slowly and go off the beaten track as much as possible.

McCRAICKEN: I see the journal is coming along rightly. You're enjoying putting it together I see.

KANE: Yes. When I started the journal I had no idea what it would be. I was in a predicament that I didn't want to go on spending so much time using the internet to type up a daily journal update, but still needing to keep people out there abreast of my welbeing. It takes me an hour every evening to write my pen and notebook journal, not much time at all, but to transcript online it needs to be reformed to make it coherent, and even then I've to read it five times to edit out all mistakes.

So the idea to write an abbreviated weekly update, or forthnightly as it is now, came into being, that would be one page of text and the usual one page for each day format, but photos only for now, with text filled in after the tour.

At the same time I was thinking of a title for this new thing. I thought how about a person with a somewhat funny name. That's when I thought of you JP. JP McCraic-ken, what does he do? He reads the news. He's a radio presenter. So I create a radio news-program, write a script for characters. You JP, the program presenter, and Barry the weatherman.

It's a bit of theatre, if you like. A humorous and more interesting organ to tell people this is what I've been doing lately, I hope you agree.

In the longterm when I put text to each of the daily pages, these news progam pages will be pushed together to the top of the journal content page, with links connecting events, like the wind in this week's program, to the actual day page, and act as an abridgement to the cycle tour. The highlights or Readers Digest version for people that just want to dip into the journal.

McCRAICKEN: Right, there's craic and kenning in what you said, and there's Best. Barry has been sitting patently waiting to tell us about the wind. Barry what is the cause of the strong wind in Patagonia?

BEST: JP, it makes a windy day back at home seem like a picnic, doesn't it?

Well, it's a phenomenan called "The Roaring Forties" only present in the southern hemisphere, usually between latitude forty and fifty south. The cause is air displacement from the Equator toward the South Pole and the Earth's rotation with few landmasses to act as windbreaks...

McCRAICKEN: Okay Barry, that was very well explained. I'm having to cut you short cause there only remains a minute of the program. Only enough time to read out this message from Lorreta Morgan, in Tusson Arizona, complaining about Sean's atitude toward paying to enter national parks, she writes.

"The entrance fees go to planting trees...."

KANE: (cuts in) That's so untrue. The park where I was, the trees regenerate themselves...

McCRAICKEN: Okay, I have to stop you there, as we've come to the end.

MARTHA: Now, Trevelin to Coyhaique, in The Photo Show