We awoke at four in the morning to a cacophony of noise. Outside of our tent a sudden storm had whipped up, with rain and thunder and lightning and a crazy wind that howled through the trees and shook our small home. I’d not bothered to peg out the tent properly and now it was being shaken around and was threatening a collapse. I dared to poke my head out, and shone my torch up into the trees above, for I had a greater concern. Above us loomed a large dead tree branch and I was worried it might fall upon us. I ducked back into the tent, which, although it no longer felt like a very safe place to be, still provided some comfort. I considered our options. Maybe it would be better to evacuate, but you’d have to be crazy to go out in that weather.

“I’ll just go and peg out the tent” Dea suddenly said to me, and before I knew it she was up and outside and doing just that, and then Wonderwoman crawled back inside and into her sleeping bag and fell back asleep.

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The storm departed almost as abruptly as it had arrived, and the rest of the night passed safely without any large objects falling upon us. The morning brought clear fresh skies and the promise of another great day of cycling. And we had twenty kilometres more along the rail-trail to continue our traffic-free happy-go-lucky everything-is-wonderful tra-la-la-la lifestyle, during which I spotted three horses, although unfortunately only one of them was a horse.

At a small place called Maffra we left the trail and continued on a main road south towards the town of Sale, where we had organised to take a day off with some ‘warmshowers’ hosts. The main road was fine, because it mostly had a wide shoulder and the wind was at our backs, which meant we were in Sale in no time at all. Here we found a decent sized town and we walked through the town centre, unsure of which shops were offering reduced price bargains and which were simply stating their location, until we arrived at a sizeable lake. Being a useful landmark we called our hosts from here and Nic, son of John and Trish, offered to come and find us and escort us home. Ten minutes later a floppy-haired teenager on a skateboard arrived and greeted us warmly. We followed him home.

John was away on business but we spent a lovely evening with Trish and Nic in their wonderful home. We were once again shown amazing hospitality and given our own private room and made to feel very much at home. What I liked best about the house, other than the collection of a dozen or so bicycles, was that the living area was largely taken up by a ping-pong table. It seemed to me an especially dubious idea to have placed this unlikely sporting arena right next to the fine china, but that didn’t stop me playing Dea and with this game not involving equine observation I was able to chalk up a victory for once.

We enjoyed some nice conversations and some good food with Trish and Nic, and also with John when he returned home the next evening after Dea and I had partaken in a lazy day off. Stories were exchanged, the most interesting of which involved a bike ride through Victoria that the family had done together, when Nic had woken up from his sleeping bag to find lots of red marks on his legs. It was a mystery as to what could have caused it, and the next night the same thing happened, with even more red marks this time. Confused, he decided to shake out his sleeping bag, and a giant wolf spider had emerged that had obviously set up home in there. Dea and I shivered at the thought.