I woke up at half past midnight. I needed to make up for the ground lost as a result of the previous day’s terrible headwind, and I’d decided I might as well just start early and ride through six hours of darkness to do it. After all, the wind usually died down at night. I couldn’t tell if it had from where I’d camped though, buried in amongst the scrubby trees, and so I walked out to the road, following a trail of arrows I’d scraped in the sandy ground with my foot the evening before so that I could find my way in the dark. I reached my destination and stood under the stars in the middle of the highway, with not a vehicle in sight, I was the only human for miles. I was greeted by the full force of the wind, still blowing strongly the wrong way. I sighed. At least I could go back to bed.

I awoke from my slumber again at 4:30 a.m. Surely the wind must have died down by now. Despite the objections of my weary body I climbed once again out of my tent and traipsed sleepily out to the almost silent road, where the only sound was of the wind still howling at me. I sighed. Back to bed.

Daylight came and I packed things up and pushed the loaded bike out to the road, knowing full well what I was going to be greeted with. As I correctly anticipated, the wind was worse than ever, an absolute gale, coming right at me. I sighed. This time I had no choice, I had to get going. Staying on schedule was impossible, but I had to do something, I had to make some distance, however small, to stay in the game. And aside from that my water was low, and I simply had to make the 60 kilometres to the next roadhouse at Cocklebiddy, come what may.

It began, of course, as a depressing slog, but soon I saw something that lifted my spirits enormously. As I crawled desperately along into the wind I looked up to see a kangaroo, some hundred metres ahead of me, hopping across the road. Two others soon followed, and these paused in the road itself long enough for me to take a photo, before all three of them bounded off across the plains. They were extremely fast, reaching the horizon in no time at all, and it was a joy to finally see these wonderful creatures for the first time. For a few minutes I had a grin from ear to ear at having seen them.

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What was sadder was the extraordinary number of dead kangaroos that littered the sides of the highway. There were so very, very many; carcasses in various states of decomposition, and all along the road. Every few metres in some places, and it was rare to go more than a hundred metres between them. Some were fresh meat for the scavenging birds that circled overhead, but many were skeletons already picked clean.

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The day was, as anyone who has ever cycled into a headwind will know, a sort of mental torture. I was going along at less than ten kilometres an hour and it felt frankly rather pointless. I knew that I had to keep going but Melbourne felt like a million miles away, a hopeless and unrealistic goal. And of course the monotony of the landscape did little to help matters. Moments of interest were rare: A father and son driving a campervan around Australia who seemed to have solved my water problem by giving me a bottle of lemonade, until it turned out that it had gone bad. A group of galahs that flew from their roadside sitting spot as I approached, then landed on the verge again a hundred metres ahead, then took flight once more as I approached again, a process that was repeated for several glorious kilometres. But generally there was nothing to enjoy about this day.

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I was ten kilometres from Cocklebiddy, there was only an hour of daylight left, and I was out of water. I’d cycled 50 kilometres in eight hours. And then, like magic, the wind suddenly dropped, disappeared just like someone had flicked a switch. I exploded. I was like a sprinter out of the blocks. Like a coiled spring, repressed by the wind for so long, now I burst forward with unexpected new energies. In no time I was at Cocklebiddy, and, water bottles refilled, I was off again. I was determined to turn this day around now, sprinting on towards the night. I saw three more kangaroos, hopping alongside me in the bush. It was flatter now, there weren’t many trees. I spotted yet more kangaroos in the fading light over the tops of the shrubs. They sat and watched me as darkness drew in. I wasn’t done yet.

I resolved to get to 140 kilometres, a realistic target now the wind was gone and I was able to ride closer to 20 kilometres an hour. Two more kangaroos suddenly leapt across the road in front of me, illuminated by my torch, they couldn’t have been more than twenty metres ahead of me. I started to worry about possibly being hit by one. It was so dark, there were so many of them, and the amount of roadkill indicated that they weren’t exactly good at avoiding moving vehicles. I got around this problem by making noise. I sang and I shouted, talked to myself, invented characters, told the kangaroos to stay away. I saw a few more, I heard a great many. They seemed to be everywhere. It was surreal. I was all alone, cycling an empty road under the stars in the outback, surrounded by kangaroos. Then I saw a snake in the road, swerved around it, then doubled back to make sure my eyes weren’t playing tricks. It definitely was a snake, and it definitely wasn’t hibernating. The outback had just come alive.

I was making good progress and was determined to make it to 140 kilometres. I knew that if I could make it to such a distance having had to trudge into that awful headwind all day that it would be a key turning point, a sure confirmation that I was going to be able to make this deadline. And the distance quickly disappeared behind me, until with just ten kilometres to go I entered an area of trees, with woodland appearing on both sides of the road. Then two kangaroos hopped across the road just in front of me. A minute later two more did the same, from left to right. I slowed down, increased the volume of my shouting. More darted across. Another three, then two more. Suddenly they were everywhere, all going across the same way, left to right, like some giant migration. I was sure that they were passing behind me too. I was stuck in the middle of a herd off flipping kangaroos and I was terrified. I knew if they hit me it was going to hurt. I wanted to stop, but I had nowhere to go. Even if I ended the day now, short of my target, I’d still have to try and put up my tent in a wood of flying kangaroos. Two more. It was surreal. The most crazy experience of my life. I dodged a fresh roadkill. Then another, much more alive one, leaped out just in front of me. “Stay away kangaroos!” I cried out desperately, foolishly. I knew I’d said I wanted to see kangaroos, but this was too much! But I had no choice other than to keep going, more kangaroos flying out of the darkness at me. This was insane.

Then finally the trees ended and the kangaroos stopped. I had made it through the madness. I rode on, the final few kilometres to my goal. There was still time for me to hear another kangaroo, and to turn my torch to look. It stood there amongst the bushes, and stared back without moving. It was a beautiful creature. We held one another’s stare for what felt like several minutes, or at least it felt like it - the kangaroo would have just been staring into the torchlight. All around us was darkness, the kangaroo the only thing spotlighted. Then at last it too had enough and bounded away, and I set up my tent, still shaking my head in shock, and called it a night. And what an extraordinary night it had been.

Distance completed: 1391km

Distance to go: 2419km

Days to go: 19.5

Average distance required: 124km/day