Day 50: Sunday 5 September – BULADEHLA TO FORSTER/TUNCURRY

Day 50: Sunday 5 September – BULADEHLA TO FORSTER/TUNCURRY
Distance: 71km
Distance so far: 1832 km
Weather: hot in morning. Subtropical evening with salt haze, particularly through the Booti Booti national park.

Visited Alum Mountain at start of day, and spoke to the curator of the Bulahdela Museum about the bypass construction works through the forest and the slopes of the mountain. It is tragic to see the huge snake of the State Highway 1 poised to cut across the river and through the wild forest on this lovely mountain. Sadder because if oil is finishing, as UK and US Governments now admit, then the felling of trees revered by th Aborigine Worimi community, the damning of sacred streams, will have all been in vain.

Undoubtedly Bulahdela will suffer economically as passing traffic is curtailed, and the town may well become a sleepy backwater with much less business. Do the locals who supported the bypass really understand this? Opinion in the local community does appear split, from Bulahdela to Taree. Nonetheless it appeared evident from our

Roland I started midday on our long ride. Roland had redistributed more of the weight on my bicycle from the trailer to the paniers and it seemed to roll
more easily. We rode together up the two big hills, then cruised out to the verdant valley below, up another incline, and then weaved around the Myall Lakes. Stupendously beautiful.

Towards the end of the day, as the subtropical salty air breezed in, we had a straight run through the Booti Booti national park. We arrived in the town of Forster. Will it be the next Venice? with properties inundated by rising sea levels in future.

A caravan park has given us a free berth for our tent tonight.