Then the day came – the day before Christmas Eve. I was heading to Australia to take on the biggest challenge of my life so far. This outrageous idea had been in the works for a long time, ever since last year’s spectacular flop when the bike never showed up. Was I prepared for this? Probably not. I had already started arguing with my heart – a bit of fluttering here and there – but for now, the ticker was hanging in there. If it got worse, I’d just have to admit that it might be time to take up knitting or some other less demanding hobby.
Christmas Eve Eve in Bodø – the gods’ own gift to seasonal depression. I was sitting alone at the airport while the north wind whipped the building like it had a personal grudge against the architect. Widerøe, those cowboys of the sky, were kind enough to accept my luggage on Christmas Eve. I had booked my tickets with Qatar Airways – because nothing screams “fiscally responsible adult” like sending a bicycle and a mountain of gear halfway around the planet. The price tag? Let’s just say I could’ve bought an entirely new wardrobe in Australia for the same amount.
The journey began with a tiny little plane to Svolvær – you know, the kind where everyone has to sit on the same side so it doesn’t tip over. From there, it was on to Oslo, where I set a new personal record in sprinting with a suitcase – had that been an Olympic sport, I’d have taken gold. The flight to Doha actually went smoothly, but arriving at 11 PM and checking into the hotel at 1 AM? Absolutely perfect for maintaining a healthy circadian rhythm.
I got up early and headed out into the city. The sun was shining in a way that made me question whether this was even the same sun as the pale glowbulb hanging over Bodø. Doha’s metro – a miracle of efficiency and cost-consciousness. A day pass cost less than 10 Norwegian kroner! In Norway, that wouldn’t even get you half a bus ride. The city was so modern and polished it almost hurt to look at. Wealth gleamed from every building, like someone had taken Dubai and asked, “Could we make it just a bit more excessive?” With the Norwegian krone weaker than my cardiovascular system, I decided to keep my wallet closed. Not that I had room for anything extra on the bike unless I planned to turn it into a cargo van.
Back at the airport by 8 PM. After a long and careful evaluation of my options (which totaled exactly zero), I waited two hours for the flight to Sydney. Thirteen hours in the air – about the length of a standard workday for a government employee, but with better service. My flight strategy? Brush my teeth. At least twice. It might sound strange, but there’s something mysterious that happens inside your mouth when you sit in a pressurized tin can 10,000 meters above the earth. After two hours, it tastes like you’ve licked the floor of a fast food kitchen. I also always switch to fruit or vegetarian meals on flights. Not because I’m particularly health-conscious, but because it lowers the chances of having to sprint to the toilet somewhere over the Pacific.
Sydney welcomed me at 6 PM. I took an Uber to the hotel and paid… something. Money disappears so fast in Sydney that I honestly don’t even remember how much it was. It was Boxing Day in Norway, but in Australia it was Tuesday, or Wednesday, or some other completely irrelevant concept – they don’t celebrate the second day of Christmas here. Probably because they’ve never experienced a proper Norwegian holiday feast and therefore don’t need an entire day to recover from it.
I unpacked the bike, and the hotel receptionists helped me get rid of the box. I think they were either impressed by my Pinarello, or just surprised that anyone would willingly cycle across Australia in the middle of summer. Tired but happy, I made it to the Opera House and bought an ice cream large enough to give the entire neighborhood diabetes – had to “replenish my muscle glycogen,” of course. At least that’s what I tell myself every time I dig into a bucket of ice cream with a spoon.
The next day, I took a long walk to Bondi Beach and back. The beach was beautiful, but there were so many perfect bodies there that I felt like a potato on legs. Back at the hotel, I decided it was time to take the Pinarello out for its first spin on Australian asphalt. I’d seen a fair number of cyclists already and, in my naïveté, assumed my bike was high-end. Ha! Out here it was all S-Works, Trek, and Bianchi – in editions so expensive they probably came with their own health insurance. I felt like the poor cousin in the bike lane.
I cycled the same route I had walked the day before, with a detour through Centennial Park. Everything was great – until the sky opened and dumped more water than exists in all of Northern Norway. “A little rain won’t hurt,” I thought, in my infinite wisdom. Then, in Paddington, the laws of physics decided to remind me why wet pavement and bike tires aren’t always the best of friends. I slipped out like a rookie on an ice rink, tore up my entire right side, and destroyed my Terrufo bib shorts – which cost more than the national budget of some small countries. I lay there in shock, right in the middle of the road in downtown Sydney. “A perfect start to the adventure,” I thought sarcastically, while silently thanking the gods that no buses had decided to turn me into a speed bump.
A young woman and her boyfriend stopped and asked the obvious: “Are you okay?” “Yeah, yeah,” I replied – like the typical Norwegian man I am – while blood was running down my leg. “But… you’re bleeding,” she pointed out, clearly gifted in the art of observation. I thanked her for her concern with a nod that said, “It’s just a scratch. I’ve been through worse. Like quarterly reports and NAV paperwork.” Back at the hotel, I found out that staying one more night would cost 2,500 kroner. For that price, I expected the bed to have takeoff capabilities. So I made the only reasonable decision: I packed up and prepared to begin my epic journey toward Perth the next day. Nothing says “I’m ready for 4,000 kilometers by bike” like a fresh road rash.
December 27th – while sensible people were still digesting Christmas dinner, I was up at 5:00 AM. I crept through Sydney at a pace that would make snails laugh at me. The city turned out to be so enormous that I started wondering if I was already halfway to Perth before I’d even made it out of the suburbs. I pointed the GPS toward Goulburn instead of the Blue Mountains. The forecast promised over 40 degrees further north, and while I do enjoy a bit of self-inflicted suffering, I do have limits. Riding in 38°C instead of 42°C isn’t exactly “cooler” – but self-deception is a cornerstone of endurance cycling.
The suburbs around Sydney – Liverpool, Campbelltown – were packed so tightly it felt like one never-ending city. Red light after red light, as if the traffic signals had entered a personal conspiracy against me. After what felt like decades of waiting, I had only managed a pathetic 85 kilometers and rolled into Picton. Calling it a “small town” would be generous – if you blinked while cycling through, you’d miss the whole place.
I found a room that was “cheap and decent” – civilization’s way of saying “don’t expect much.” I spent the entire evening adjusting the bike’s gears. The derailleur hanger had decided to test my patience by bending in the most annoying way possible. After hours of swearing that would make a sailor blush, I got it to work. Success is in the small victories.
The next morning, I started with the sun. Hot air balloons floated majestically across the landscape – a scene that would’ve felt more idyllic if I wasn’t already sweating down my back at 6 AM. 06:00. I filled my lungs with air that already felt like it had passed through a hair dryer, and continued pedaling toward Goulburn.
It was hot — not “Norwegian summer at 25 degrees” hot, but “backyard barbecue at Satan’s place” hot. But hey, this is Australia. What did I expect? Penguins and polar bears? The biggest shock wasn’t the heat itself, but the lack of gas stations and rest stops. In Norway, even up north, you’ll stumble upon a station now and then, where you can grab a coffee and something sweet. Here, you can literally die of thirst between one stop and the next.
I made it to Marulan, a place so small it probably doesn’t even have its own Wikipedia page. I bought a cola and ice cream – my sophisticated sports drink and energy supplement – and discovered that it was only 30 km to Goulburn. But the road? It ran along the highway.
There I stood, sweaty and tired, facing a decision: the highway or a 45 km detour. The choice was obvious to anyone with more than two functioning brain cells, but that didn’t stop me from asking a local at the café. He referred me to an older cyclist – probably the closest Marulan had to a bike guru. “Of course you can ride on the highway,” he said, as if I’d asked whether it was okay to breathe. “We do it all the time.” ” With this dubious permission, I ventured onto the highway, half-convinced my last words would be, “But a local said it was fine!”
Surprisingly, it turned out that Australian highways actually have proper shoulders. I felt safer there than on many Norwegian country roads, where the shoulder is often more of a theoretical concept than something that actually exists. I zoomed through the last 30 kilometers to Goulburn, and for the first time that day, it actually felt like I was making progress.
Goulburn greeted me like an oasis in the desert. I checked into the hotel, took a shower that lasted longer than some marriages, and went out to eat. The town, which is supposed to be one of Australia’s oldest inland towns, looked like a mix between a western movie and a British colony. Founded in 1833, allegedly by a guy named Hamilton Hume in 1818 – which makes me wonder what happened in those 15 years in between. “I found this place, but forget about it for a couple of decades.”
As I wandered around Goulburn, with a burger in hand that tasted heavenly after the day’s struggles, I admired the impressive courthouse, which looked as though it was designed to intimidate both criminals and architects. The town had once been a hub for wool and cattle trading, which explained why it still smelled faintly of sheep even in 2023. Byen hadde vært et senter for ull- og kveghandel, noe som forklarte hvorfor den luktet svakt av sau selv i 2023.
St. Saviour’s Cathedral stood as a testament to the fact that even in the wilderness, people needed a place to pray for forgiveness for all the swear words they let slip when the temperature crept above 40°C. I stood there, 170 kilometers from Sydney and over 3,000 kilometers from Perth, thinking: “What on earth have I gotten myself into?” But at the same time, I felt a buzzing excitement – this was the start of something truly insane. And as anyone who knows me can attest, “insane” is practically my middle name. Well, not really, but it should be.
https://www.komoot.com/tour/1994234415
