Bike SA Annual Tour 2013 KI - These shoes were made for . . . throwing?

I don't think he was getting in our tent!

This day began a little earlier than all the others, as I woke some time in the wee hours of the morning to a "thunk, thunk" against the tent wall. Thinking that the local fauna were being a bit enthusiastic, I went back to sleep. A bit later, I heard it again, except being slightly more awake, I realised it wasn't local fauna, but someone throwing shoes against our tent!

What's in that bag?

Creepy crawlies

Now admittedly, Mr Carl, being ill, was doing a fairly spectacular job with his snoring. However I thought it was a bit of a drastic reaction when a disembodied voice yelled "turn him over, he's keeping the whole camp awake." Not being 100% awake (what with it being night time and all), I simply looked over and realised that Mr Carl was already on his side, so what she said didn't make any sense. 



It was then my brain caught up and I realised she was having a go at him for his snoring, which made me mad. So I yelled back "He is on his side, leave him alone, he's bloody crook!" This unfortunately woke Carl, effectively stopping the snoring. Which left an opening, which the frogs in the pond took up with full gusto!

 

Easy to spot!

 



Suffice to say I was a little grumpy at breakfast, and had planned many terrible things to do to the lady's shoes should they still be there in the morning (they weren't). However there were places to see and riding to be done, so there was no point in staying grumpy.

Not so easy

Today we had a few options, we could see a bird display at Raptor Domain, we could ride the extra 11 km down to seal bay and go on a tour and we could visit KI Spirits. Being that neither of us were feeling all that flash, we decided to head straight to Kingscote, with the priority getting some cold and flu medication for Carl. Thankfully this still involved stopping at both the bird park and KI spirits, which were rest stops for the day.

Almost found them all

The road was pretty cruisy and the weather was smiling on us once again. The Adelaide Cyclist freight train made good use of these conditions to fly along, though illness and interrupted sleep had left us feeling a little fatigued. Still, it's impossible to be too grumpy on a bike and the shoe throwing incident wasn't worth ruining the day over.


 

Disturbingly realistic

Soon we rolled up to the Raptor Domain wildlife park. Carl and I had decided to forego attending the show in favour of getting into Kingscote sooner, however we still had a lot of fun playing tourist. The wildlife park has a really cool game for kids (and grownups) where they've hidden insects around the place and you have to find them. They're not real insects, but some of them were surprisingly hard to see and we had a lot of fun trying to find them all!

Baby Wedgie

Karen and Brett had ridden down to see the bird show the day before and had recommended that we keep an eye out for the rescued wedge tail eagle chick, however when we had first turned up we found the cage but it was empty. Thinking that we were going to be out of luck, we continued to play find the insect, until the majority of riders had either gone in to the bird talk or headed down to seal bay. As we were getting ready to head of, one of the keepers rocked up and she had the wedge tail eagle chick with her. 

Bikes equal happy!

The lady called us over and told us the story behind the chick as she put her back in her cage. She had been rescued from the Northern Territory and was 6 weeks old (I think). She was probably about the size of a large chicken so it was amazing to think about how much she had grown in 6 weeks. Because we were such a small group, the lady invited us to carefully pat the chick. We were all a bit tentative, after all she had a wicked looking beak, but she was gentle and seemed to enjoy the attention. This was truly an amazing moment, having always admired wedge tails as powerful and graceful birds, I was truly honoured by the opportunity to touch one.


 

No matter what the bike

Now that the day had definitely brightened, Carl and I powered along, heading to lunch. We picked up our orange caboose for a while, until the undulations resembled hills a little too much. We were trying to catch Karen, as she had taken off to try and stay in front of Brett (who had gone to seal bay), however she beat us to the lunch stop. It was a bit of a novelty for us being one of the first ones into lunch, rather than the last and we gorged ourselves on baked potato with all the trimmings. 

No cold can stop him!

Soon we were on our way again, chasing Karen and heading to another awesome stop. This time our destination was KI spirits and afternoon tea would be provided with a bit of extra kick! Brett and Karen also managed to turn up and so the four of us set about trying a vast assortment of spirits and liqueurs. This was actually a bit tricky, as we didn't want to put ourselves in a posistion where we were unable to ride, so we chose carefully a few that tickled our fancy. Karen and Brett, having been here before, recommended the honey and walnut liquer. This was delicious, and if we had more room in the backpacks we would have grabbed a bottle of that as well as the KIS lime and ginger bottle that we did take with us. This was a fruity, tart drink that was perfect with tonic water and I can't wait for summer so I can sit outside, relaxing, sipping it and listening to our pond.

Karen really likes honey

Suitably happy, we cruised the final leg into Kingscote and found we had plenty of time for one more stop. On the outskirts of Kingscote is the Honey Shop, which sells all different honey related products based on the islands thriving honey producing business. KI honey is particularly special, as it is made by Ligurian bees and I believe it is the only place in the world where this species of bee still exists as a distinct species. Every effort is made to protect the bees, and no bee related products, including honey, may be brought to the island. The shop also has a display hive where you can see the bees hard at work.

Happy Bees

After some honey chocolate fudge and and honey icecream, we headed into town to the campsite. It was a real novelty having plenty of space to choose from and we even had the luxury of the soft grass on the oval (no subsurface irrigation here). Mr Carl and I tried to choose a slightly more remote spot in consideration of other campers, however as the day wore on, more people chose to camp near us.








I indulged myself in a massage, then Carl and I wandered down to the town centre in search of a chemist. After wandering around aimlessly for a bit we found a map, which indicated that the chemist was up a side street, not something we would have figured out by ourselves.

  

Aussie icon

Having purchased a enough drugs to knock Carl out we wandered back to the city centre to have a bit of a poke around. On our way we caught site of a couple of signs from a notable Australian cycling icons hanging in shed, so I had to grab a picture. I'm sure the locals thought we were daft!

Patience is not a virture for birds

Since we had a bit of time until dinner we wandered down to the beach and eventually found ourselves at the place where there is a pelican feeding display everyday. It was about to start, so we joined the crowd, which included Brett and Karen, and settled in to watch. 

Mr Percival in person

Honestly I wasn't expecting a lot, but the gentleman undertaking the feeding was incredibly knowledgeable and had quite a sense of humour about the whole thing. He probably needed it given the amount of gulls that kept trying to land on his head. He told us quite a bit not only about the pelicans, but also the gulls, including a pacific gull which had joined the feeding. It was a really awesome experience and a far cry from the 5 minutes of watching birds eat fish that I was expecting.

Take off!

Finally we wandered back up the hill to dinner. Dinner was a slightly more gregarious affair, with people making full use of whatever they could find to dress to the theme of pirates vs frocks! We were entertained by local musicians and enjoyed the party atmosphere, however we were both still a bit worn out due to illness and opted to head to bed early. We fell asleep to the sounds of the party kicking on and the knowledge that numerous people, many years our senior, were partying so much harder than we could! 

A festive affair

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