One thing about classrooms - they don't seem to have mosquito netting installed. We spent the night sleeping on bean bags and cushions (those who got in first, anyway) entertained by an apparently endless supply of whining bugs. Which led to another slow start, awake at 6:45am but not ready for anything until after 8am (we had to be out of the classroom by then...
Erin and Jonas were deputised to go and find Ray the principal and discuss our plan for the day. We ended up doing an assembly presentation to the whole school then doing more detail to the older kids in smaller groups. At least, Bindi and Ray did the presentations and the rest of us tried not to mumble too much. It was a bit of a shock to me to be back in a primary school environment, and seeing the style of teaching they used. I remember why I didn't like primary school now :-)
Our presentation developed pretty swiftly into a pattern, thanks to Bindi and Jonas - she presented the introduction, we all said /showed where we're from using a map of Oz, Bindi talks about the trip, where we're riding and a mention of why (politically sensitive in some places, not Bidyadanga), then Jonas shows what's in his panniers. Jonas is good because he has hardly any gear (two panniers) and it's all new and tidy. Evan or me doing that would take... some time. I think he's got more stuff than I do, but it might be a close call.
After each wee talk we let the kids ride round on our bikes. Well, everyone else does, the trike is 5km back up the road still, much to the disappointment of various people. Kids are great at testing bikes, anything that is likely to break probably will.
After school I took a trip to the beach in Shawn's 4wd. It's only 20kms or so, but it's all sand so I was glad we didn't bike. The beach is dunes and corrugated coastline at its best, sand driving skills are definitely required. We drove along the coast for a while to find a swimming spot, because the tide goes out a couple of km and it wasn't high tide. We swam in a wee tidal creek and played round for a while.
Towards evening we finally got it together to leave. Well, in theory anyway. Naima had volunteered to ride the tandem, but was clearly not actually going to leave any time soon. So I decided to get a lift back to the trike and ride it out of the gravel road then see whether she'd arrived yet. The gravel was easier going out, perhaps because I had an idea of how far it was and also I knew it was going to get easier as I went. Anyway, 7 kilometres of gravel didn't seem particularly bad. I arrived at the seal just as the sun was setting, leading to (another) great sunset. I have to recommend the west coast if only for that reason, you get great postcard sunsets as the sun drops below the sea.
The seal was less fun, Naima didn't show up so I was riding the loaded tandem by myself. I also had the tyres quite soft and was running a Haro on the back (only rated to 70psi) so it was a bit hard going. Also my expectations were inflated a little by the flatness of the road and my old mountain bike touring speed being around 25-26kph on the flat. On the tandem I was struggling to average 19kph.
The sunset also meant that the group was not ready to eat until 9pm. Given the lack of sleep the night before plus the early morning I was starting to feel uncomfortable. Started thinking about camping away from the group so I can sleep earlier, and maybe having dinner/ snack at about 6pm.