I arrive in Paraburdoo about 1pm. The road in is a bit annoying - it heads towards the reservoirs up a hill then swings left around the whole ridge, rather than through what looks like a nice valley that goes straight through. So what looks as though it should be a quick last 5km is actually more like 15km. It was hot and I was hungry, so I suppose anything would have annoyed me. The road did nicely.
I arrived and went straight to the mall for lunch and food supplies. The bookshop was pretty crappy, but compared to anything I'd seen in the last week or so, was bibliophile heaven. They even had a sale, and apparently they'd discovered that no one was buying science fiction. So I got some readable stuff quite cheaply. Internet access is available in the library and is free! This shire council is nice, which makes a big change from the previous $11/hr cafes. The librarian is also very nice, and we chat. Since I'm the only one from the ride who's here there's also no pressure of having 15 ferals all wanting to use the two computers, which may also help.
Leo and Chris arrive in the van, the group is camping 10km out of town and will be in tomorrow. They're not keen to ride any further than they absolutely have to. Tom Price is another 80km, so we will spend a day or so here as an action day, then ride to TP, hopefully in a day.
I had a quick wash in the public toilets, sponge bath with hanky and dry in about 10 minutes thanks to the hot dry weather. I camp about 500m out of town behind a tree, and discover that my sleeping bag is a bit fragile. It rips as I pull it out of the bag, which is a bummer. Still, a bit of gaffer tape fixes it up. After a bit of thought I work out that it's a nylon bag that's going on 10 years old now. Maybe I need a newer one? Or at least a new cover.
I spent most of the afternoon on the net, doing email and updating my web site. It's amazing how quickly time passes when you're on a free access... but then I'm not exactly sucking bandwidth here, sending a bit of text back and forward every few minutes is not the expensive part of using the web. As long as you own the PC, that is.