Lake Charlegruk to Nhill

 
Lake Charlegruk to Nhill = 85km
Cummulative total = 528km

We woke this morning to a lovely fine morning and there was a little bit of fog on the lake. 

We had brekky and managed to get away before 8am.  The road to Kaniva is straight north from here and only 48km.  We knew there was going to be a westerly blowing and so it would be a cross wind and fortunately for us the bulk of the ride on this road was sheltered from the trees and shrubs and the cross wind didn't really affect us until the last 15km where it was more open.
The view was either wheat fields, drying out canola fields, sheep paddocks or shrub land.  Neil did manage to jump over the fence to pick a wheat granule to show me that it still had moisture in it ... I thought now why did he do that does he think I am a city girl that doesn't know about wheat?!!!

The road was good to travel on although the traffic was horrendous - I tell you I am surprised there wasn't an accident today on this road ...

LOL peak hour aye!
So as you can see from the photo it is a very nice road to ride along.  There wasn't much of the Little Desert National Park to go through as most of it was a few kms either side of the road.  But every now and then you got a glimpse or taste of it alongside the road with the stunted trees and heaps of kangaroo tails - in fact to come through here last month would have been spectacular with all the wildflowers - maybe next year?!
Just before our turnoff we came across this road name -

We were making good time coming along here and got to the Western Highway where we either go left for 2km to Kaniva into a raging headwind or turn right for 38km to Nhill into a raging tailwind ... we took the easier option and turned right to Nhill with the raging tailwind!!!
I had a feeling that we might do that as it is a shame to waste the strong westerly that is blowing.  Initially we would have done the Kaniva to Nhill tomorrow via the back roads but decided to take advantage of the tailwinds and brave the Western Highway.  It wasn't as bad as we thought it would be - we had a huge shoulder that was smooth and very little crap in it.  And with the tailwind we sailed along on the flats, had to pedal up the inclines and absolutely flew down the very slight downhills - it took us less than 2 hours with breaks to get there!  And there wasn't much traffic either, or maybe we were just going to fast for them to overtake us!
So here we are at Nhill - the campgroud is okay - they only charged us $15 for a powered site:) has a good kitchen, some shade but close to the main road so I am not sure how much sleep we will get as this is a main truck route for Melbourne to Adelaide and right next door to the campground is the trailer change over area - not quite sure what that is for, but there is a new one just a bit further out of town that they are building but it is not quite finished yet.
We will stay here tomorrow for a rest day.  Despite the tailwind you tend to cycle even harder without realising and I am sure tomorrow we will be a little 'heavy in the legs':)