A random email...
Dave, how are things.
I've been told that i look like you on several occasions. Some think
so more than others. One person in particular asked me to give them
advice or a little inspiration. I think she was hoping for something
you said before or something you might say to her. I've seen your show
once or twice but that was a long time ago. When this happens again,
what can i say to them? just to fullfil the illusion in their head
that they're talking to you. My name is Darragh and i'm from Cork City
in Ireland. Ive been sighted as you in Galway, Dublin, Cork and
Cardiff.
Cheers Dave!
Darragh
This guy obviously thinks I'm someone else. Suitably confused but full of mischief, I reply...
Hi Darragh,
My girlfriend is very excited at the prospect of there being two of us! Mate send me a picture of you, I want proof of our likeness!
Dave
I don't even have a girlfriend. A day later...
 Dave,
Ive attached my passport photo and another. I'll let you or whoever be
the judge.
Darragh
Now terrified, I decide not to reply, he clearly thinks I'm Dave Gorman. One day later...
hang on its dave gorman i was looking for......google linked a wrong page......
Darragh
At least life's interesting...
I tell you what, the technology being employed at the Dave Cornthwaite travelling roadshow is just going whizzbang these days. Another 600 and it has to be said immaculately dressed boys and girls from St Stephens High School took the total facecount spoken to into the high thousands today, and the poor souls had to endure an almost-embarassing first minute fiddle with a wireless remote used to shift my slides backward and forwards, they'd seen the first four slides before I'd even started, which was marvellous. Once I'd gotten the hang of it, and therefore relieved of the static burden of my laptop mouse, I was bouncing around chatting about the joys of longboarding, microphone in one hand and picture-flicking remote in the other, gross images of my feet causing reverberating groans throughout the substantial hall. It was a veritable circus of gaffaws and stunned silences, the latter of which was probably best summed up by a young lad in row number two who was snoring quite heavily for the best part of an hour. This, bar any last minute additions to the schedule before I fly home next week, was the last talk of the tour and I walked out feeling a bit sad. But there's no time for wallowing, so much good has come from the past six weeks and now I'm prepared to hit the ground running in the UK in time for the launch there, shame the ground's going to be a bit soggy for a little while, mind.
 With the St Stephens heads of school after the talk.
What a suberb day. Nat Cleator, my surrogate mother, sister and driver, shepherded me back up to the Redlands area in Brisbane for another two talks both organised by Steph Pearce, who was present at the Vic Pt. Library talk on Tuesday and decided the presentation needed more airing in the area! 1350 teenagers at Victoria Point High School was a warm up for a much more intimate affair down the road, where 120 Year 7s (12 & 13 year-olds) cosied up for 45 minutes at Redland Bay State School. Over the past few weeks the presentation has evolved and it's a real pleasure being able to have an impact on youngsters who are flying through a critically formative part of their lives. At the end of the talk the class President, Hamish, presented me with a present which I unwrapped with gusto to reveal a Redland Bay SS Commemorative Recipe Book, a box of Roses chocolates, and a RBSS stubby holder. Tangible rewards are not what I'm after from these talks, but I realised from their thankfulness that there's a whole lot of value in inspiring our young. I'm in a fortunate position to have a story that can reach out to these kids, and I'm not going to waste that opportunity.
 My laptop waiting for the children to line up...
No talks today, but I went for a skate with young Kye, who is effectively my little brother over here, and we spent half an hour gliding along the roads of Hope Island grinning at each other. He was all wobbly on a board when the BoardFree team left the Gold Coast in late January last year, but now he's fluid as you like, a 10 year-old with style. Am working on a video of our skate, watch this space.
 High five. Low five. Oh, missed.
Great day today. Drove up to Redlands to the east of Brisbane and spoke to a Victoria Point library full of locals, ranging from five years old to eighty five. A box of books and a question and answer session later, I had two more talks lined up for Thursday and a warm glow from meeting two young men who had followed the journey from beginning to end on the website, and today 'wagged' school to come to the talk. Who says BoardFree isn't a positive thing?!
Following a Triple J interview towards the back end of BoardFree Australia I received an intriguing message from a lady at Griffith University on the Gold Coast. Her name was Belinda Beck, and she wanted to study my legs. Today, finally, I found myself at the University lying beneath a large machine which was straight out of Batteries Not Included. Usually reserved for elderly ladies with a generous helping of arthritus, the machine is designed to study bone density and would, I hoped, give me an insight into what BoardFree Australia had done to my poor skeleton. Several more scans later my hips, tibia, spine and heels had been fed a small dose of radiation and I'd read in the patient information booklet that from the age of thirty your bones start to disintegrate. Can't wait to get old. So to the results, and some surprisingly good news. Contrary to popular belief my right calf is only 8mm wider than my left (although the journey did end a whole year ago), and in fact my left leg is stronger thanks to its load-bearing duty on my board. The density of my left heel is 3.87 standard deviations above the mean for a male of my age, which basically means I have the densest left heel in the world. Who knew.
 The albino hulk's trousers just couldn't cope...
A fairly tepid weekend involving eating, sleeping and some beer. I tried to surf on Sunday morning but should stick to longboarding. My shoulders are very pink, apparently the Australian sun doesn't show mercy even if you're wearing a rash vest.
Two talks today, the first is for the Gold Coast Rotary club in the Marriott at Surfers Paradise. It goes down well enough for the secretary to tell me it's one of the best talks they've had (probably says that to everyone), which surprised me, as a bald chap in the front row snored for the final thirty minutes, head rolling around in his hands, dribble, the lot. It was only a thirty five minute talk.
Then onto The Southport School, where Kye Cleator attends. I'm staying with Kye and his family down the road and they're now the proud owners of Eddie the rollsrolls who was on show today pretending to be Elsa. Several hundred little faces looked up and gasped at pictures of damaged feet and long desert roads and Southern Right whales on the Nullarbor. It's always so gratifying talking to kids this age, they're lack fifteen rows of eager sponges, soaking everything up.
It's a mental thing, skateboarding 
'There's Mum and Dad', points Kye, as his Mum takes a picture
There's a Boardsports tradeshow on at the Gold Coast exhibition centre but frankly there are more cats at a dog party. Outside there is one saving grace, the national slalom skateboarding competition. Some of the guys from Mossjam in Melbourne are here, and some new faces. Several books are purchased and I take Eddie the BoardFree backup rollsrolls down the slalom course, video cameras in tow. That was nice.
Some things you just can't explain. This morning we pack up Aggy for the final time, and away she goes, seemingly fit as a fiddle. No speed issues, fuel consumption is up, we're flying. But now, typically, we're out of our way and Brisbane is beyond us. 1500km away, and less than two days to do it. Our hand has been forced, and let's face it, who knows what else is around the corner where the van is concerned. She's done us so well, hiccupping yes. but we've circled south eastern Australia and had a ball, she's just not equipped to take us further. We leave Aggy in a Kensington VW garage, and walk away, forlorn yet free.
Kate is heading to Melbourne for a much needed holiday. She's been amazing, making up for my license-less existence, driving 4500km in three weeks, seeing Australia for the first time amidst the rush of a book tour, through the windscreen of a Kombi full of character as I snored and read and navigated and failed miserably to beat her in general knowledge and film games. She's had her moments, mind, like buying pillow cases twice as large as the pillows! Yesterday we were heading to Queensland, on wheels. Just a few hours later I'm hugging Kate goodbye in Sydney before stepping in between two wings and hopping 1000km north. It took three and a half weeks to skate. For $79/£35 it took me an hour. Hello again, Gold Coast.
750km yesterday without bother, and the first ten today were much the same. And then the old BoardFree devil struck. Aggy began to struggle. Back to Hay we went, and out again after a check-up. Then the same trouble, so back to Hay for a deeper mechanical inquisition. And that didn't help, so I made a judgement call. Talks awaited in Brisbane but we're never going to get there like this, so our options are now reduced to one, we head back to Sydney, and fly.
So we took a different road, as the one to Brisbane didn't seem to want us. But eastwards to Sydney was going to be a slog. Still 1000km to go, much easier in a van than by skateboard, granted, but poor Aggs had lost her will and slowly the hills began to test. By the time the sun has begun to fall we're barely pushing 20kmph hour uphill, 80kmph maximum on the flat. The only joy we get is downhill, where gravity takes hold, but the only capable garage en route is in Wagga Wagga and they're rammed. Our luck is not in, and frankly I could skate faster than this. It's about turn for the book tour, and I need to get on a plane ASAP, can't afford to miss these events.
Parked up at Yass car park, last night in Aggy
Time to move out. Brisbane beckons and we have Australia's heart to cross, the guts, they call it. Temperatures of up to 40 degrees threaten as we leave Adelaide behind and plough on down straight and long highways, past the Wolf Blass winery, a lush and well sprinkled oasis in the middle of a yellow, thirsty land. We cross the Murray River a number of times, a wide and beautiful snake, mellow in its southerly attitude. Another border comes up and we jump out for a photo with the sign, graffit'd to hell, flies invading our personal space ruthlessly. We get back into Aggy, and speed away. Well, speed might be pushing it, but by the end of the day we're back in New South Wales, bedding down in Hay. The town, not the yellow stuff.
See ya later, South Australia
This morning I paid a visit to an old foe. At the entrance to Thorpe Street in Mitcham, South Adelaide, myself and some of the BoardFree team jumped in the air for a photograph early one October morning. Unfortunately a fairly sharp spike of metal bent out from the base of the Thorpe St signpost was all that my left foot landed on, and the resulting injury needed a couple of stitches and required two weeks of rest. I didn't hang around for long today, although the sign and the offending piece of metal were still there the 40 degree heat and the somewhat embarrassing fact that I was filming a signpost all by myself quickly hit home. Memories recalled, I skated away on Elsa, who hadn't been anywhere in sight when I gained my most severe injury on BoardFree Australia.
Self explanatory really. The foot of the Thorpe St sign, and the foot, fifteen months on...
The Sailability session at Adelaide Sailing Club was cancelled today, because a sealion was on the pontoon. Can't really add much to that, except to say I met up with my good friend Chris Riordan, who naturally turned up half an hour late for my talk at Adelaide Sailing Club. A pleasant crowd turned up thanks to Deirdre Schahinger's persistent advertising and I waffled on about BoardFree for a while before speeding north to Chris' house. On the way, Chris piped up, 'Stop at the junction, then turn left, and Dave’s going into the bottle shop to get some beer.’
With Deirdre Schahinger, Chris Riordan and Bob Schahinger
Last time I was in Glenelg was my birthday, late October 2006. Lying there on a high street bench was a book bearing an inside-cover inscription suggesting that whoever found the book should read it, then leave it in another public place for someone else to enjoy. Today, back in Glenelg, I decided to set a BoardFree book on a similar journey. I wrote a note on the inside cover, then left it on a bench and watched from afar. Slowly I realised that you can't give books away. Well, my book, anyway! For an hour and a half, and from three different bench locations, goodness knows how many members of the public noticed it, some picked it up, but none took it. One group of three young lads even looked through it for about two minutes before thrusting it down. Demoralised, Kate and I drove home and at a set of lights I caught a couple in a neighbouring car eyeing up the decals on the side of the van. 'Is that you?' the guy pointed.
'Sure is, would you like a book?' They paused, eyeing up the $25 price on the van, so I jumped in, 'for free!'
'Yeah!' said the lady as we both pulled away, and I handed over the book at about 5kmph.
Fingers crossed they abide by the rules.
 
Rest day. Or rather, Escape From The Sun Day. It's pulling mid thirties in Adelaide and the pommies can't take the heat. It's cooler in the evening, mind, and we venture into town for a meal with Renato Costello, who covered BoardFree for the Sunday Mail when the journey came through town and will be doing a piece on the book sometime shortly. The Adelaide Fringe kicks off this evening, too, and the festival - held in the wonderfully titled Garden of Unearthly Delights - is almost utopian. So peaceful, even beyond the silent disco in which headphoned folk swayed to the music that only they could hear. In the UK, I daresay the grass would have been considerably layered in discarded Carling cans and the air filled with a more than occassional drunken roar. It all serves to reinforce what is apparently a controversial viewpoint, that Adelaide would be home of choice were I to move to Australia. Public transport leaves something to be desired, though; on a Friday night the railway station was eerily quiet, not to mention devoid of trains.
Very warm day, we trundle towards Adelaide, through yellow, drought-ridden hills, over the Murray at Wellington, into the South Australian capitlal as the sun dipped into the Gulf St Vincent. There are a lot of memories in this city, some good, some not so much, but we're staying with Bob and Deirdre Schahinger, who became the team's surrogate parents when we passed through in '06, so we're in a home away from home just a kilometre away from the dreaded metal spike that kept us in Adelaide for so long. The scar on my heel throbbed a little as we pulled into Mitcham, spooky.
Skating onto the ferry that took the team across the Murray in October '06
We have until 2pm to get to Mt Gambier, just across the border. Three hundred pupils at Grant High School are expecting an afternoon talk, so it is with great dismay that we run out of petrol for the third time this journey. Aggy does about 370km to the tank and has a limp fuel guage, Kate and I are not quite up to speed with her consumption yet. But no fear, there's an emergency can in the back, so I fill up as a stray roadside cow looks on curiously, and then we hotfoot to the school.
When we arrive half an hour early it becomes apparent that we are totally dim when it comes to Australian time changes. It takes quite a pair to travel through the entirety of Victoria without realising that the clock went forward an hour upon leaving New South Wales. The clock turns back thirty minutes when crossing into South Australia, so now we're ten and a half hours ahead of the UK and utterly confused. The talks go well though, two lots of 150 kids spreading themselves out on the carpeted floor of the drama room as cinema-size images of the BoardFree journey flick from Perth to Brisbane, the young audience gasps when mngled pictures of my feet appear. 'Can you get their reaction on the video camera?' I ask Kate, who comes up to me afterwards with a confession,
'I was filming, and wondering why it was so dark, and I got their oohs and ahhs, but the lens cap was on.'
Going to be interesting to edit, that one.
Speaking at Grant High School
In mid September 2006 Doug Thorne and friends were driving 4x4s across the Nullarbor, and at Caiguna Roadhouse Doug suggested that Danny from the BoardFree team got a haircut, 'You need some scissors on that, snakehead,' said Doug, nodding at Danny's mohawk. Six weeks later Doug and his wife Jill were cooking up a BBQ storm for the team in Mt Gambier, and more than a year on we're recreating the scene. I'm handed the beer cooler I had last time (World's Greatest Dad!?) and a disgustingly large plate of meat, and then sink into a state of bliss.
We're off again, south out of Melbourne and around Port Phillip Bay, a quick scone breakfast in Geelong and then we career onto the Great Ocean Road, stopping off at the Surfworld Museum in Torquay to sign the long loan papers for Elsa, who willl sit quietly in the middle of a BoardFree Australia exhibit for at least a year. The board will remain with me for the duration of this tour, but I'll post her back to Torquay from Sydney once we're done.
The memorial arch near Lorne
Through Anglesea and Lorne, Apollo Bay and Lavers Hill, memories of four hard but exhilerating days of skating flooding back as the road winds and dips around cliff edges and through forest. The Great Ocean Road is sublime, the world's largest War Memorial commemorating Australia's dead and injured from the First World War, the road built by survivors of the conflict. And what a memorial, it's driven by thousands each day, would be near impossible to knock of the top spot of a list of scenic tourist routes. And drenched in sunlight, much unlike the stormy, wet weather that dampened the picture postcard appeal last time around, the coast basked in glory. We stop at Port Campbell and bed down for the night. Next stop, South Australia.
The Great Ocean Road
Explored Melbourne having failed to experience the city last time I was here due to a need for rest and sleep. The centre is neat and tidy, an air of sophistication given an Aussie edge by the occassional bare-torso'd man in boardies just strolling along the main street. Horses pull carriages alongside state-of-the-art electric trams, and probably the busiest place in Melbourne (when the cricket isn't on) is the front of Flinders Street Station, from which emerges a couple of hundred people every minute or so, fresh from what must be one of the best train networks in the world.
Flinders Street, in the last century?
In the evening Gael joined Kate and I in St Kilda, and we ventured into what many people would consider to be the pits of despair. Others, though, mainly young British backpackers and tourists, treasure the Monday night event within the Elephant and Wheelbarrow - we, feeling like Grandparents, stroll into the Neighbours Guest Night, and recall our student days for about two hours before Alan Fletcher, who plays Dr Karl Kennedy in the soap, dragged us outside for a chat. He was happy to do the same for the BoardFree team as we passed through in a slightly more fatigued state 14 months ago, and to repay his kindness I have a copy of the book for him. He looks at it, then at me, then at it, then gives me a big hug. 'Mate,' he says, 'you did well.'
Kate, Dave, Fletch and Gael at the Elephant and Wheelbarrow
Jumped on a train and spent the morning with a bunch of skaters rolling around a long drain in Springvale. Had my hand shaken a lot of times and began to turn pink from the sun.
Rob 'Wedge' Francis takes Elsa down the drain
St Kilda festival in th afternoon, hundreds of thousands of very tanned people in all manner of hats. I was the only pink one there. Met up with uni mate Gael Evans who was there on the day I rolled into Land's End (his picture, below, is in the book) and watched in awe as hundreds of people sat on a grass bank cheered in delight for hours on end as frisbees and aussie rules footballs were kicked into the crowd and returned with gusto. Gael made use of his 6 foot 5 frame and casually plucked an errant disc out of the air, drawing a standing ovation from half of Melbourne. Had this been the UK the authorities would have cut the party short on safety grounds. The police here joined in. Wonderful, wonderful day, topped off by several book sales generated through admirers of Elsa, my board, who is enjoying her last days in my company before taking stock at the Surfworld Museum on the Great Ocean Road.
Heading to Land's End, by Gael Evans on the 2nd June, 2006
Restful day. Didn't sell any books. Went to the Regent Theatre and watched Priscilla Queen of the Desert. Superb production, sat separate from Kate and Lesley, our wonderful host and procurer of tickets for said show. Thing is I was sat alone watching Priscilla, clutching a three inch high heel made from chocolate
and Daquiri in a flashing neon glass. Woke up in a hot flush later that night having dreamt I was a drag queen.
It's time for another big city. Dull light as half grey clouds parade the horizon, much colder than it was when I skated in the opposite direction 14 months ago. Through Bairnsdale and past the layby where the team celebrated the 4000km mark of the journey with 40, 00 and km etched in marker pen on three voluntary sets of buttocks. Recreated a moment from this stretch in front of a 'Powernap' roadsign, and spent the rest of the journey through Stratford into Sale remembering chats with my brother, who had turned up unexpectedly and cycled the 76km to Bairnsdale alongside his big bro.
Was there ever a more apt sign?
A fairly lazy day in Lakes Entrance, pottering around before heading to Nautilus floating restaurant in the evening for a signing. Fairly small showing, but a few books were shifted, including two to a wonderful elderly couples who got through the first two chapters over pudding. Jodie and Sheryl, who heard about BoardFree on the radio as we headed towards Lakes in November '06 then cheered us in and cooked up a traditional ozzie BBQ for the team, were yet again on top hosting form. A handful of kids milled around clutching a personalised copy each and using Elsa as a toboggan. Probably the first time I've signed a book on a boat.
The young whippersnappers from Lakes Entrance
Meandered down the remainder of the coast, flogging books at every stop; suf shops, sports shops, bike shops. A couple of Scottish teenagers get a copy, as did our campsite manager at Bermagui. Feels great, working through another box. In Eden, our last stop before the road twists west into Victoria, the local surf shop didn't want any copies because, we were told, books aren't popular in Eden. Odd that, considering it's the scene at the beginning of the bestselling book ever, who said Australia doesn't have any history? Outside the surf shop a heavily bearded man scratched his neck with the handle of an umbrella, and two rough old roadside workers pulled up alongside us in the Caltex and asked, 'are you the guy who skateboarded across Australia?' At my nod the driver smiled, 'I heard about you, right there on the side of your van.'
And so into Victoria and the winding and dipping of the Great Dividing Range. The sun is out today and for the first time we feel like we're on a roadtrip, eating away at the kilometres and staring boss-eyed into endless forests. And then, 75 km west of the border, there's a settlement. If two words ever filled the BoardFree Australia team with dread during the skate, they would have been 'Cann River.' Crouching in a valley, there are three roads out; to Canberra, to Eden, and to Melbourne. Once upon a time in late November 2006 I rolled up outside the Cann River Motel four days after leaving Melbourne and my right foot promptly swelled up a fair size larger than its compatriot. The journey adopted a state of limbo as the team convinced me that sitting on my board and pushing with hands wasn't a good idea. And thus begun the most depressing stage of my life, bar that late day in 2000 when I managed to lose about 100,000 words of my first book. Yes, Cann River, momentous, yet deserving of a well erected middle finger.
The dreaded Cann River Hotel We push on as the Great Dividing Range licks at Aggy's exhaust, through Alfred National Park where the team did their utmost to lift me on a hard day's slog over the hills; Becs and Holls flashing (but only after Bec nearly blinded Holly with her bra strap) and Simon strutting around camply in a bikini and hawaiin shirt. Then past Orbost where the majority of the team's arachnophobia became apparent thanks to a mighty ceiling-hugging Huntsman, and finally to Lakes Entrance where Sheryl from Kickback Cottages had a pizza in the oven and wine and beer in the fridge. Welcomes don't come much better than this, little Dylan had been waiting at the gate gasping at every car in case it was us - feel slightly guilty for turning up so late!
Hello Victoria!
Speeding down the south coast, through very English countryside and even more British weather. Lost count of the people who have mentioned that we brought the rain with us. Sell a few books to people along the way, including Tyron in Narooma who owned a skateshop back in '06 and made a good donation. Great to see an old face, even if I knew it for all of five minutes a lot of months ago. Stopped for the night in Bermagui, where the campsite owner promptly bought a book with a gasp of recognition, 'didn't you have a great group of girls with you last time?'
'Yep, Becki, Bev, Holly, Laura and Kate, I think they were round here selling wristbands and t-shirts when we passed through...'
'Ah that's right, great girls.'
With Tyron in Narooma, early December 2006
The rain is pouring down and we're living a slightly damp existence as Aggy growls her way south. Through Nowra and Kiama, down the hill that was so steep I tore the crotch out of my trousers in front of a queue of jammed vehicles, up and down undulating terrain, pointing gleefully to the laybys where I once pulled over and doubled over, gasping for air. Seems like someone else did that journey, everything is so different now. We camp up in Lake Conjola Entrance Tourist Park, home of lazy kangaroos and bright red parrots. Stayed here Monday 11th December 2006, just five days from Sydney and a new world record. It rained that day, too.
'Dave, why aren't they bouncing?' Kate and the roos at Conjola
Up early for Breakfast on the Beach, hosted on North Beach Woolongong by WaveFM. Sold a few books before the skies opened and we were forced inside, poor Aggy crying and forcing us to catch her tears with little empty bottles.
Our mobile bookshop is working well
A restful afternoon at the house of Len, Carol, Emma and Amy Snowdon. Len lost an arm and a leg in a train accident a few years back and is a member of the local Sailability and the Disabled Surfers Association. Kate was stretching her legs in front of Len, who llooked at her and said, 'you wanna see a proper leg stretch?' before promptly pulling his prosthetic up over his head. Genius.
With Len Snowdon at North Beach, Woolongong
Aquaskipping has become a hobby of mine ever since a newspaper article about the human powered hydrofoil extracted a rather bizarre first thought: I wonder if I could cross the Channel on one of those?! Well, it's not quite the Channel, but four months on from my last Aquaskip on that fateful day in Hove Lagoon (see www.bouncefree.org.uk for the rundown) here I am in Sydney with Bob and Andrew from Aquaskipper Australia, watching Andrew take on some ridiculously large waves at Bondi (I wimped out, quite like being in one piece) and then moving on down to the calmer Redleaf which is just Aquaskipping heaven. Enclosed swimming area with two pontoons, ah it was good to be back in the water drawing confused glances from all and sundry.
Aquaskipping at Readleaf, Sydney
And then to Journeys Bookstore in Annandale, where I was fashionably fifteen minutes late for my first ever book signing. Outside BoardFree took pride of place in the window, a blackboard anounced my presence, and completely overwhelmed I took to the stairs and apologised profusely to the gathered crowd. Alex and Connor were there, Connor has Lowe Syndrome and is undoubtedly the star of the book (well, chapter 23 anyway!) and immediately made friends with Elsa (my board) again, rolling around as I chatted and answered questions. I've been waiting for this since I sat down with my first journal in Uganda, 1999, and finally I have my own book on the shelves. Lucky lucky boy.
If Carlsberg dressed windows, they would probably look like this..
Afterwards, after an embarassing loss of petrol in the middle of one of Sydney's main arteries, Kate and I drove south to Woolongong, the journey has begun.
BoardFree launches today.I find a copy in Dymocks, tucked away in the sports section, even in bookshops the categorisers can't read 'travel writing' on the back! An hour-long interview with TNT Magazine in Sydney's centre preceeded a wonderful early evening courtesy of Sailability Rushcutter's Bay. It was here on December 3rd 2006 that I battled with demons that had chased me up the coast, and then resolved to continue to Brisbane after Bev Blackburn (the angel-voiced member of the support crew) opened up her guitar and sung the journey's song, Rolling to Brisbane. There was the spot where she sat, with the Harbour Bridge arching in the distance, all around people watched and listened. I was stood over there, silent tears pouring down my cheeks. That song convinced me to go all the way to Brisbane. Of all the things I looked forward to prior to this book tour, I didn't consider the depth of emotion each revisited memory would hold.
A BoardFree boat at Sailability Rushcutters Bay, Sydney
Neil and Emily joined us and Sailability led two boats (now logo'd up in BoardFree colours) amongst hundreds in the Friday night twilight race, the harbour water lapping greedily, the unsure sailors amongst us taking our time to get used to the fact that heavy tilting wasn' t going to result in an early bath. Afterwards I was giving the mic for a few seconds to promote the book, and we emptied one and a half boxes, the first copies of BoardFree sold in Australia. Talk about glowing inside...
With the wonderful people at Sailability
Aggy the van has now completed the Tour team and we all set off for Bondi this afternoon with Neil and Em, Aggy's owners. The book officially launches tomorrow, and fittingly I had my first interview this time around with ABC Goldfields Esperance from WA, who followed the journey all the way after we passed them in Kalgoorlie right back at the beginning of September 2006. Been burying my nose in laptop today organising media and getting things ready, I'm not sure it will feel like the tour has begun until we drive south down the coast on Sunday.
Neil, Emily, Kate, Sydney, Elsa and Aggy, the current BoardFree team!
I wake early and skate in perfect light around Rushcutters Bay, then up a huge hill that brought the memories flooding back - one year on I can still do it, the only difference now is that at the top of a climb I feel like dying. I had my camera and tour mascot Sydney Treeswinger with me, and perched him on a railing for an obligatory shot with the harbour bridge and opera house in the distance. He's fixed with a permanent smile, little monkey.
Sydney Treeswinger, the tour mascot. He's rubbish at sightseeing...
There's something about jetlag that makes life slightly unbearable without a mid afternoon nap. That done, though, I found myself wandering into Ariel bookshop in Paddington, Sydney, and to my delight found BoardFree on the shelves. It's not out until tomorrow, but it's a proud moment nonetheless.
My book! On the shelves! For the first time! Ariel bookshop, thank you!
Having spent six months in Sydney surrounded with a support team dedicated to BoardFree, it was a slightly empty feeling driving into town from Kingsley Smith this morning. Memories around every corner, like the tree that sheltered us from the sun during Christmas '06, the giant fruit bats whirling over Rushcutters Bay at dusk, a vague fatigue that dulls everything - or though this time it was from the flight, not four months on a board. Well, I'm back, and this time with a new team member in Kate Vere-Hodge (poor girl's only known me for about two months and she's been roped into coming to Australia with a near-stranger), but oddity aside we have a job to do, the book launches in just a couple of days. It's time for a new journey although I'm glad to report there is some familiarity this time around, as my board Elsa demanded to come back with me and see the roads from the comfort of a van. She's going to end up in the Surfworld Museum in Torquay, Vic, bless her cotton wheels...
Elsa in Rushcutters Bay, Sydney. Nice sticker, that...
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