Adventure Race race (XPD Cairns) 24:00:00 [3]
Lake Tinaroo Paddle 15km 1151hrs - 1449hrs
A quick transition and we were onto the boats about 5 - 10 mins ahead of Orion. A non-eventual paddle in the heat where we probably dropped a couple of minutes to Orion.
Trek 60km 1449 - 2055hrs (Tues)
We jogged the first section of this, walking the uphills. Firstly the track we needed was marked differently on the map so we walked back up to the top to re-check. Once we got into the track section all the tracks and ribbons made no sense. We stuffed around in here with Orion for hours before finally taking the track that went in the opposite direction that we wanted. It did finally turn around and go the right way. Orion were ahead of us here after taking the track before us, however we found them at the bottem tucked away in their tent. Unfortuantely Brent had got an infection in his ankle and they made the decision to withdraw, putting us back in the lead. We walked on, while I struggled to stay awake for a while. We couldn't find the next CP at the lookout (great spot with 360 degree views) after not having the course correction. The next section was a 5km off road bash through rain forest to the road,. This took us 5hrs 15mins, but took some teams days! Once on the road we jogged what we could all the way into Cairns for a hard fought victory back at the Ridges Hotel for Champagne and pizza. Phew - that was a long one!