Tuesday, 28 March 2023, evening // The Ends of the Earth, at the Ends of the Earth
2pm?
1°42‘08“ N
157°10‘1“ W
It is gorgeous.
I’ve been thinking [about you] a lot on this ride. Of marriage and romance and what those mean [to you, and what you wish for yourself.] On a daily basis I think of my grandfather, having written from Christmas Island to a woman in Beaver Falls, Pennsylvania, whom he had never met, asking her to marry him — at Fr. Rougier’s suggestion. By the time he received the last letter from him from her – August, 1918 – it seemed she was more than open to the idea.
Suddenly the distance between me and the water has been cut by half. The tide is coming in. The water is ten feet away.
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I lost all data logged between here and east point.
I left London at 10:55.am. I think I got here around 1pm.
I’m pissed off. I am not pissed off. I’m just upset that I lost all the data regarding getting here. The timing, the fact that my odometer stopped working long before I reached Main Camp, after leaving London and heading east.
The notation about the miles of a double row of coconut palms somewhere east of Joe’s Hill, running perpendicular to the road, and maybe a quarter-mile away, sometimes closer. Sometimes a half mile away.
The notes about the birds, the flock, the eggs.
I’d been working on a watercolor, and because of being unable to see my phone screen well, or read due to the sun, so bright, I somehow deleted all my text. The text I started writing to Robin.
The end of the world at the end of the world! Where I gathered sand for myself, Robin, for Rebecka.
Longitude and latitude?
3:55 PM the end of the earth at the end of the earth Firing up this bike and heading out.
It’s 4:15. Going through that last sooty tern colony was amazing and scary and no doubt they didn’t like it either.
Speedometer starts working right after I left the colony, heading west, at 17 miles.
At 25km. I am on the Aeron runway which I did not see before, it having been on my right as I rode the length of the peninsula. Now it was on my left coming home.
km 27 through 33: Two rows of palm parallel to road on lagoon side.
40.2km Joe’s hill. 5pm
45.1 odometer gives out again just before Carver way. It’s 5 PM.
Casualty report: one egg, one tern.
53.6 km 5:13 PM
Main Camp 5:28 depart JMB Store 5:49 PM – 6:14 PM
odometer broken 61.2 km Day of Rex. Bay of Wrecks Stopped in Tabwakea for corned beef and jelly at the “Chinese” store. Lose both on ride home as they bounced from the basket on the read of my motorcycle. Motherfucker.
Locals call it the “Chinese” store, as the owner, back in Tarawa, 2000 miles away, is of Chinese descent, has a Chinese name. Was
6:45 PM 71 km London
71 minutes