May 26: This may go down as the longest day of the trip. 12 hours on the Green  Hornet and I made it about 500 miles north.

The ride was beautiful, and I timed traffic through urban areas well enough to avoid too many hold ups. A little behind schedule due to the previous day’s mishap, and I elected to push into Airlie Beach on the Central Queensland coast.

This would require me to work into the dusk hours slightly, an ill advised move judging by the high volume of roadkill possum and kangaroo in the ditchs lining National Highway A1.

Fool me once, fool me twice…

I made the crucial mistake of settling for Caltex fuel again. I was running very low between Rockhampton and Mackay, and had no choice but to top off with the low grade fuel one more time. Sure enough, the Green Hornet resisted a few miles in. I thought I had fouled the spark plug when the bike came to a sputtering halt, but thankfully it turned over with a little time to flush through. I topped off again at the nearest BP and made my way daintily (55mph) through nightfall to Airlie.

Tomorrow my first order of business is to get a spare fuel can filled to the brim with fresh BP.