Far in the east, the edge of the world tumbles through space. The horizon — a sharp black silhouette against a thin white slice of sky — splits the night in half, hints at a distant hidden sun. Thousands of stars hang in the endless darkness above, all of history, billions of galaxies exploding forever.
All the way down here, on the surface of the planet, on this long thin stretch of road, all I can hear is the whisp of rubber on the bitumen and the regular breathing of my companions. We’re out of our saddles and climbing the last rise before the long, fast descent to the river.
Gravity toys with us as we roll over the crest, shifts its grasp, stops dragging heavily on our back wheels and starts drawing eagerly on the front. It whips up a wind; the pawls in Fore’s hub rasp like a swarm of bees in his wheels. Tears stream down my face which is pressed to the blast, scouting out lines; fingers scream in the cold air and the bitter chill. We flow through the bends like water flowing to the sea — inside shoulder tipping in, outside leg straight, inside knee hanging just so — all the way down without a hand on the brakes.
We roll up to the gate on the water’s edge only to see the ferry pulling away, shrinking into the shadows on the opposite shore, a single white navigation light blinking in the darkness.
My rear tyre is flat; repairs commence, first on land — cold hands are dull, blunt instruments — then crossing the river. The wheel is back on the bike when the ferry’s steel ramps scrape up the eastern bank (lost time: zero minutes) and right away we’re rolling again, up the eastern side of the gorge, breathing more sharply, falling into a rhythm that dispatches hairpins one after another.
It’s along here, suspended halfway between the ridge above and the tiny boats on the green water below, I realise the bush is alive with birds and the gentlest of breezes. A dog is barking. We’re flooded in warmth and morning light. Somehow, between this side of the gorge and the other, night became day, descending became climbing, cold became warm in much the same way a life passes: fleeting, easy to miss, and without ceremony.