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I knew there were two bridges on the way, I knew they were going to be bad, I had planned a strategy to get help, or a truck, but I was onto the first one almost before I realised it and besides, there was no-one around and a line of cars not far behind me, spur-of-the-moment time….skinny rail tracks on shaky sleepers, shee-it…..I rode on. <br /><br />On each side of the tracks were planks, two wide (about 350 mm total) rough-cut, unfixed, splits, cracks, uneven heights, nasty gaps, all balancing on randomly placed and spaced sleepers….….on my right was the rail track with a six inch drop to the random sleepers, to my left the random sleepers and the remains of a “safety” rail, wouldn’t have stopped me from plunging over, it is simply, a railway bridge, the facility for pedestrians and vehicles, a temporary afterthought by desperate people.

BOCAS BRIDGES AND BRAVE BIKIES

Bill Shum
2006-08-21 17:10:19

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I knew there were two bridges on the way, I knew they were going to be bad, I had planned a strategy to get help, or a truck, but I was onto the first one almost before I realised it and besides, there was no-one around and a line of cars not far behind me, spur-of-the-moment time….skinny rail tracks on shaky sleepers, shee-it…..I rode on.

On each side of the tracks were planks, two wide (about 350 mm total) rough-cut, unfixed, splits, cracks, uneven heights, nasty gaps, all balancing on randomly placed and spaced sleepers….….on my right was the rail track with a six inch drop to the random sleepers, to my left the random sleepers and the remains of a “safety” rail, wouldn’t have stopped me from plunging over, it is simply, a railway bridge, the facility for pedestrians and vehicles, a temporary afterthought by desperate people.

This bridge must be a kilometre across, sweat blinding my eyes, shaking and stuttering, trying to keep enough momentum to go straight but slow enough to avoid the cracks and broken planks, trying to find footholds on the sleepers, my mouth is so dry, jaws clenched, no two ways about it, I am shitting myself, pure terror, the drop off to the left is inconceivable, eventually I miss a sleeper with my foot and drop it, luckily across the tracks, there was absolutely nothing on the left side to have stopped me and the bike going over. Magically, there’s a guy standing right there!…he waits all day in a little set-back directing traffic from one side at a time to cross, he helps me get the bike up but the front wheel is across the track…we try to lift it across, I’m shaking so much I can barely hold the bike, the cars and trucks are backed up, some horn work!…finally one of the drivers comes up and we lift it across onto the planks…I am really doubting if I can go on, I ask them if they can help me walk it across, only another 500 metres!…they can’t, the traffic is getting stroppy, ...