In 1992 I was diagnosed with brain cancer. The procedure to biopsy the mass went wrong and an emergency operation left me with some paralysis.
That was quite a long time ago and despite an initially very poor prognosis I’m still cycling.
My first cycling adventure was immediately after graduating from university when a friend and I caught the train to Grafton in NSW and started cycling north.
When we got to Brisbane I liked it so much that an intended two day stop over turned into four years. I worked for community radio 4ZZZ, an FM rock station with a social conscience and an alternate news service, as their broadcast technician. After a year or so at ‘Triple Zed’ I volunteered to build the first studio and transmitter facilities for Brisbane’s new multilingual station 4EB.
Shortlly after that I moved to Europe for four years where I worked to establish a community radio service in
Back in Australia I settled in Melbourne and was much involved in social change campaigns mainly dealing with environment, peace and social justice issues particularly with RAG [the Rainforest Action Group].
During this period I also worked as an IT manager, teacher and as a volunteer at Broadmeadow and Fitzroy Community Legal centres until my ‘accident’ in 1992.
The highpoint of my activism was I suppose being a member of the ‘Gulf Peace team’ that traveled in 1990 to the border between Saudi Arabia and Iraq along with over 100 other activists from all over the world who considered invading and occupying another country not necessarily the best way to settle international disputes despite how loathsome the leader of the invaded country proved to be.
After my “accident” in 1992 I managed a project to build a water supply system for villages on a tiny volcanic island called Paama in Vanuatu in the South Pacific and worked as the initial coordinator of a Victoria wide advocacy organisation for people with physical disabilities. More recently I’ve worked for the Disability Discrimination Legal Service and as a volunteer for the Asylum Seekers Resource Centre
Over the last five years or so I have slowly cycled all the way around Australia both to keep fit and to promote the idea of ability rather than disability to both myself and others.
I haven’t been in a hurry. I’ve lived as simple a life as I could, trying to make do with what I could carry on my bike. I often stopped for months at a time in places I liked. I spent 6 months in Broome and even longer in St Marys in NE Tasmania. This blog/website covers the nine months in 2008 spent cycling from Sydney to Perth across the Nullarbor.
My first trip to Perth started out pretty well as a whim. It just came to me one day that it would be a good thing to do for my health and physical rehabilitation so I just bought a simple bike, kitted it out as simply as I could and set off. I didn’t even carry a tent, just a water proof fly.
My next trip starting in October will be a fundraiser/promotion for the Freedom Wheels Project run by Technical Aids for the Disabled [TAD] profile in Australia. Details can be found on the onyabike Melbourne to Broome 2010 blog
email steve@onyabike.org
Last updated May 2010
CHECK OUT THE LATEST TRIP PLANNED AT THE FOOT OF THE BIO PAGE