Land Rover 70th gathering

In 1948, the first Land Rovers appeared, initially considered a stop-gap vehicle to get the Rover company going again after the war.  No-one really thought that seventy years later, some of those very early models would still be running, and looking like new on the other side of the world.  In those intervening years, not only did the original Land Rover continue production, it developed a cult following and regular gatherings of enthusiasts are now to be found in all corners of the globe.  I guess it’s appropriate that 70 years should be celebrated.

In Australia, over the Easter weekend, a large gathering of over 900 vehicles quite literally took over the town on Cooma in New South Wales.  Unfortunately Kim and I were unable to attend that particular event but I did manage to make the smaller Queensland gathering in the town of Goomeri (population 664 on a good day) over the long holiday weekend in September.  Over 100 vehicles turned up, from a very early Series 1 right through to the last of the Defenders and some shiny new Discoveries. 

  

A fair sprinkling of military Parenties (the Australian built military variants) and some unusual rarities completed an eclectic collection.  For aficionados that really is a Tickford station wagon, rebuilt from a wreck and the only one in Australia.  And yes, we were one of only two Defender 90s!

    

The gathering was a grand opportunity to chat with other owners, catch up with friends old and new, and compare notes on modifications and adventures.

After a run of almost four hours and I arrived at the Goomeri Showground.  It took longer for me to set up camp than it usually does with Kim and I working as a team, but by early Friday afternoon all was in place and the kettle was boiling ready for a cuppa.  A procession of visitors asking about our set-up lasted until the evening when just for once I was obliged to drive the cooker and prepare my evening meal.  The obligatory pre-dinner G&T was accompanied by yet more visitors.  Everything worked well, even the old tank of gas that we’d used on our Simpson Desert trip lasted until the water was heated for washing up.  Swopping tanks took a couple of minutes, then everything was packed away apart from a glass of Shiraz on hand while I watched the sun go down and the stars appear.

On Saturday I did something I’ve not done for ages, sat down and read the newspaper from cover to cover.  A wonderfully relaxing start to the day.  Then it was time to take a look at the other Land Rovers, join in some chat about things going wrong – and things going right, picking up a couple of ideas for future projects and generally finding out how others enjoy their Land Rover hobby.

As several hundred of finished our dinner on Saturday evening, storm clouds gathered and it was not too long before flashes of lightning and the ominous sound of thunder heralded the imminent arrival of a tropical storm.  There was just enough time to roll up and stow the awning, and pack away the chair before it was upon us.  Lacking the incentive to return to the remnants of the post-dinner gathering I rapidly climbed the ladder and took shelter in the rooftop tent, but not before a fine collection of mud had attached itself to my boots.  But at least I was dry and it gave me time to catch up on a few chapters of my book.

The Sunday morning sky was threatening with voluminous black clouds filling the sky.  I had to pack up the tent to join the parade of vehicles filling the showground so that they could be filmed by a drone – and a great many other cameras too.  Large drops of rain began to fall and so I decided it was time to head back south rather than spend the rest of the day in a muddy field, a sentiment shared with quite a few others.

Four hours later, after a mainly wet drive and a stop in Blackbutt for a rather splendid steak pie, Vin Rouge was parked outside the house and I was getting on the outside of a large beer.  Sadly a shortened ‘long weekend’, but an enjoyable one shared with a lot of fine Land Rover people.

Facts and figures

I like to keep some basic records of our trips.  If you’re interested in such things read on.

We were away for just eighteen days.  Our ‘round the block’ route firstly took us west and north through Mitchell, Longreach and Winton, then followed the Plenty Highway until we dropped south to Alice Springs.  South again for a while before we turned east to the geographic centre of Australia (Lamberts Centre), through Finke and Dalhousie Springs.  Eastward across the Simpson Desert to Poeppels Corner, Birdsville, Windorah, Eulo, Thallon and back to Brisbane.

• Total distance travelled – 5,400 kilometres (3,355 miles).
• Distance across Simpson Desert – 500 kilometres (311 miles)
• Fuel capacity – standard tank 45 litres, second tank 60 litres, two 20 litre jerry cans.
• 
• Fuel used – 637 litres (168 gallons).
• Average fuel consumption – 11.8 litres per 100 kilometres (19.9 miles per gallon) including crossing the desert in low range and lower gears which almost doubled fuel consumption. 
• Breakdowns – only one.  The metal ferrule at the end of a hose that transfers oil under pressure from the pump to the intercooler fractured and was fixed with two rubber ‘O’ rings.
• Failures – Gale force winds broke the sand flag mount and we lost the flag antennae.
• Tyres – No punctures.  We use Cooper Discoverer S/T Maxx tyres.  They’ve completed over 80,000 kilometres and still have serviceable amounts of tread remaining.
• Kim took just over 1,300 photos.

A final list.  The pies available at the Birdsville Bakery.  Not your usual menu I think you’ll agree.

Now it’s time for Vin Rouge to be thoroughly cleaned from top to bottom, ready for whatever we plan next.  In the meantime, here’s wishing you safe travels, distant horizons and wonderful adventures.

Reflections on the Desert

I suppose we had some preconceived ideas about what the desert might look like and what we might see.  In retrospect I guess that we were wrong.  Ok, we’d expected sand and dunes but did not expect to see the abundant growth of plants, shrubs and trees.  In places the greens were quite vivid indicating new growth, a distinct contrast to the gnarled and blackened trunks and branches of the trees.  Even some of the wattle was in bloom (that’s the bush on the right in this picture).

It was not green all the way across the desert.  As we progressed further west, the flora became sparse, the shrubs smaller, hugging the ground for protection.  But even there we found tiny flowers forcing their way through the sand to display their blossom. 

Nearly all the grasses were dry and dead, at least above ground, but they presented interesting shapes whether singly or in clumps.

There’s a sort of tumbleweed that after it has blossomed, dries out, breaks off where it meets the ground and blows about, scattering its seed as it does so.  Plenty of these lodged in tyre tracks and some were large enough to be a potential problem as they can hook onto the exhaust pipe and catch fire.  Fortunately, we were forced to stop only once to shift one of the larger prickly devils out of the way.

We saw little wildlife.  If you look carefully at this picture, there’s a dingo ahead of us, one of only four we saw.  A dingo is a ‘primitive dog’, entirely wild and can be dangerous.  In the Land Rover we did not need to take any particular precautions and eventually the animal wandered off the track to observe us from behind a bush.

We expected to see feral camels.  Apparently, there’s loads of them but we saw not a single one.  We did spot a few brumbies (wild horses) and a couple of goats.  Reptiles?  One skinny lizard, no snakes.  Insects?  Just bull ants.

Bird life too, was peculiarly absent.  Apart from a few Willy Wagtails, some eagles and the occasional small and unidentified bird, the air was absent of life.

There’s something quite magical about the evenings in the desert.  The temperature drops rapidly, so does the sun.  A sort of twilight takes over for quite a while when the fringes between sky and the land turn shades of pink, red and violet until darkness finally takes over.  The sky is huge, lit by millions of pinpricks of starlight.  For us the moon was low on the horizon so the stars were brighter.  Outback television at its best!  It was compulsive viewing.

I must mention sand – we certainly experienced plenty of it.  Colour varied from deep red ochre to almost white, with every shade in between.  Some of the sand was coarse, large grains that provided a grip for our tyres.  At the opposite extreme was the fine stuff, dust like.  It blew about, obliterating tracks and heaped up into soft piles that it was necessary to push through.  The, at times, gale-force winds created mounds in addition to sculpting the harder sand into weird and wonderful shapes.  Loose sand gripped the tyres, taking off forward motion as effectively as good brakes.  And of course, it found its way into every nook and cranny.  Some days we taped up the back door in an attempt to reduce the influx.  It didn’t work.

It’s a popular notion that the track from west to east is easier to travel than the opposite direction.  To be honest, I can’t really say that I could see much of a difference.  Both sides of the dunes seemed to be equally as steep, or maybe it was the result of the winds at the time we were travelling.

We camped two nights, totally alone and the silence was wonderful.  When we turned off our lights, it was not exactly dark and as our eyes became adjusted, it was possible to see sufficiently well.  Problems?  Well only one really.  We’d experienced an oi leak before reaching Alice Springs and thought that it had been fixed.  150 kilometres into the desert, this proved not to be the case.  Our old nemesis, metal fatigue, had caused the pipe that carries engine oil from the filter to the intercooler had cracked, right on the point where it should seal.  I had no option but to disconnect the pipe and take a look.  That’s when the extent of the problem was fully revealed.  It was finally fixed by replacing the rubber ‘O’ ring and adding another one on the outside of the joint, clamping the whole lot together.  It worked and there’s been no sign of leakage since.  Phew!

Overall, we found the experience of crossing the Simpson Desert to be very special and rewarding, although according to Kim, she’s not exactly anxious to repeat it in the short term.

Heading Back East

We’d reached Birdsville, which although a destination point, was still 1,600 kilometres from Brisbane.  There was quite a journey ahead.  But first we took a whole day to relax.

There are two places of note in Birdsville, the pub and the bakery.  We ate well in both.  Sunday roast at the Birdsville Hotel does not disappoint in quality, quantity or price.  And the curried camel pies at the bakery could well be described as a culinary delight.  So much so that we had pies when we arrived, pies the next day and then took a couple with us.  We were so taken with the pies that we forgot to take a picture, so here’s one of the pub instead.

My bush repair on the hydraulic pipe was holding up.  Not a drop of oil was being leaked and I reckoned that it would see us all the way back without a problem.  For once I was right!

160 kilometres from Birdsville is the town of Betoota.  The population is zero, apart from one weekend in the year when the Betoota Races are held and the population suddenly swells to several thousand.  The pub, that has been closed for several decades, is about to reopen so, who knows, maybe Betoota will once again flourish.  It has some inspired artwork to assist.  According to Aboriginal legend, the Dreamtime Serpent is travelling through Mihika country, making pathways connecting the river systems.  It’s rendered here in different types of local gravel.

Overnight camping at Windorah, population 80, was quiet, peaceful and another step towards home.

Next morning, back on the road, we passed a herd of brumbies (wild horses), stopped briefly for coffee in Quilpie, population 574, another brief stop at Toompine, the pub without a town, population 2, scared some kangaroos, wild goats and emus and finished up for the day at Eulo, population 108.  Urban it was not, but in comparison with the Simpson, it seemed almost crowded at times.

Kim insisted on stopping for a photo opportunity.  Can’t think why!

Awake early, we saw another glorious sunrise and once again hit the road.  Cunnamulla was preparing for the annual Cunnamulla Fella festival of bull riding, whip cracking, wool bale rolling and shearing competitions, yee-hah!  We didn’t stop.

A significant rain event was forecast and we didn’t really fancy ending the trip with packing away a soaking tent, so pressed on, instead soaking up the kms through Bollon (possibly a population) to overnight at Thallon, population 292.

The local pub, the Francis Hotel, was welcoming.  The pub is also the post office, information centre, shop, restaurant and social hub.  We ate well, chatted with the locals, had a few glasses and turned in.  Up early for sunrise to see the silo art at its best, we joined a small group of fellow travellers with the same idea.

The silos are huge, some 30 metres high.  The effect is as startling as it is colourful.  The skill required to paint them is extraordinary.  Two street artists, Travis Vinson [known as Drapl] and Joel Fergie [The Zookeeper] completed the work which has attracted tourists to the tiny town and helped to reinvigorate its economy.  It took a lot of paint too – over 500 litres and 500 spray cans.

Our final day was to complete the last 600 kilometres and so we hit the road.  Goondiwindi has a pleasant coffee shop but we didn’t have the time to linger very long.  The area grows vast quantities of cotton and the roadsides were littered with the confetti of cotton tufts blown free from the trucks transporting it.  We wondered why such a loss of product was tolerated.

Kim does have a penchant for interesting diversions and typically she found a narrow, winding road through the foothills of the Great Dividing Range to Stanthorpe, a fruit growing area that claims to be the coldest place in Queensland.  Apple pie at Suttons is a real treat that we enjoyed before setting out on the final leg of our travels.

The sky blackened and just as we completed the steep descent of the Cunningham Gap, the heavens opened and we were deluged with rain.  Not content with that, the elements drummed up a violent thunderstorm followed by heavy hail.  Visibility dropped to a few metres and we stopped until it passed.

Approaching Brisbane we encountered traffic light land.  Stop - go rush hour traffic made driving more hazardous than it was in the desert.  However, we arrived home safely, luxuriated in long hot showers and drew a line under what had been a great adventure.

The Simpson Desert

We’ve made it.  It took three days for us to complete the crossing.  Around 500 kilometres and 1,100 sand dunes apparently – Kim counted every one, but reached a slightly different total.  It was certainly an adventure.

Day one
We set out from Dalhousie Springs heading east into the rising sun which was a bit of a hazard.  But it was not long before it rose high in the sky and we reached the first sand dune.  It wasn’t very big but from the top we could see dune after dune stretching to the horizon.

The sand was soft in places but we made steady and to start with relatively good progress.  A group of three vehicles passed us going west and that was the last we saw until late afternoon.

Kim, as usual, took photos.  She loves plants and flowers.  We’d noticed that the desert was much greener than expected and with a bit of care, all sorts of tiny flowers could be found.

By the time we stopped to set up camp we’d covered 180 kilometres and crossed 345 sand dunes.

That’s when I noticed a growing patch of oil underneath the vehicle.  The repair carried out at Alice Springs had failed and oil was being forced under pressure from around a hydraulic pipe fitting.  After a bit of head scratching and a short discussion about whether we should turn back, I had a crack at a ‘bush fix’.  Then Kim spotted oil leaking from one of the front hubs and a quick check revealed that some the bolts had worked loose.  That was an easy fix but it did prompt me to go around to check if any other fastenings had also worked loose.  I didn’t find any!

Day two
Making an early start the breeze quickly increased to a fresh wind and then a gale.  Sand blew about, wiping tyre prints from the track and building banks of soft sand at the crests. Driving challenging at times as frequently the track would take a sharp turn just beyond the crest where the bonnet and spare wheel reduced visibility to guesswork.  Sometimes it was difficult to determine which was track and which was dune.  Then a gust snapped off the sand flag and we lost it.  Oh bugger.

Kim found more flowers among the desert scrub.  These on the left are called ‘poached eggs’.  We don’t know about the one on the right but reckoned it looked something like a daisy.

About mid-day we stopped at where we guessed was roughly the middle of our journey from Dalhousie to Birdsville and celebrated with a Polo mint!  And the bush fix was working.  Not a drop of oil had been lost.  Celebrate with another Polo.

Our position wasn’t clear so we stopped and took latitude and longitude readings and quickly found a track that took us to Poeppel Corner.  The marker post there showed the corner where three States, Queensland, Northern Territory and South Australia all come together.  There’s nothing else there so we set off to find a place to camp.  We took a track heading north, driving along the relatively flat salt-caked surface of the bone-dry Lake Poeppel.

It was a hard day’s driving for me and an equally hard day’s hanging on and navigating for Kim.  The dunes were much larger with greater distances between them than we had previously experienced.  However, we covered 145 kilometres and crossed more than 450 sand dunes before camping miles from anywhere and miles from anyone.  A hot meal and we retired to the tent to escape the wind.

Day three
The sun quickly warmed a chilly morning and although the wind had abated slightly overnight, it was not a very comfortable sleep in the roof top tent.  Starting early we immediately encountered a very rough track that bounced us around.  Then we were back amongst the dunes.  These were again bigger and very windblown at the tops but we made good progress nevertheless.  And the bush fix was holding.

Kim found more flowers, although how she spotted them with all the bouncing about, counting of dunes and keeping track of where we were in her map book I do not know.

Passing a sign that warned us that Adria Downs Station, a vast cattle grazing area, was private property, a much smaller sign indicated that Birdsville was ahead.

A single vehicle approached us and we waved as they went by, then we noticed that they had turned around and were following us.  We stopped to find out if they were OK and were told that they had driven out from Birdsville in a hired 4-wheel-drive, had no recovery gear and could they follow us back.  No problem and we all made it back safely.

The final sand dune is known as Big Red and it has something of a reputation as being difficult to climb.  Indeed, Kim’s book warned that it should be walked first.  But we’re in a Land Rover and simply pottered gently up to the top.

The drive into Birdsville was dirt road with even a bit of tarmac for relief.  Dusty and more than ready for a shower and a beer, we pulled into the Birdsville camp site, set up, hastened to the amenities block and thence to the iconic Birdsville pub for that beer and dinner.

A bit for Land Rover people
The three-day crossing was completed entirely in low range.  On the flat(ish) clay pans between the dunes we could reach about 40kph in fifth gear which was as fast as comfort would allow.  Most dunes were taken third gear.  When the crests were very soft it was necessary to drop to second but when the dunes were shallow it was possible to get over them in fourth.  But third gear was the favourite.  Low enough to provide lots of power but high enough to maintain sufficient speed.

Where other vehicles had spun their wheels climbing the dunes, they dug holes in the sand.  These holes caused us to bounce up the gradients and to wallow down the other side.  Not once did we lose traction descending and it was often that we had to accelerate downhill to maintain reasonable speed.

There’s no doubt that our short Defender 90 bounced more than a vehicle with longer a wheelbase but even after 14 years of ownership it impressed me with its abilities.  Only on four climbs did we not make it to the top at first attempt and each of those was due to taking the approach too slowly.  And yes, we did make it up Big Red first go!

So here we are in Birdsville.  The famous Birdsville Races start in a couple of weeks and we will be long gone by then.   There’s time for Kim to get some laundry done, to check out the pies at the Birdsville bakery, to top up the fuel tanks and have another dinner at the pub.  Cheers.

Before the desert

Thanks to the best efforts of Google to prevent us accessing emails, blogs have by necessity been a bit delayed, and as we’re now in remote country and there’s no cell phone communication, they’re even further delayed.  We have a satellite phone and use it sparingly to report our position daily to our youngest son in the UK.  If we fail to check in, the idea is that he can work out approximately where we should be and alert the emergency services.  Fortunately, we’ve never had to resort to the emergency procedure.

Leaving Alice Springs we soon left the last bit of tarmac and hit dirt roads, or tracks really.  Some tracks are wide, with lots of space to recover if the vehicle slides on the loose surface stones, while in other places they are so narrow that two vehicles cannot pass.  I won’t go into the quality of the tracks.  They vary from good to awful, often with no warning of the change.

We saw perhaps, half a dozen vehicles on the way to the Maryvale Aboriginal settlement.  Once there, a few scrawny dogs lay around and a number of wrecked cars propped on rocks was about the sum total of life.  Of people, not one, so we carried on to a spot called Chamber’s Pillar.  This natural rock formation towers over the surround flat landscape, near to another known as Castle Rock, which looked to us a little like two faces, mouths open looking towards the sky in wonderment.

It’s impossible to put into words the magnificence of the sky at night from a place with no man-made light to obscure the view. The sky seems enormous, the stars clear and bright, and the Milky Way really does look milky.  We stood and stared until our necks hurt.

Arising before dawn, we watched the sun rise and cast its colour-enhancing morning light on Chamber’s Pillar.  A cold wind whipped up small whirlwinds of dust and we were happy to get back to Vin Rouge, put on the kettle for a warming cuppa.

More dirt tracks and our mid-day stop was at the Lamberts Centre, which is the geographical centre of Australia.  We realised that we were further away from the coast than we had ever been before.  Time for a few photographs and a bite of lunch and it was necessary to be on our way.  We still had a long way to go to reach Mount Dare before nightfall.

We did make it, with almost an hour of daylight left and something in excess of 350 jarring kilometres of rough track completed in the day.  Now Mount Dare is not a mountain but a roadhouse/pub.  Our tent was erected in record time and we adjourned to the bar for a cold beer or two to wash away the dust.  We decided to eat in the pub and I can honestly say that the fillet steak I enjoyed was one of the best.  Replete, we turned in for a (reasonably) early night and slept like logs.

A lazy start to the following day was a bit of a novelty but it was necessary to fill up with as much diesel as we could carry for the next filling station is over 600 kilometres away in Birdsville and we have more than a thousand sand dunes to negotiate before then.

A relatively short run of about 70 kilometres and we reached Dalhousie Springs.  There’s not much there, just a campsite and a billabong naturally warmed by fresh water from the artesian basin.  So we soaked away some aching muscles in 34 degrees watched by hundreds of corellas roosting in the trees.

Camp set up and we heard tales of vehicles breaking down in the desert and met one chap whose vehicle needed towing.  The tow truck had travelled over 400 kilometres to find him.  Fingers crossed we’ll be OK.  Tomorrow is the beginning of the Simpson Desert.

Not much tarmac

The road west from Boulia is variously called the Outback Way and the Plenty Highway.  It’s not clear exactly what’s plentiful on this track, unless it dust.  We found plenty of that.  Bulldust pits in the road, dust on the car, dust in the car, dust covering just about everything, including us.  We’ve experienced dust before of course but it never ceases to amaze me how the stuff manages to penetrate every tiny crack and crevice.  And of course, as the humidity is very low, static builds up and the red stuff sticks to every piece of plastic.

Setting out from Boulia we quickly ran out of tarmac.  It was to be about 400 kilometres of dirt road before we found it again. 

Then we ran out of Queensland.  It had taken five days but finally we reached the border, crossing into the Northern Territory.  Queensland is a very large State.

We came across small pods of cattle, a few sheep, various species of birds and that was about it.  A few other travellers and a couple of road trains could be identified early by their dust clouds but apart from that, we had the road to ourselves.

Breaks are necessary and we’re getting petty efficient with the coffee breaks.  The new cupboard makes use of some dead space above the cooker.  It seems to work well, even when it’s me making the brew.

There’s not a lot more to add.  The scenery changed little.  Scrubby eucalypts, spinifex grass, the occasional bush, a few cows, half a dozen sheep, a couple of birds and that was it.

Where the road surface was good, and outback dirt roads can be very smooth, we made rapid progress, averaging about 75 kpm.  Bulldust pits dropped the speed to about 30kpm, and long stretches of rough meant we varied from slow to about 60kpm.  Concentration is required the whole time.  It’s very easy to become mesmerised and miss danger points.

Miles of road works slowed progress.  Sometimes, minor diversion tracks had been created by a grader while new bridges were built over what would be rivers in the wet season.  Sometimes the works went on and on and on, and we wondered why it was necessary to create upheaval on such a grand scale.

The Australian outback is a strange place.  Sometimes it seems as though it never changes, then all of a sudden, something quite different appears.  The land is ancient, hundreds of millions of years old.  Time has served to create weird and wondrous shapes.  Sometimes there’s a whole collection of natural formations, sometimes, quite incongruously, just a single shape, apparently there for no logical reason.

After something in excess of 400 kilometres we reached tarmac again.  The Stuart Highway which runs from Darwin in the north to Adelaide in the south.  We turned left and, in an hour, arrived in Alice Springs.

Kim wanted to stock up on provisions and as it was Sunday, we headed straight for the supermarket.  Upon returning to the vehicle I spotted an ominous puddle of black oil underneath.  “Oh dash bother” or words to that effect.  We have problems.  Closer inspection revealed that engine oil was being forced out under pressure from near the filter.  Tightening made no difference so it was evidently a workshop job.  With the greatest of luck and after a few false starts, we found a superb engineer who diagnosed a worn ‘O’ ring in the system.  We carry quite a collection of spare parts and as luck would have it, had one of the correct size.  A huge thank you to Ghan Road Mechanics (and a recommendation to use them if you ever find yourself in strife in the Alice). 

We spent an enjoyable day exploring Alice Springs and by mid evening we were once again ready for the road.  Just as well, we have of lot of remote travelling ahead.

A little less tarmac

Continuing westward, it was not long before we reached the town of Longreach.  We’ve been here before, some nine years ago and how the place has changed.  Before, it was a quiet town.  Sure it had the QANTAS museum, at which we spent an enjoyable and informative morning and the School of the air where we spent an educational afternoon.  The Stockman’s Hall of Fame we more or less missed out.  This visit we skipped the two former and spent the entire morning at the latter.  We were accompanied by busloads of grey nomads queuing for the gift shop and the toilets, but enjoyed the Stockman’s show.  Breaking horses, training horses and explaining how horses were used (and still are used) to round up cattle and sheep from the vast areas of the outback stations was informative, if perhaps presented as something of an entertainment. 

Instead of staying, as originally planned, we decided to move on from the tourists, instead heading on to Winton, setting up camp at the back of the North Gregory Hotel.  This is the place where the song ‘Waltzing Matilda’ was first performed by its lyricist, Banjo Patterson, in 1895.  We learned about the song, how it came to be written and why there are several mysteries associated with it, and of course joined in with the singing of Australia’s unofficial anthem.  All this presented by a chap whose name is Gregory North.  Another of those mysteries apparently.

Winton lays claim to the world’s largest deckchair.  No, don’t ask why, we have no idea!

One of the delights of travelling is meeting fellow travellers.  We met up lovely couple who grow hops in Queensland, the only people who have managed it.  Suffice to say that the evening was enjoyable, social and only gently alcoholic.

Onward and westward.  We’re getting a bit remote now, following the Kennedy Development Road.  Still on tarmac but less of it.  One way that it’s possible to lay a reasonable road at a reasonable cost is to lay a central strip of tarmac with wide strips of dirt road either side.  Normal travel is on the tarmac.  When another vehicle approaches, the idea is to slow down and move partially onto the dirt, resuming the tarmac after passing.  If it’s a road train approaching, then the smaller vehicle clears the tarmac entirely, allowing the road train to continue unhindered.  This has the advantage of not stirring up clouds of dust and stones that can easily shatter windscreens.

Surprisingly, for most of the almost 400 kilometres across the outback scrub, we had cell phone coverage and were surprised when I had a call from one of my Brisbane Seniors On-Line learners with a computer problem.  There’s a distinct danger that Australia is becoming civilised west of the Black Stump.

Parched throats tempted us to stop at Middleton, population 3, the last remaining outstation of Cobb and Co, which ran the fast horse-drawn coach services in the last quarter of the 1800s.  An old coach remains, quietly falling apart.  The pub’s not much better but the ginger beer was cold.

A few cattle, some sheep, various eagles, brolgas (a large crane), two emus and a lone budgerigar with suicidal tendencies were the only wild life to be seen.  Vegetation was sparse, apart from clumps of gums near to the dried-up water courses.  The road was straight and after four and three-quarter hours we pulled into the small town of Boulia.

Kim tackled her ‘outback kitchen’ on the back door of the Land Rover and we enjoyed our evening repast of lamb steaks and veggies, preceded by a G&T with real ice.  Yes, life is definitely getting civilised in the outback.

On the Tarmac

Australia is in the grip of its worst drought in many years so typically, a few hours after bolting the tent onto the roof rack it poured with rain.  However, apart from slowing up the packing, it cleared the air and our (reasonably) early start was greeted with a fine morning and clear views of the distant mountains as we left the urban conurbation of Brisbane and set out west.  Heavy traffic meant slow progress for the first hour after which, as we cleared the city we made better progress.  I anticipated that the long slow climb onto the Great Dividing Range towards Toowoomba would have us grinding along in second gear, but Vin Rouge decided that it was time to get cracking and we roared up, passing truck after truck.  Coffee at Picnic Point is something of a ritual for us, but we didn’t stay too long, despite the attractions of the scenic vista.  As we made progress the traffic thinned until we were passing only road trains carting cattle towards the east and four wheel drives from the various mining and gas drilling plants.  There were a lot of road trains, and a lot of prime steaks on the move.

Soon we were pretty much on our own.  Despite the seemingly never-ending roadworks the k’s mounted up as the scenery became less green and the land less undulating.  We did see a great many kangaroo carcases, victims of altercations with trucks.  By late afternoon, as the sun was making its inevitably journey towards the horizon, we pulled up at the small town of Mitchell, checked into the caravan park, set up camp – surprisingly quickly as it’s been a few years since we last did it – walked over the bridge and immersed ourselves in the naturally warm waters of the artesian spa.  Glorious.  The aches of travelling washed away courtesy of the Great Artesian Basin.

It took a little while to get used to sleeping in the rooftop tent.  Was that because we were unused to it or because the temperature dropped like a stone to freezing?  Either way it was not the best night’s sleep we’ve ever had.  But morning dawned bright and crisp, and it was not long before the sun’s warming rays restored us, along with hot tea and porridge.  Then it was time to hit the tarmac.

We’re told that Tambo is famous for its teddy bears.  Now I confess that I’ve not previously heard of Tambo, let alone their teddies, but stop we did to check them out.  They are rather special, made of pure sheepskin in a variety of colours that sheep were never meant to be.

On again and as we made further progress west the road trains became longer and the other traffic less.  Blackall is reckoned to be the place where the outback begins, marked by a tree stump that was used as a survey point 150 years ago and so I guess we can say that we are now in the Outback proper.  Augathella we somehow missed.  Barcaldine passed under our wheels with little to notice it.  A near altercation with a large kangaroo was averted by application of the air horns, quite a few wedge-tailed eagles flew languidly away from their carrion at our approach and eventually we arrived at Ilfracombe.  Now Ilfracombe cannot the described as the hub of the universe, but the Wellshot Hotel serves magnificent lamb shanks (two of ‘em) plus veggies.

So here we are at the end of day two, well over a thousand kilometres from Brisbane and we’re not even out of Queensland.  Australia is a big country.