B-Rod and I are not really good at having and making plans. I think I’ve mentioned before B’s aversion to lists and plans. I feel like we were particularly bad with this trip. Not that this is necessarily a bad thing . . . there’s something to be said about doing what feels best in the moment without having any restrictions or expectations. The problem is neither of us really did much research into Australia before we got here and neither of us really had any idea of what we wanted to do or see after we dived the reef. We thought about going to Uluru to experience the outback and to see this world famous site, but as we looked into it, it was a bit more than we were willing to spend. I’m sure it would have been pretty amazing, but it wasn’t important enough for either of us to justify the cost. So, when we met a couple of Aussies who are from Queensland (the province we’re currently in) and they suggested an itinerary for us to experience the real Australia, we decided to follow the list. The one guy (who was known as Gumby) was born and has spent most of his life in the outback. He was the one who came up with the list. It was to take us into the mining district, through the outback, into wine country and down to Sydney.
The next day, list in hand, we rented a car and set out on our way. We decided to skip the mining area as it had us backtracking a bit and we decided we were just going to go “directly” to Sydney. The first night got us to Charter Towers and we started to feel a bit disheartened as it seemed like we had just done a short distance on the map. The second night we got to the third stop on the list, Longreach (home of the Qantus museum), and we began to feel even more disheartened. Not only were we not making the time Gumby thought we would make, but we discovered that we were not really interested in experiencing much more of the outback. It is everything you would expect it to be . . . . hot, dry, desolate, sparse, quiet, and somewhat lonely. We are already landlocked prairie folk who want to be by the beach and close to the ocean. We don’t regret coming out here. Sometimes you have to experience something to know that it is something you don’t want (B-Rod had always kind of dreamed of doing a motorbike trip in the outback . . now he knows that this is something he doesn’t have the desire to do.) So, the new plan is to head for Brisbane. Along the drive, we’ve been playing a “conversation starter” game. One of the questions that we got yesterday was “What would your life look like if you had no goals at all? How would that feel?” Both of us felt like it would be very freeing, so here’s to scraping the list, being free and just seeing what comes up along the way.
Banana trees with bags on the bunches. We bought some amazing mangos at one of the farms.
Endless fields of sugar cane.
Heading off into nuthin’.
There are termite mounds everywhere.
Nice train underpass. Bones of dead animals. Can you see them?
Full on nuthin’
Un-inspired picture of us passing a Road Train. They are 50 meters long.
Non-plussed emu thing. It refused to make eye contact with us. It was very stuck up.
All off the creeks have names (many of dead things), but none, NONE have water.
This is what a signed, documented landmark looks like in an outback town. ‘Arno’s Wall’ is a bunch of garbage found in the dump added with rocks and cement to make a wall.
43º C. We drove most of the time with the windows down, as we are both nuts for the heat!
This guy looks a little like that sheep that was lost and found in Scotland a few years ago. He seemed to shaggy to be out in the 43º heat. For a moment he looked like he was going to Ram us. (B called him a Sheep in an Insta-tube post, but is well aware that this is in fact a pissed off Ram).
When the night falls, these guys come out. There were about a dozen in the park by our motel. I would imagine there were one meeellion more hanging out by the edge of the highway, judging by how many are hit. So cute, so tragic.
The Road of Bones. I’m kind of glad the image quality is poor, so you can’t see how many dead roos there are.
Airplane pose in a Catalina flying boat.
This is the sister ship to John Travolta’s Boeing 707. It was pimped out in gold and teak, and the Jackson Five used it for a world tour.
747 Nacelle.
Retired Boeing 747 in Longreach.
This guy was just walking down the main street with a cow. When I asked him if his cow ate the other flip flop, he replied “howyagoin gowdakeepyarbbleyarbblesomethingsomething sandal”
This was a straight up awesome way to enjoy a now cool 36º evening. We saw a billboard advertising the Drive-in, but that could well have been from the 70s. Nope, it was in fact open, so we watched a movie under the stars and it was fantastic!
This post has been brought to you by ‘The Lot’. It’s a burger with everything, including a fried egg and beets, and served between, what appeared to be, bread crusts.
