burnt down in 1979, has been turned into a slick operation that pushes the right buttons and avoids being too obvious. A good watering hole for people like us who got there the dirty way, but also for those who stepped off the Dash8 or Aztec that is parked across the street. Anyway, H & I were having our first ale and wondering where Max & Linda really were. Thirty seconds passed and "Helen!" .....It wasn’t hard was it!
Again, lovely to catch up with these good people, met last year on the Darling. Their news surprised us because when asked how long they would be on the road this year we were told they had enjoyed themselves so much last time, going up as far as Cape York, that they had leased their Gladesville house in Sydney for two years and really were nomads! We dined together in the pub and laid plans for the following morning when we were to conquer Big Red.
Sadly none of you will be able to go to The Working Museum in Birdsville to hear John Menzies describe and see him demonstrate machinery that he has collected. Toy
s, saddlery, household items, lawnmowers, pumps, chainsaws, fridges, buggies, Furphy tanks, wheelwright equipment, beautiful mules making chaff and raising water etc. etc. This has been the town’s major attraction for many years but his wife has been taken ill and gone to hospital in Adelaide; John has decided to call it a day after this year’s races. To see the ingenuity of a past era of mechanical thinkers, frankly we have gone backwards with all the digital stuff. Much will be recalled into use I’ll bet. After spending the morning in the Museum we gathered our senses and drove the twenty or so kilometres out to the day’s main challenge. Nappanerica is the traditional name given to the last of something like 600 dunes that have to be crossed if you come over the Simpson from Dalhousie Springs and Alice. The dunes average about ten metres in height and between a hundred metres and a kilometre between, with the occasional whopper, and Nappanerica (or “Big Red” as our own brothers so poetically name it) tops the lot. No intrepid Aussie can resist the challenge of going against this one, 4WD prowess is at stake here, as the Channel 10 chatter on the UHF makes plain. Pure men’s talk.
“Bernie, do you copy?”
“Gotcha Johnno”
“Jeez, youse in Low third or High second mate? She’s a bastard on them corrugations, just can’t make the last ten ”
“Yeah, I can see yer havin’ trouble from up here, give her some real stick yer donkey”.
Or more correctly: “Whi
te Prado attempting Big Red westwards, are we clear?”And if no one answers off you go – great fun too. The thing is lots of people do this and the crests are completely blind, so cars are fitted with tall red flag topped poles to avoid a head on. We ventured towards Eyre Creek where wild flowers were rumoured, but in the knowledge there were another 592 dunes ahead there was little point in going further. What was clear was that you don’t cross the Simpson towing anything, so the Big Red challenge was it.
A brief digression. Back at Mungerannie Hotel half way up the Birdsville Track we met a woman who complained of the cold temperature there (it was a lovely 26C) saying that the heat in Birdsville was 33. She was correct and the temperature continued to rise as we approached B, and again while there. As we reached Bedourie to do some fuelling up the temperature rose a further 3C within a distance of just 20kms. We were beginning to realise things were not as they should be as local folk complained to each other of the sort of summer they were likely to have. The thermometer in the car told us coolly that it was 38C outside. This is August, Qld temperatures were exceeded by 10C. It still is as I sit in Barcaldine in my shorts hotter than we were at any time on last year’s trip.
No comments:
Post a Comment