Final - The List

The magical whisky tour is over. The Geek Wanderlost caravan has driven its last mile. The cheesy words of the old REO Speedwagon song are ringing in my ears:


                   It's time to bring this ship into the shore
                   And throw away the oars, forever

Dubbo

I did some prac teaching in Dubbo back in the mid 1980's (you know last century). I also worked there for about 3 months not long after I finished uni so the place holds no mystery. I have been to the gaol and I have been to the zoo, so let's be honest that's about it. What was interesting to me was passing through all the old towns that were part of my high school years.

As some of you would know I attended quasi prestigious boarding school in Sydney that was originally set up to educate kid's from the country. I was living in Newcastle at the time so it was a bit of a stretch that I even qualified. Here I was a kid from the city that was just three hours up the road (the highway was not as good back then) boarding with these kids from the middle of nowhere. I had the pleasure and privilege to visit some of them and their families on the pastoral properties that they came from and here I was passing through those same parts of the world again.

It brought back memories of the Caddy's of Tottenham, the Traverse-Jones family from Trangie, The Campbell's from Narromine, the Cosgroves from Warren, the Day's from Forbes, the Cranston's from Wongarbon, the Tristian-Smith's from Orange and the Steele's from Dubbo. That's not to mention the families whose names I have forgotten that I visited in Nyngan, Wilcannia, Peak Hill and Gilgandra. What are they doing now? Are they still living there? Would they still remember me? Would I still remember them? Sadly all these question will remain unanswered as in most cases I lost contact with them decades ago. It was fun to reminisce all the same.

The one town that made me smile the most was Cobar. I can't remember the name of the family I knew from there but I do remember writing a mock country song about the town in a humorous vein entitled "No One's Sober In Cobar". Sadly I could only remember the title and the next line but the tune was still stuck in my head. I amused myself for some time humming the now forgotten, never to be country classic. 

Dubbo is still a dump though. I made a cardinal mistake when I booked somewhere to stay there. I didn't look at where it was on the map. Now there is a real seedy side to Dubbo and no points for guessing where I ended up. It's not like I didn't know where it was either. It was just laziness and apathy on my part so there is no one else to blame. I needed to stretch my legs when I got there, I had basically been in the car for 8 hours. I decided to walk across the bridge and into town and back. Well I saw discarded syringes, nearly got run over by a motor bike that was on a walkway, and got pan handled. That was all within an hour of arriving in town. Now I have been in some pretty dodgy parts of Australia on this trip and felt much safer in all of them. Dubbo was creeping me out.

Well I am back in Muswellbrook tomorrow, just for a night or two. I have to be in Sydney for a few days later in the week and will be back in town to start work fresh as a daisy on Wednesday, I can't wait!

Broken Hill

I arrived in Broken Hill not long after 11.00am. I headed to the tourist office to get a local map, then went and grabbed a much needed espresso coffee. I have to say the town is thriving and has a pretty good vibe to it. It's closer to Adelaide than Sydney, 520 k's versus 1150k's, so everything is really centred around South Australia. It even stays in the South Australian time zone. There were three things I wanted to do here but I only got around to doing two of them. I missed out on the Living Dessert Sculpture Park from pure apathy nothing else. I did however get to see where they shot a lot of Mad Max 2 and I also got to see the Pro Hart Gallery.

Broken Hill gets its name from a break in the hills that was at the original site of the town. Of course being a mining town they have mined the break into oblivion so the name is somewhat of a misnomer now. BHP also takes its name from the town but hasn't been active there since the 1950's but there is still plenty of mining going on. I stayed at this wonderful old renovated pub that had just 23 guest rooms along with an extremely nice dining room. They even had a live pianist playing (no I didn't get up and have a go). This guy was so old I think he could have been Methuselah's father. Everything he played sounded like those jaunty old war time tunes like "Tea for Two", "Pack Up Your Troubles In An Old Kit Bag" and "It's A Long Way to Tipperary". Even when he played more recent stuff (say only 30 years old) it still sounded as if it had been arranged for the musical hall. I absolutely loved it. It made me a little sad however because it made me think of mum. This was her kind of music and of course she will never hear it again.

I'm getting ahead of myself however as I have to tell you about the Pro Hart Gallery. Old Pro was a much maligned Australian artist whose use of colour and innovate painting techniques (think firing paint filled cannon balls at your canvas using a variety of weaponry) raised a few eyebrows. He made fabulous use of colour and portrayed iconic bush scenes in a vivid and totally understandable way, it was instantly appealing and recognisable to a child. What I didn't know until I visited the museum was that he was also a talented sculptor, some of his portrait work was absolutely haunting (he was often criticised for not being able to paint people), plus he also had quite a political side to his work. I always had a sneaking admiration for him because he was a talented organist as well. The gallery was only small but it has some fabulous examples of his work, including one of the Rolls Royces he had painted and of course the famous dragonfly image from his stainmaster carpet TV commercials. It gave me a fresh look at both the man and his work. I'm pleased I got to see to through adult eyes.

I also visited Silverton which is not far out of town. It really is a ghost town. It has a population of about 50 and is trying to eke out an existence based on its appearance in innumerable TV shows and films. I have to say that it didn't do a lot for me. There was nothing particularly wrong with the place but it's charms were lost on this visitor. 

In contrast the dinner in the dining room at the Royal Exchange Hotel Broken Hill was exceptional. Hard as it is to believe but I would say it was the best meal I enjoyed this entire trip. A twice baked cheese soufflé and the tenderest piece of eye fillet I have eaten in a long time. Sadly everything wasn't perfect as I ended up with a hair in my meal (that obviously wasn't mine). That did however get me a complimentary cheese platter and a glass of 21 year old port so I really can't complain. 

Dubbo is my next stop. It's really only a layover place. Just the 750 kilometres up the road. The trip is nearly over and I'd say two or three more posts will see this blog out for the immediate future. Who knows where or when I will get to fire it up again?

Peterborough

From Coober Pedy I headed to Peterborough. It's the last substantial town in South Australia before you reach the New South Wales border. It was once a thriving railway junction where three gauges of train line met. Back before federation each state adopted a different size of rail line meaning that you had change trains if you travelled interstate. Worse still was the freight which had to be unloaded then loaded on to each different state's rail network. Obviously both of these things are time consuming, expensive and pointless but it wasn't until 1970 that the countries major train lines were standardised. Peterborough thrived until then.

Coober Pedy

There is not a whole lot going on in the way of things to see and do when travelling from King's Canyon to Coober Pedy. In fact I would have to rate it the most boring bit of road I have travelled on this entire trip. Once I got back out to the Stuart Highway I left the Northern Territory and entered re entered South Australia. The first thing you notice is the road improves but the speed limit drops. The first town inside of South Australia is Marla and it's 156 kilometres from the border. I would rather listen to a speech by Julia Gillard than do that drive again. 

King's Canyon

How do you top Ayers Rock? It's a mighty hard ask and so the remaining activities left on the this odyssey will unfortunately for them be measured against this most amazing of experiences. I think it would need to be maybe the Grand Canyon or something as awesome to stand a ghost of a chance of getting close to the Ayers Rock experience. 

Therefore it was with not much hope that I drove the 304 kilometres from Ayers Rock, past Fooluru and on to King's Canyon. Look it is a really impressive sight but it just can't compete which is a real shame as it's well worth a look. I arrived slightly hungover as the night at the hotel bar hadn't finished until just after midnight and as seems often to be the case I consumed a little more than I intended. Well a leisurely (yeah right) 6 kilometres stroll up and down the sides and across the top of King's Canyon soon sweated the remnants of any alcohol out of me. It was a sight to behold.

Yes I did walk up the left side, across the top, then down the right side. I went back to check out the sun setting on the cliff tops, pretty impressive don't you think?


I did the walk by myself and caught up with David and Keely for a glass of red (hey I needed one more) at the sunset viewing before we headed back to the resort for dinner.

Now calling it a resort is a bit of stretch, mind you I got one hell of a room upgrade. I just booked the entry level room and ended up with a spa suite so I wasn't complaining.

Sadly I had no one suitable to share this with so it largely went unused. The reason I mention the dubious nature of the resort title is not by way of complaining but when you turn up somewhere and they have run out of bread, chips, wedges and a whole host of other things that I can't remember right now you know it's not a resort. Alice Springs is 300 k's away so it's not like you can go up the street and get some more however having to wait until the next truck arrives (there is one a week) to replenish supplies takes away from the resort part of the deal. None of it bothered me as everything I wanted they had (plenty of red wine for instance). 


The nights entertainment was when it started to get interesting again. I didn't feature on a piano this time but I did manage to join an all girl singing group called the "Lice Girls". Let me explain. Little Keely was pulled up on stage to get all the kid's involved and let the mums and dads enjoy their meal. The catch however was once the kid's were finished they got all the dads up (queue David). Then when all the dads were done all the mums got up. Well I assume they must have thought that David and I were two gay dads so I got dragged up to act as Kelly's surrogate stage mother.

Yes that's me with rollers in my hair. Oh how the mighty have fallen. From playing the star at the Ayers Rock Resort to playing the fool at King's Canyon. What can I say but any chance of my ego getting too inflated was quickly dealt with, but a good time was had by all. We called it an early night and I retired alone to my spa suite with my glittering show business career withering on the vine before my very eyes. 


David, Keely and I caught up for quick breakfast early the next morning. They were heading for Alice Springs and I was heading for Coober Pedy. I bade them farewell and wished them a safe journey. I somehow know we will stay in touch, they made a great part of my trip truly exceptional.

Extraordinary Day

My second day at Ayers Rock was pretty amazing on so many levels. I picked up two Japanese hitch hikers, my car can really only fit one extra at the moment. I met up with a single dad and his delightful daughter from Adelaide and we swapped divorce stories (his were better). I belted out some tunes on a piano at one of the hotels and had a crowd of people singing Billy Joel and Jackson Browne tunes. Oh and to top things off I was offered a job. You will have to read on to get the juicy details.

Ayers Rock

I was wandering around the rock today and found this old pair of rusty scissors, or at least I think it was rust. I didn't know that dingos could use scissors. It's not to soon for that joke is it? Anyway I drove in from Alice Springs and headed straight for the rock, it's not like there is a lot else to do if you are in this part of the world. 

Devil's Marbles

Well I have some rather tragic news. My faux summer has come to an end. It gone down to one degree last night and could only manage a top of 18 today so the polo shirts and shorts are back in the bag. In other sad news Lake Eyre is down to about 10% capacity so not really worth the effort to fly over it I'm sorry to say. It seems that nature is telling me its time to end this sojourn and get back to work. So it's off to Alice Springs today via some more interesting looking rocks. Followed by Ayers Rock and Kings Canyon, Coober Pedy, Broken Hill, Dubbo, another quick stop in Sydney and then home. I'm thinking I will pull into the driveway on about the 15th or 16th. But lets not get ahead of ourselves.

The Territory

I drove down the road to Tennant Creek today, what a town. At least I didn't get an armed police welcoming committee here so that was refreshing. The local cop was happily pulling over anyone breaking the town speed limit however. He could have put himself to better use patrolling the highway. They drive like maniacs here, it's as if their life depends on it, I know mine certainly did.