Sunday 28 August
We had the BEST night last night. Well it
didn’t start out the best, we rolled up to the caravan park and the lady was a
little grumpy. We were stuffed from driving for such a long time for so many
days too. We powered up and decided to do some washing. The bore water stunk so
I needed to put eucalyptus in the rinse water. When the washing machine finished
we went to the pub.
The publican, Phil was in a tis and the
staff who are mainly backpackers were a little lack lustre but that was ok. I
found the Tom Cruise memorial room and emersed myself in old photos of the
Birdsville track until it was time to order dinner. Greg had started watching
football on TV and chatting to a bloke at the bar. Boring.
We ordered and since we were one of the
last people to order, watched the other patrons filter out and the bar become
quiet customer wise. Then a truck turned up and all the staff went into action.
Eventually we caught up with Phil who owns
the place and we had met 2 years ago. He explained the high excitement with the
truck which had turned up after 9pm.
The truck was 10 hours late and carried all
the supplies for the hotel motel for the next week or whatever. They were
expecting much Birdsville traffic to stop at Marree over the next few days so
were sweating on the delivery. Everyone was tired after a really busy day so
just wanted to unload it as quick as possible. ‘All hands on deck’ style.
Also Phil’s wife’s mother had been unwell
so she was tending to her which took another person away from the running of
the pub. Phil looked so tired poor fellow. We shared our bottle of red with him
and then he shared a bottle of red with his dinner and us. Letting the staff
lock up and go to bed, we stayed on for a little longer before it was all time
for us to retire.
Back to Today
By the time we were ready to go the caravan
park was empty – it had been quite full. There was a strong wind blowing and it
made it quite cool and difficult to know what to wear – which sounds vain – but
in the car is hot, out of it with the wind was cold. We fiddled around with
washing and water and air bags and it felt like we were never going to leave.
Greg managed to drop everything in mud including the caravan keys and our water
filter. I was busy washing these things also.
After fuelling and buying some fresh bred
rolls baked at the general store, we were on to the track. Photo stop first of
course. Greg had put some more air into the Cruiser air shockers to support the
fact Gibson was now relying on her and not the stability bars so Greg wanted
first drive to test out the steering. Fine by me – by the time I finished
running around taking photos I was happy to sit for a while.
We started up the iconic Birdsville track.
Hooray, made it after 2 years of waiting.
It was tame in comparison to Oodnadatta.
We wanted to see everything on the track
but soon came to realize that unlike Oodnadatta which has pink signs
everywhere, this place has nothing so you have to figure it out for yourself –
even Hema maps doesn’t have he sights on it. We did find a ruin- a failed date
farm, then further up the track the hot springs.
The hot spring is a pvc round tub, about 4
meteres diameter maybe with a pump pouring hot spring water one in and a drain
the other. Four young blokes were already in it and having a few beers – as you
do. I wasn’t going to join them but we did. Found swimmers and in the pool we
all were.
The guys were also going to the races and
were from around Echuca in Victoria so we had a lovely chat about football
among other things for about half to ¾ an hour when I decided I was getting too
hot and hopped out to get changed and make lunch - followed shortly by everyone else. The buys
took off while I was still in the van making salad rolls for lunch. What a pain
in the bum making salad rolls are – all the bits you have to take out of the fridge
and put back in again. Making your fridge hot. Next time its vegemite rolls and
shut up!
Because the road was so good, we made
better than expected time – and with nothing sign posted to see, didn’t stop
much either. Just before Menangerannie station we came across some blokes on
tractors doing road works – and their UHF radio was tuned to channel 40 – as
was ours and we heard this conversation among them:
Did anyone see where the snake kit is?
Nah
Is it in the ute?
Dunno – hang on looking, can’t see it
Is it in the other ute?
Nah
Did it travel back to Adelaide in that ute?
Dunno
Think a snake ate it.
We both found this conversation amusing.
The road works didn’t hold us up which was
good an it wasn’t long before we were at the Station where we needed to get
fuel and decided to book in for the night in their camp grounds.
Then we discovered that the troublesome
caravan electrical cord cable had got loose from the connection and had spent
the last goodness knows how many kilometers dragging on the ground and was
stuffed. Pins bent, plastic worn away, buggered. No Caravan lights.
Just what you need after a long day of
driving – stuck in the outback with no van lights. Luckily Greg had packed a
spare expecting the worst as this cord was trouble since the auto electrician
wired it up when we bought the van.
But Greg isn’t an auto electrician and
barely knows what to do.
As it got darker, Greg was out there taking
the old stuffed parts off and exposing the wires, rewiring and trying to get
the whole thing to match up so things would work. At dark when the flies had
finished bothering people and the mozzies came out he gave up and decided to
give it another crack in the morning.
He hadn’t had a rest all day and it was too
late to get him to rest now as he would sleep all night – so I did the only
thing I could do and dragged him off to the pub.
What a great night!
We met some blokes at the bar just by
chance and got chatting. They were going to the races too. Then the work crew
came in who we passed on the road and we said hello to them, relised who they
were and enquired as to whether the snake kit ever turned up.
They were still looking for it.
Then the barman, we realized was the one
that worked for Phil at Marree and him and his wife had only started 3 days ago
as did Jo the lady who I met when I paid for the fuel earlier. Then we met Phil
– another Phil who owns this bar and was not well as he had stuffed his back
hauling boxes of Grog in anticipation of the traffic going to the races.
Had a ball
We bailed about 11pm but they kicked on until
12.30!
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