Driving – Page 4 – gbpilgrim

June 12, 2017

Gold rush

Compared with the mostly endless expanse of the Northern Territory and Western Australia, the southern state of Victoria is far more manageable to grasp. With its rolling green hills and web of country roads punctuated by amenable towns, it feels more familiar; cosy even. Don’t get me wrong, Victoria has some rugged and remote places and its share of foreboding bushland and bleak emptiness. But there’s usually a bakery and decent coffee stop within a 50 kilometre radius or less. Which I’m sure you’ll agree is very important indeed.

Landing at Tullamarine, Melbourne was grey and damp. It’s June, it’s Melbourne. I was about as surprised as I would be if the UK Conservative Party decided to dump everyone in the shit rather than get on with governing twice in the space of a year. The wind was strong, my crappy hire car was far from stable, but at least I was heading away from the clouds on the drive north to Bendigo.

Bendigo is almost the archetypal Victorian regional town. It’s a decent size so you can have your fair share of Harvey Norman and Maccas. But it’s also one of a string of towns born from the gold rush of the 1850s. This means there is a legacy of grace and charm, funded by glimmering rocks and transformed into ornate Victorian buildings, elegant parklands, and pompous statues. With a prominent effigy of Queen Victoria it could be the Daily Mail’s utopia, but I think that does an injustice to the fine people of Bendigo, and the fact that they at least have moved on from the 1800s.

I was here for work, but one of the advantages of having a work appointment in a cafe was the ready availability of cakeage. With an hour or so in between appointments, I walked a little bit off exploring the centre of town and parklands, discovering remnants of autumn, embellishments in iron and stone, and opulent fountains inducing the urgency to seek relief. I also came across a tower on a hill which, naturally, I had to climb for the view. With the rather prominent spire of the Catholic Cathedral punctuating the air and an array of functional buildings interspersed with green, I figured I could be in Exeter or something. Only without the knobbers.

The next day I had the drive back to the airport to look forward to, squeezing in a decent breakfast and coffee courtesy of proximity to Melbourne. With a little time to spare, I returned via a network of country roads rather than the freeway, which was heavily populated with end of financial year traffic cones.

In keeping with recent reminisces from 2013, I paused briefly at the village of Maldon, which is somewhat cutesy and somewhat boasting an oversupply of antique shops and useless trinkets for a place of its size. It looks like the type of high street that should have a good bakery, but I didn’t really find one, so pushed on to Castlemaine, which had a bakery but this didn’t look particularly inspiring. Still, the coffee was getting even better as the number of kilometres from Melbourne decreased.

Veering off the main road to head up to the top of Mount Macedon, I paused in Woodend, which had a bakery that looked more the kind of thing I was after. I mean, it was called a bakehouse for goodness sake, which is something that every fine Victorian should celebrate. I purchased an overpriced wrap and inevitable caramel slice, one of which I ate rapidly at the top of the hill, the other gorged on the flight home. The wrap fulfilled a functional purpose, the slice an emotional one.

Anyway, such have been my ramblings in Victoria over the years I wasn’t actually sure if I had been to the top of Mount Macedon before. It turns out that I hadn’t, unless I really don’t remember the upward crawl into roads lined with ever more spindly and pathetic-looking gum trees, the view of expansive plains below and a giant golden cross constructed to appease the wrath of the almighty.

It was chilly up here, but I knew I was on my way back to Canberra so it wasn’t going to get any better. And for the second time in succession, my dawdling was beginning to make it touch and go that I would make my flight. Maybe I’ll learn, or maybe I’ll just nudge a little over the speed limit and swear at every idiot who dares to pull out at a roundabout and get in my way. It seems to work, and so this gold rush came to a successful frenetic end, antidote to the sedate charm of Victorian Victoria.

June 4, 2017

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South to North

Frosts. Enough already! But it was heavy rain with milder conditions greeting me at five o’clock in the morning bound for Canberra Airport. Despite very little traffic, every light was red, the automatic check in counter didn’t recognise me and I was, with some sympathy, relayed the news that I was too late. I looked forlorn, beaten, empty. I felt as much. But throw in a few calls and they managed to arrange some fog in Brisbane to delay my flight and leave me with a 12 hour trip to Darwin. Annoying but also blessed.

It is hard to be anything but languid in the tropics. I felt the odd man out putting on trousers and shoes to undertake work. But in between there were outdoor coffee stop laptop catch ups, esplanade strolls, and post-work reduced-price eating at the Mindil Beach Night Markets. And there were shorts, fully taking advantage of The Dry, which provides an unstinting predictability of blue skies and 33 degrees. Darwin grew on me, but mainly because it wasn’t The Wet. And I’m not sure I could live here, because it only seems to attain adequate on the coffee measurement scale.

Having come so far, I was determined to explore beyond Darwin during The Dry, so tacked on an extra night to squeeze in what most people would probably do over two or three days. An early start on Saturday and speed limits of 130km/h help, and I found myself entering Litchfield National Park before ten; just in front of the procession of tour buses (invariably named things like Crocco Tours, The Top End Crocosaurus, NT Outback Crocclebus etc etc) entering the parking area of Florence Falls.

I had been here in The Wet and it was, undeniably, very wet (there is a blunt truth to many a Top End expression). Today, there was still plenty of water gushing from the twin cascades and into a perfect swimming hole, which soon became populated by sagging swimsuits and shocking Speedos (the tour buses had arrived). No wonder the crocs keep away!

Off the beaten track just a little, a path leads back to the car park following a small, shady creek. It’s called Shady Creek. Again, I remember this in February, when the path was subsumed by the creek and crossing took a bit of arms-linked watch where you put your feet and hope there’s not a snake there kind of affair. Today, with barely a soul venturing this way from the pools, it was a masterpiece of tranquillity. And still devoid of snakes.

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Rejoining the Stuart Highway I noted Alice Springs was a mere 1402 kilometres south. And between there, not very much at all. Apart from Katherine, which for quite a long time I pictured as a cute, small-town feel kind of spot nestled in a rocky valley beside the tree-lined meander of the Katherine River. It might even have a nice organic coffee place with homemade Hummingbird cake and copies of The Guardian.

About one hundred clicks out, and with the road trip feels returning to my synapses, I remembered to readjust my expectations. I’m glad I did; not that there was anything wrong with Katherine, but I was restricted to Woollies and Red Rooster for dinner. Nonetheless, it didn’t matter, for Katherine was purely a functional base from which to enter Nitmiluk, more commonly known as Katherine Gorge, a place I had neither been in The Wet nor The Dry.

The benefit of a long drive was arriving in the latter part of the day, with the air cooling just a smidgeon and the light all radiant amber. It was so good, so captivating, that I hiked for a little longer than I planned, detouring an extra few kilometres through rocky valleys and verdant oases to Pat’s Lookout. Grand and serene, primeval and elemental, it was a surprise to be joined this late in the day by a couple of backpackers. But we didn’t say much, other than accented helloes, perhaps because we were just a little beholden by the world we were in.

The light sunk lower as I headed back down towards the visitor centre, confident that I would make it before it became too dark. And indeed, my timing was only a little out, as the last red hues of the sun cast the top of the escarpment aflame. These are the scenes you live for in the Australian outback, these are the memories that never fade.

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Almost everyone who comes to Nitmiluk goes out onto the water. My restricted time meant the only option was the Dawn Cruise the next morning, before a race back to Darwin Airport. I think even if I had longer to linger, this would still have been the best option, with only a scattering of people aboard to witness the calm commencement of a magical new day.

Quick tour guide factoid 1: there are actually nine gorges in Nitmiluk, inevitably named Gorge 1, Gorge 2, Gorge 3 etc. During The Wet, the natural rock barriers between each get flooded, allowing saltwater crocodiles a little greater room for exploration.

Quick tour guide factoid 2: the park rangers undertake a Saltie capture and release program to clear the gorge when the waters have subsided. This was in operation now. But Freshwater crocs are there all the time. Like over there, quick, look, just to the right of the boat. But the worse a Freshie can do is tear off your arm or some such.

Quick tour guide factoid 3: we have now come to the end of Gorge 1, so it’s time to get out of the boat and make your way for about 400 metres to the next boat and Gorge 2. It’s all rather gorgeous.

As the sun slowly rises into a field of dotted high cloud, it intermittently breaks through to illuminate massive canyon walls topped with precariously positioned trees. The water flickers with a murmur of wind. A cormorant sits statue in a branch half submerged by water. Sandy beaches and mangroves are interspersed, sometimes disappearing into the fissures and fault lines of the massive sandstone plateau that stretches far into Arnhem Land.

I could never ever pretend to understand what it is like to be an Aboriginal Australian. To be one of the Jawoyn people who have lived with this land for tens of thousands of years, way before a British Lieutenant was a twinkle in his father’s eye. To live, to breath, to die upon a land that they do not see themselves as owning but of being one of itself. It was a land that was a privilege, just for a few hours, to be a part of. And it seemed strange, very strange indeed, to know that I would be back in an artificial white man’s capital, a freezing white man’s capital, later that day.

Australia Driving Green Bogey Photography Walking

February 6, 2017February 6, 2017

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1577 kms to go

It’s entirely natural to reminisce about holidays, to #tbt, to revel in the sights and sounds granted by being at leisure. And once home, to miss the adventures, the freedom, the thrill of discovering new places and experiencing a certain degree of randomness along the way. Casting my mind back to January – and a road trip return home – such rose-tinted sentiment is tangible, readily available to grasp.

There seems to be an added dimension of fond reminiscence surrounding this trip though. It was as if it took place in a different age, before the world got a real dumb deal; a time when things were not quite as barking mad, when there was still some value placed on logic and reason and fact, when the majestic pinnacles of the Warrumbungles were less likely to be obliterated in a twitterstorm. Thank goodness I got to see them – and more – on the return to Canberra…

Farewell pineapple paradise

A couple of days on the Sunshine Coast had delivered only intermittent milky doses of sunshine, with homely patches of drizzle persisting throughout my final morning. An obvious light in the dark was the Big Pineapple on the outskirts of Nambour. A possible former plaything of an ex PM and Treasurer of Australia, I felt this was a perfect way to say goodbye to the Sunshine Coast and a suitably symbolic start of another long drive through the heart of Australia.

South of here, along the Steve Irwin Way, are the crikey strewth craggy lumps of the Glasshouse Mountains. I had hoped perhaps to go for a walk, but a dense shower and the constraints of time put a scupper on that. Instead a brief stop at a lookout to watch the cloud graze the jagged edges of rock, and a scurry to the car as it moved overhead and deposited its load was the order of the day.

I decided to circumnavigate Brisbane, heading inland through Woodford, Kilcoy and loosely following the valley of the Brisbane River. Here, it was an insignificant trickle compared to the wide brown water beating a course through the city. At Esk the summer made a splendid return, providing the setting for an exemplary chicken sandwich-making lunch stop.

I was heading towards the New South Wales border and had entered a region promisingly labelled the Scenic Rim. Curious as to how much this was tourism marketing exaggeration, it didn’t take long to ascertain that, for once, this was not fake news. Distant views of extinct volcanic peaks became closer, the green and fertile landscape opening up as the car climbed the curving ribbon of highway to cross the divide. At its apex, Main Range National Park offered one final taste – on a brief jaunt – of the majestic rainforest that had been a significant feature of my trip.

Beyond the rainforest, the road ambled down a valley through what appeared to be a rich vein of farmland. This continued to Warwick, which was a pleasant, well-heeled kind of place, suggesting the surrounding farmland does indeed possess significant richness. From here orchards and vineyards cluster around Stanthorpe, at the heart of the Granite Belt.

Pausing at Stanthorpe the rain had returned and I made use of mobile coverage to assess the likelihood of getting soaked while camping. It was touch and go but I opted to camp a little south in Girraween National Park. This was unlike a Queensland in any of the brochures…cool, cloudy, a little dank. Clusters of giant boulders dotted the landscape, sitting within short and stubby forest and forming natural terrain for pools of water to form.

Here, in Queensland, just a few miles from the state border was a striking replica of Namadgi National Park in the ACT. Weather and all. The granite boulders a symbol of home, the coolness a familiar relief. But – pinching myself – the reality was of another thousand clicks to go, and the impending ordeal of losing an hour tomorrow.

The road

I was definitely the first person to leave the campground the next morning, cognisant of a long day ahead and jumping forward an hour into New South Wales. A lonely road led to Glen Innes, the only memory of which I have is of waiting ages for a coffee and then discovering, driving out of town, that they had decided to put sugar in it. This clouded my opinion of Glen Innes, and driving through the next town of Inverell, I wish I had stopped there instead.

I was back on little used country roads, cutting a smooth swathe through fields of wheat and passing over desolate ranges coated in eucalyptus. I was making a surge to Narrabri, hoping to get there as quickly as possible for lunch. But lunch came quite late (and, inevitably, in KFC), after a few diversions slowed my progress.

Crossing a bridge into Myall Creek, the name registered in my head for some reason. Maybe it was in A Country Practice or had a Big Thing or was the birthplace of some famous Aussie cricketer who sent English wickets cartwheeling towards the Nursery End? If only. Sadly, heartbreakingly, it was the scene of slaughter, as white invaders massacred 28 Aboriginal men, women and children who were camping peacefully on the Myall Creek cattle station in 1838. Even more sadly, grotesquely, such occurrences were not rare. What distinguished this was that for the first time – the only time – white men were arrested, charged, and hanged for the murder of Aborigines.

Today, it is a quiet place of solitude and reflection. The chirping of birdsong persists despite searing heat and baked earth. A simple, memorial walk exists, a swirling red path providing points of information and remembrance. There is talk of healing, of coming together of ancestors, of deep remorse and some kind of hope. A hope that, eventually, love does trump hate.

Myall Creek seems a long way from anywhere. The nearest town of Bingara has a sleepy charm; it’s the kind of place I could be tempted to sup an ice cold schooner in the pub, surely the beating heart of the town. But I head on, closer to the incredible peaks and volcanic plugs of Mount Kaputar National Park. I have a fondness for this spot, which effectively heralded the happy start of an epic trip in 2013. Back then it became a surprisingly good replacement for the Warrumbungles, which had been decimated by bushfire. But now, four years later, I could finally cruise past Mount Kaputar and see how much nature had recovered.

In the bungles, the mighty Warrumbungles

Entering Warrumbungle National Park, it was pretty clear that a fire had ravaged the area; blackened trunks of trees lined the steep slopes and the road produced a patchy, lumpy ride where the tarmac had no doubt melted. Up one of the hills, some of the buildings of Siding Spring Observatory had suffered damage but the telescopes survived. Well, thank goodness for that…we can still scope out future worlds to inhabit when Fake Lord Emperor Pussy Grabber destroys this one.

But this land is a resilient land. Just under four years and further into the heart of the Warrumbungles, the green explosion of new growth is abundant. I was looking forward to exploring it more in the morning. For now, time to make my bed in the delightful surrounds of Camp Blackman and enjoy the added attraction of running water and hot showers.

I was the first person up the next morning again. This was deliberate and well worth it, for I was embarking on a pretty long walk and it would be hot. Returning to the car park towards the end of that walk I passed numerous people coming the other way. Of course I said hello, g’day, howzitgahn but my mind was saying things like good luck you fools, shouldn’t have been so lazy this morning should ya.

With benefit of doubt perhaps they were not doing the entire Breadknife and Grand High Tops walk. Maybe they were just doing the first part, which was gentle and followed the course of a mostly dry creek bed. This would be a rather fine walk in itself, for it is such an elemental, earthy landscape in which to linger. I wasn’t expecting such enchantment here, such homage to the rugged environments further inland, closer to the desert. There was a bit of Flinders Ranges crossed with The Grampians about this place. Two of my favourite ever spots blended into one.

The other benefit of starting early was to witness the early rays of sun graze the hilltops and glow through the tree trunks and branches of the bush. I think the angle of an early sun also helped to illuminate some of the spider webs formed between shrubs on either side of the path, requiring a little stooping and contortion to avoid. Being a pioneer has its downsides and I guess if I was later in the day many of these webs would have been smashed by hapless walkers that had come before.

Inevitably after a couple of kilometres the track climbed, with a steep but nicely constructed path giving way to endless metal steps. This was taking me up towards the Breadknife, so named because of its sheer sided slopes and thin pointed summit thrust into the sky like a scene from Crocodile Dundee in which Mick shows some New York Hoodlum a proper knife. Up close, you couldn’t really see it, but, eventually, when the trees fade away and the rocky floor of the Grand High Tops themselves are underfoot, the knife is there, just one of many rocky crags and rounded lumps rising up from an incredible sea of green.

“Call that a knife?” was the current expression that was going through my head as I sat and ate some cold bacon sandwiches premade from the night before. I didn’t say this out loud, because two other hikers soon joined me in admiring the view. Distant to the west, beyond the sweep of green was a flat, yellow expanse that would extend to – well – Perth? Behind, further rocky mounds and eucalypt forest reached to the horizon; a horizon I would be heading towards later in the day.

But first, descent. It wasn’t too bad, apart from a few larger rocky steps somewhat deformed and eroded into that gravelly stuff that is treacherous underfoot. Luckily I stayed upright, apart from the numerous times ducking under spider webs again, some of them occupied by things which are probably perfectly fine but Australian and therefore potentially deadly. Such was the profusion of webs in the shadow of the Breadknife, I grabbed a stick and waved it up and down in front of me. For a moment I felt like Harry Potter, but this particular wand had a success rate of something like 25%.

The largest, ugliest, potentially deadliest spider sat low over the path, guarding the final section of the loop back to the metal steps. I started to take a photo of it and it looked at me as if it didn’t really like being in pictures. So I stopped. Wary, I assessed any alternative routes but to the left of me, a scrubby, rocky drop and to the right a cliff face. There was nothing for it but to crouch as low as possible, scramble quickly underneath and avoid looking up.

Further down the trail I encountered a young lady throwing rocks at another occupied web. It was one I must have ducked under a couple of hours earlier. She looked terrified and said as much. In trying to comfort and reassure, I told her it was probably the last of them and moved promptly on. She scarpered under the web to continue her walk while I went to look at a deadly snake. Pausing at a little wooden bridge over the dry creek, a beautiful Red-bellied black meandered along the rocks beneath. It was quite mesmerising, until it disappeared out of sight, when it became a snake that I couldn’t see and therefore significantly less appealing.

Come to Warrumbungle National Park, to experience an epic, timeless Australian landscape and to appreciate its friendly animals. Actually, do come. I loved this place more than anywhere else on my trip. Good campgrounds, great walks, beautiful country. And only six solid hours from Canberra…so I may return!

Old country for no men

A couple of hours and I was back in more familiar country. Dubbo is one of my token regional research towns and I had a sense of déjà vu checking into a motel with a plastic cow on a pole out front. But still, a motel, with refurbished rooms, air-conditioning and a king-sized bed. After my morning adventures, what better way to appreciate this scenario than nap.

I was still a little weary as the evening emerged, so randomly stumbled upon the comfort and cooling refuge of the local cinema. Star Wars and a natural blue raspberry Slush Puppie in a cinema in Dubbo. It was like it was 1985 again.

The next morning, after obligatory buffet breakfast, I set off on the final stretch of road home. It was a day in which there was little of note. As a commemoration of all things road trip I made a spontaneous stop at a place called Peak Hill. Here I went on a little walk along the perimeter of a big hole in the ground, previously mined for gold. While gold sounds glamorous, it was a hot and dusty walk with countless flies trying to go up my nose and the pervasive smell of urine in the air.

South of here, Parkes had a more pleasant aroma, decent coffee, and was positively bustling with the prospect of Elvis coming to town. Or thousands of Elvises (or Elvi?) all dressed up for the annual festival, starting in a few days. If ever you needed an encapsulation of randomness this was it. Seeking quirky Elvis sights, many shops were filled with posters for upcoming Elvis impersonation gigs, and a couple of murals were dotted about the town. One, I was informed by a very enthusiastic lady, lit up at night and projected videos and played songs out loud and everything. I should come back tonight she said. I got my coffee and moved on.

From here, more familiar names like Canowindra, Cowra and Boorowa passed by. All surrounded by a gentle landscape of golden wheat fields and occasional strips of bushland. It was a placid, smooth, easy ride where the only real highlight was the prospect of falling asleep at the wheel and creating a massive fireball visible for miles around. A frozen coke kept me going to join the Hume Highway and bypass Yass. The Hume Highway! Yass! This is practically home.

Of the 4,232 kilometres covered on this trip to Queensland and back there were around 50 more to go. Past Poacher’s Pantry where a pre-Christmas lunch lingered in the memory; across the state border and back into capital territory; a roundabout and empty dual carriageway through bush towards home. The city of Canberra is here somewhere, but I could still be out on the open road, in the middle of nowhere. Suburbia and never-ending apartment construction does finally emerge. There are supermarkets in which to replenish supplies, and, crucially, stock up on hot cross buns for Easter.

It is January 9^th and with a cup of tea and hot cross bun I am relaxing at home. It is always nice to be home for sure. The ready availability of a bed and shower are not to be underestimated. However, there is that slight disappointment in the air of a good trip finished. With summer still in full swing and the prospect of extensive work minimal, there are still days ahead which could be holiday-like. But they will be comparatively static, comfortable, predictable. Well, at least until January 20^th 2017.

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If you really enjoyed this endless waffle or have more time to kill while you should be working or doing something far more productive, check out the other two parts of my Christmas and New Year trilogy. Like Star Wars, only less something something something dark side.

Part 1: Back on the road: Canberra-Mudgee-Scone-Tamworth-Armidale-Grafton-Lismore

Part 2: Sweaty New Year: Ballina-Nerang-Brisbane-Stradbroke Island-Sunshine Coast

Australia Driving Green Bogey Photography Walking

January 14, 2017January 14, 2017

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Back on the road

Christmas Day came and went with little fuss; a suitable blend of English traditions (think paper hats, Christmas pudding and rubbish TV) and Australian holiday (cue swimming pools, prawns and rubbish TV). And the next day like millions across both hemispheres, I hit the road to expand my horizons, meet up with others, and curse at the appalling driving ubiquitous across the highways and byways of the land.

My destination was Brisbane and a tad beyond. In the first of three undeniably thrilling instalments I shall take you with me on the journey north. I had determined to go inland, avoiding the ludicrous middle and outer lane hogging of the Sydney motorways and the family-fuelled people carrier congestion of the coast. Yes, I would mostly miss the beautiful cooling ocean but there is a lot to see in the interior of Australia, believe it or not…

Boxing Day mash up

Setting out, the tones of Jim Maxwell narrating the Boxing Day test helped me along familiar ground to Goulburn and then round the back of the Blue Mountains via Taralga and Oberon. I’m not quite sure when the familiar becomes, well, exotic, but I had never been to Hartley before and I wasn’t expecting to see emus along the roadside. Attempting to quell this confronting change, I popped in for some afternoon tea in the cutesy national trust cafe. Devonshire scones with clearly non-Devonshire cream. Sigh. When will they learn?!

The journey proceeded through Lithgow and alongside the expansive Capertree Valley, where my first lookout stop offered a surprising reveal of a sweeping landscape. From here, the final sandstone ridges of the Blue Mountains stand bastion over a green carpet of eucalyptus, and – closer to the road – the occasional green taming of human activity. Apparently the Capertree Canyon is the second biggest in the world after that gargantuan gorge called The Grand Canyon. Which clearly makes it the largest in the southern hemisphere. However, despite this billing, for me, it was a detour too far.

With the day drawing to a conclusion I had to make haste to my first camp spot, passing through a seemingly deserted Mudgee, and hitting the gravel roads into Goulburn River National Park. Here I surprised myself at how efficiently I made camp, setting up gear which had not seen the light of day for a few years. Yes, the swag was back and loving its natural environment.

With all this travel and excitement it was easy to forget that it was Christmas time and today was Boxing Day. It certainly didn’t feel like a typical Boxing Day, but I paid a little homage to tradition by boiling up and coarsely mashing some potatoes and carrot, serving it with some ham, and adding a few pickled onions and a pile of Branston. This camp stove and esky creation was a perfect amalgamation of English traditions and Australian summer holiday, a supremely satisfying garnish to this first day.

To England, my New England

The next morning dawned sunny and warm, a hot day ahead to progress north into New England. At some point – Merriwa I think – I rejoined a road I had once been on, and the New England Highway steadily progressed towards Tamworth. Some may disagree, but I find this route north to Brisbane more scenic, more interesting than the Pacific Highway, which follows the coast but sufficiently distant from it to rarely glimpse the gorgeousness of Pacific Ocean.

Here, the landscape is rolling and golden and covered in a warming glow. Sun-baked fields and picket-fenced horse studs line the highway, frequently terminating at abrupt rises in the land and wilderness once more. A steady stream of small towns gladly interrupt the journey, adding the interest of random claims to fame, elegant facades, and Driver Revivers. And road signs proclaim only 700kms to Brisbane. I could be there in a tick.

But obviously I stop and detour and make inevitable visits to big things like a giant golden guitar in Tamworth. It’s my third time here but I still cannot resist the allure of such a curious, iconic Australian landmark. The car and I refuel, we park up and make lunch of ham sandwiches and crisps. And, comfortably gathering that road trip rhythm, we set off once more, another hundred clicks up the road to Armidale.

From Armidale I find myself heading south and east…not exactly the direction for Brisbane. But just a little way out of town, farmland gives up and a corner of Oxley Wild Rivers National Park is accessible. This is gorge country which – after rain – boasts the promise of waterfalls. In the midst of this summer Dangars Falls is absent, but the deep gorge is clearly less fickle and the campground nestled above it is a delight.

After setting up with even more surprising efficiency there are a few hours left in the long summer day for a bit of a walk. It is the perfect time of day and – at what must be approaching 1000 metres in altitude – the temperature is pleasant, the walk shady, and possessing only a couple of manageable inclines to negotiate. The final couple of kilometres weave along a ridge high above the chasms carved by Salisbury Waters, leading to an abrupt halt at McDirtys Lookout. It may sound like it’s named after a slang term for a ubiquitous fast food burger chain, but there are no car parks, no neon signs, no frozen cokes in sight. Just a landscape preserved thanks to its inaccessibility and the wild rivers that made it.

In the Washpool

Day three and already I was making spontaneous changes to my vaguely pre-defined route. Instead of heading up a boring looking road to Glen Innes, the journey took me along a section of the Waterfall Way and then cut across on a quiet, winding road to Grafton.

Along the Waterfall Way I could make a mid-morning stop at Ebor Falls, a site I had previously encountered boasting a couple of quite magnificent waterfalls. Today, they were an inferior imitation of what I remembered, reduced to a trickle and hidden in the shadows from the morning sun. But as road stop rest stops go, there was plenty to savour: a gentle shady walk along the valley rim, pockets of wildflowers and patches of birdlife, the smell of the bush. All under the deepest blue skies.

It is broadly along the latitude of the Waterfall Way that the first of a number of pockets of ancient rainforest appear; clusters which frequently emerge all the way north from here, up to and across the Queensland border. Dorrigo National Park is the first and has much to adore. But having been there and done that, I was keen to make it to a large swathe further north.

From KFC in Grafton, the car headed through patches of woodland and along the picturesque valley of the Mann River. Rugged ranges loomed, neared and eventually required climbing; like so many roads from the coast to the inland, hairpins and lookouts and massive tree ferns clinging to the eastern escarpment. Atop all this a dirt road led off the highway and plunged into the rainforest of Washpool National Park.

The Washpool walk provided nine kilometres to stare up at giant trees and admire the light through the vivid green canopy. Vines and creepers tempted Tarzan escapades. Humidity sapped and a small waterfall offered only gentle relief while also hastening the need to pee. It was an immersive and captivating rainforest experience but – perhaps after another long, hot day – a couple of kilometres too far in my opinion. Still, at least I had sweated out maybe one piece of southern fried chicken.

I felt as though I had earned a beer and decided to take one with me on a brief amble to a lookout near the park entrance. This is the benefit of having everything in the car and, um, the beer would provide hydration if I ended up getting lost or bitten by a snake or something, right? Thankfully the lookout was a mere stroll and the satisfaction of that coldish beer on that bench on those rocks in that peace with that view under early evening skies without the prospect of getting lost and having snakes for company was something to cherish.

While the beer episode is up there, it was just about surpassed by waking the next morning beside Coombadjha Creek. This is why you put up with a little discomfort and a lot of phaff by camping. You feel part of the environment, immersed in the landscape, at one with nature. Even if this means enduring the bittersweet alarm call of shrieking and cackling at four in the morning.

Before breakfast, before packing up, before moving on once more, I could hatch out of the swag and wake up with the world around me. Virtually from my bed a small trail followed the pristine waters of the creek and looped back through a large stand of Coachwood. The sun gradually made its appearance, shafts of light angling through the trees and shimmering through the ferns onto the water. The creek was clear and cool, and after three nights of camping without a shower, it was tempting to bathe. But I really didn’t want to ruin its purity; my mind turned to the allure of the ocean instead.

Return to a civilisation

Without going into lurid detail I did wash each day thanks to boiling water and the use of a bucket, an art mastered in the trip of 2013 with Jill. Simultaneously I could make a cuppa, grill some toast and prepare my morning sink. Sure, it wasn’t exactly luxurious or even two star, but it allowed me some confidence to mingle a little with civilisation each day and order a morning coffee, buy petrol and ice. Which is exactly what I did in Grafton after descending from the hills that morning.

Heat had been building on this trip and by now it really was scorchio. I could resist the ocean no more and joined the masses along the Pacific Highway, turning off towards Yamba. Outside of school holidays I am sure this is an easy-going little coastal town. Today a shady car park was at a premium and the wait for fish and chips was half an hour. But it had several beaches lapped by clear and calm water in which to linger. I finally felt that a layer of inland Australia had been cleansed, only to be replaced by salt, sand and – subsequently – fish and chip grease.

I encountered my first inexplicable traffic jam north of Yamba and speculated that this was being replicated up and down the highway. Still, I only had twenty clicks at a snail’s pace before I could turn off and head to Lismore. Lismore was to herald my proper return to civilisation, something which some people would find surprising in relation to Lismore. But I was to sleep in a proper bed and have a proper shower here, both of which I was quick to enjoy upon arrival. Refreshed and walking Lismore’s unfathomably charming streets, I felt part of normal society again.

Yet after the joy of showering and napping on a double bed and walking a little along the Wilsons River, I felt lost. This habitat, this environment, this standing still in one place felt a little odd. Still with a couple of hours of daylight to spare, I drove out into the lush countryside, through stretched out villages hidden amongst the trees boasting honesty fruit stalls, lefty views, and probable marijuana. To Nightcap National Park, where some falls were missing but where the late sun bathed the forest in gold. Just me and the Subaru, enjoying the last beer from the esky, the final slice of ham. We had come far and – refreshed – we could carry on until the end of days. Or, more likely, until I needed a shower and craved a soft double bed again.

Australia Driving Green Bogey Photography Walking

October 23, 2016

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Remain?

I was naturally curious to gauge the reaction of arriving in Europe on one of those British passports. A snide eye roll, a tutting sigh, a stale baguette in the face? But no, such was the tardiness of Easyjet that Geneva airport was practically closed (and, yes, I know, not in the EU). So with haste it was through the Swiss border and across into France.

France. Dawning on a beautiful late summer’s day on which some of its citizens were semi-productively shuffling off to work while those who worked in Switzerland – courtesy of a public holiday – were not. The French also had school, which by a happy coincidence meant a child free day to venture into the Alps with relieved parents Monsieur Alain et Veronique. And inevitably eat cheese.

La Clusaz was a suitable lunch venue, reached via a scenic ride up a valley and into the green pasture chalet-dotted world that is so typique. Quiet streets recovering from the summer holidays led down to a clutch of shops and restaurants. Being lunchtime, the shops were closed and the shop owners in the restaurants, one of which took us in for some lazy refuge. A beer, charcuterie, fondue, tarte aux myrtilles. All inescapably inevitable and delicious.

I guess if we were keen, had bikes, several blood transfusions and some special Coke cans, we could have worked it off heading up to the Col de la Colombiere. But it was much easier to appreciate from car, rising up from Le Grand-Bornand through some of those chalet-dotted villages, alongside rustic farms and into a precipitous wilderness. Marmots whistled, cyclists huffed and puffed, and the only lump of cloud in the Alps stubbornly hovered and clung to the mountaintops above.

Descending from here was every bit as if not more fun than the climb. While I’d appreciate the distinct lack of a need to pedal on a bike I’m pretty sure I would lack the bravery. The car itself had plenty of natural momentum to hurtle down the straights and sweep round the bends. Villages and dreamy views flew by. And then we were back into the valley. A big valley with towns sprawled out and “traffic furniture” in profusion. France was leaving school and work, and we had a pick-up of our own to get back for.

Our school pick-up was without too many a problem. By contrast, another tardy Easyjet plane resulted in another late night pick-up from the airport, as the parents decided to join us for the weekend. Well, a long weekend, since the next day was Friday and the kiddies were still in school. Ahead was the prospect of another tantrum-free sojourn into the mountains, all being well.

And what a lovely tour it was, revisiting some vaguely familiar territory but under glorious skies instead of disappointing murk. First stop was Carrefour, which was a little less lovely, but suitably stocked with bread and meats and cheese, staples that can be lumped together and taken up to the top of a hill in scenes reminiscent of a Peppa Pig episode in which they have a thoroughly middle class picnic.

The hill in question was situated in the Plaine Joux area, topped with wooden tables and lazing meadows, peppered with cows, and surrounded by mountains. If you didn’t want to idle in the sun, several trails could take you to the top of other hills, down into valleys, across farms, or simply round the corner to marvel at the vista in the other direction.

Down there somewhere in the Vallee Verte, past the evocative Onnion, and wedged into the mountains sat the Lac de Vallon. Placidly reflective, partly in shade from the looming hills, blissfully quiet, it was a pause in the return home. A final beautiful moment before the weekend proper and the chance of greater mayhem. A mayhem that was admittedly delightful, barring one or two moments.

And so there were walks to parks and more picnics, bouncy castles, lego blocks, hearty lunches, tickle monsters, bustling markets, outdoor petanque, selfies, tired parents and doting grandparents. Oh, and a bit of a premature gateaux anniversaire for a certain someone. It was the final family flourish before saying, again, au revoir. Goodbye. Leave.

Driving Europe Food & Drink Green Bogey Photography

September 20, 2016

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The other side of the road

For countless miles past I have been chauffeured around the highways and byways of Devon and Cornwall by my brother. Often to head out for a walk, a spot of sightseeing, some lunch. Maybe a round of golf or a special treat to a humungous Tesco. But not until August 2016 did I only partially return the favour (albeit without the Tesco) for him and his son.

Being the midst of summer holidays it was typically overcast on the jaunt through the South Hams to Salcombe. Atypical was the lack of traffic however, and we were in the centre of town foraging for treats before you know it. Fudge, pasties, ice cream, supposedly good coffee. Fodder for a very British lunch in the refreshing drizzle, which naturally timed its arrival to perfection.

Just a stone’s throw from here – but via tortuously scenic roads hemmed in by a picture postcard of thatched cottages – sit the pebbles of Slapton Sands. Even on dismal days the pebbles lend vibrancy to the air, clarity to the water, and a chance to display consistent inadequacy at skimming. The alternative option of tossing increasingly giant rocks into the sea proved far more accessible and entertaining.

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The stubbornness of cloud to vanish endured the following day driving over the Tamar and towards Holywell Bay, just west of Newquay. Two things appeal here: an array of rides, games, and equipment for child entertainment and the spacious, undeveloped sandy beach. Actually three things: the pitch and putt links. No make that four: Doom Bar on tap in the golf clubhouse.

As the afternoon evolved, summer came back with a bang. Perfect golfing weather and opportunity to get a little burnt. I never get burnt in Australia, only soggy little Britain, quite probably because I never expect to be on the receiving end of such ultraviolet aggression. The golf wasn’t exactly red hot, but we coped around the course sculpted in such a splendid location.

Having abandoned a bunch of wildlings on the beach, it was late afternoon by time my brother and I rejoined the rest of the family, who didn’t seem to miss us one bit. And why would they, frolicking in the sun, attacking one another with water, jumping over surf. It was quite wonderful to see, together in perfect harmony, in amazing weather, in an attractive place. What else do you need? Fish and chips maybe? Okay.

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Lots of families were in various states of disharmony in Looe on what proved to be the warmest day yet. On the coast of South East Cornwall not a million miles from Plymouth, Looe can be quite agreeable. In October or April perhaps. On a hot day in August I would say the only thing going for Looe is the presence of Sarah’s Pasty Shop. I don’t know Sarah but I would marry her tomorrow, no qualms (she also has a divine looking cake shop so there really are no negatives as far as I can see).

The criminal thing – though actually fortuitous for us locals in the know – are the queues of people backing out of Ye Olde Cornish Bakehouse or West Cornwall Pasty Ltd or whatever they are called. Chain stores in mediocrity. Delivering nourishment to hordes of people trying to find a few metres on the grainy beach. This is why Looe on a hot August afternoon is not for me. But I’d go there for Sarah.

Of course, escaping crowds can be achieved by venturing out of the seaside towns and onto the coast path. Lantic Bay made a striking debut in my consciousness last year and – earning a calendar appearance – my brother was keen to soak up the cliff top views and countryside ambience. Hands down this is better than Looe, but then, the beach isn’t as accessible…something which can cause consternation amongst beach-lovers. Back to Looe it is. Hi Sarah!

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In a final hit and miss cloud affair in which there were more misses than hits we returned to the North Cornwall coast the next day. The aim was a last hoped-for paddle in water and delicious cream tea, something that could please everybody. The setting on the River Camel at Daymer Bay was agreeable enough, and could have been quickly heightened with a spot of sun. But it was under a mackerel sky that a few of us tiptoed into the water and clambered over rock pools.

Because I was actually really enjoying driving around blind bends and along single track lanes I decided we could seek out a cream tea further up the coast near Boscastle. For once eschewing the village, we managed to get a parking spot at Boscastle Farm Shop, which hosted not only cream teas but an array of impressive looking cakes and a half decent coffee.

It’s a spot to put on the list for future visits. And with the coast path literally on the doorstep, who’s to say I will reach it by car next time around? Sometimes, passenger or driver, the best of the south west is out there on foot. Overlooking the sea with the allure of cream at the top of a hill. Lovely.

Driving Great Britain Green Bogey Photography Walking

September 4, 2016

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Over the hills

It wasn’t so long ago that I spent an awfully long time in the south west of England. Time that was only occasionally awful in the gloomy despair of November; otherwise it was all sunshine and lollipops or – more accurately – white cloud and clotted cream teas. Thus arriving back again on the most sublimely gorgeous of blue sky days proved no big fuss.

Who am I kidding? It was a sublimely gorgeous blue sky day after all and, following a quick embrace of various family members, I scarpered for the moors, reuniting with narrow lanes, wayward sheep, dry stone walls and a Willy’s ice cream. And on the subject of willies…such was my frantic rush to climb Sheepstor I ripped the trousers I had on while straddling a ditch, leaving me delightfully well ventilated if a little wary of human encounters. The views – from my end at least – were majestic.

Ripping trousers so early on are not a good portent for the remainder of a holiday which has historically involved a deluge of high fat dairy products, intense sugar, and hearty stodge. The fact that I was here not so long ago for an awfully long time (acquiring at least one stone in the process), failed to have little impact on my behaviour. Pasty done, cream tea done, massive barbecue meat fest done and 48 hours not yet passed.

Lest things become all a little familiar, a circuit breaker came in the form of a Canadian visitor – Claire – who I had not seen since 2003 in New Zealand. Visiting the country for a couple of weeks I naturally proceeded to take Claire to some familiar Cornish places and indulge in familiar Westcountry treats. But at least I got to experience them through a new pair of eyes – an experience confirming that jam on cream is definitely wrong and not at all aesthetically pleasing (I mean, what do Canadians know about cream teas anyway?!!)

Unfortunately it was all a little murky in Boscastle, but at least the descent to the harbour took us out of the clouds and into a flower filled, tourist peppered, boat bobbing idyll. From which we promptly walked up and up (a seemingly recurrent theme all day) along the coast path to the western headland. Here, the clouds skimmed our heads and offered a little pleasant drizzle, obscuring the coastline and patchwork hills inland. While a weather feature atypical of Manitoba, it could only divert for a few minutes at best, and half a cream tea back at sea level felt like a more agreeable option.

Radically, the cream tea was in a new location for me. And such adventurousness continued when I stopped midway between Boscastle and Tintagel and sought to find Rocky Valley. After a touch of on road uncertainty I found the path (hint: look for the valley with lots of rocks), and it was quite a sight. Of course, walking down into a valley meant going back up again, but what would Cornwall be without all these hills, eh?

Familiar ground was back on the cards in Tintagel, where we called in for a Cornish pasty, obviously. The pasties here have acquired a legendary status over the years, rivalling those of wizards and knights and horses and pixies and things. But as such legends have become diluted by a parade of tourist tat shops, so too the pasties may well be in decline. They are still more than tolerable, but not on the pedestal they once inhabited. Next year, I will have to check again!

The Cornish pasty was of course the typical tin and copper miner’s lunch. In fact, it probably features in Poldark, crumbs smeared down the body of that actor dude that everyone seems to think is a bit of crumpet. Well, Poldark lovers, I may have trodden in his footsteps (and pasty crumbs), radically keeping my top on in the process. I cannot be sure of course, for I have never watched the goddam show, but the scenery around St Agnes looks the part. All windswept headlands, precipitous cliffs, thrashing waves, purple heather and golden gorse, with the added decoration of Wheal Coates mine. It is Cornwall in a snapshot, as Cornish as the pasty, and I am pretty sure as pleasing to a Canadian visitor as patchwork fields, jam on cream, Arthurian legends, mist, bobbing boats, and – undoubtedly – the novelty of hills, those inevitable, never-ending, Westcountry hills.

Driving Food & Drink Great Britain Green Bogey Photography Walking

May 22, 2016

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Green and white

I’m not sure if the Southern Highlands of NSW are deliberately trying to be Scottish or English or even Irish. I mean, there’s the name, but I do not see ragged rocks round which raggedy rascals run, nor boggy glens of heather and gorse lurking in the haar. There are big country estates akin to the tweed jacket terrain of a southern England itching for a brexit, but the falling leaves and withered buds lining their driveways can no longer mask the reality of eucalyptus and brown, scrubby land. Meanwhile, in Robertson, a fondness for potatoes is clear for all to see, only it culminates in the splendid apparition of a big thing, undeniably Australian.

The landscape can at best be described as greenish and pleasantish, a subdued and ultimately futile attempt by those illiterate and innumerate immigrants to create a home away from home, made all the more difficult by prolonged heat and drought. The United Kingdom is the United Kingdom due to its lousy but somehow endearing weather, and because of that Australia will never be able to compete. And nor should it, because Australia is definitely better for being more than just a half-baked recreation of a previous rose-tinted incarnation of a mother country. Plus it can just vie instead – rather well as it turns out – at Eurovision.

As the fading gentrification of the Southern Highlands descends toward the sea you can be in no doubt that this is Australia. Indeed, an Australia as it was before anyone, even its first peoples, decided to venture over by boat. The plateau abruptly falls away into a dense system of deep valleys and gorges. Massive walls of sandstone plummet towards pristine creeks obscured by a blanket of gums. A pair of black cockatoos glide in the air, conversing in prehistoric shrieks. Banksia and wattles compete for attention in the understorey topping the escarpment. And a thin veil of water tumbles over its edge, destined ultimately for the ocean.

Between Fitzroy Falls and the ocean, further endeavours to pacify the landscape emerge in Kangaroo Valley. Undeniably pretty, flower gardens and cottages adorn the valley, while larger lodges bask on elevated terraces as if attempting to emulate the initial slopes of an Alpine pass. Indeed, a winding road gathers some form of height before snaking down to Berry, where the quaintness is a tad more commercialised but delivered in style with good coffee and expensive buttery tarts.

After the surprisingly sprawling outlet strips of Nowra, the environment becomes evidently coastal. Salty inlets and spotted gums signal the ocean is near, and at Jervis Bay it is realised in a flourish of white sands and opaque water, a brilliance which softens as the day says its farewell. Today’s departure is a cut above, a boastful multicoloured extravaganza of transitioning light and incandescent skies. It is an exquisite end to an enthralling ride.

To provide some attempt at balance, not everything down at Jervis Bay was entirely utopian. The next morning was decidedly cool, a persistent easterly wind restricting twenty four hour shorts wearing. The first breakfast I had in Huskisson disappointed and the coffee was only adequate. But such first world irritations faded quickly away upon the welcoming green and white terrain of the White Sands Walk.

From bay to bay, traversing succulent coastal forests in between, it’s an easy amble from Blenheim Beach to Hyams Beach. The only real difficulty is deciding whether to take your shoes and socks off on the sandy bits only to then have the hassle of putting them on again for rougher terrain (conclusion: wear sandals or thongs). Plus there’s the challenge of restraining your photo-taking so that you don’t have endless, repetitive pictures of clear water lapping at fine, white sand.

The sand is so white here that it famously gets on every piece of tourist literature and recurrently features on Sydney Weekender as the whitest sand in the world. In fact, it is genuinely so white that even small-minded immigration ministers would feel unthreatened and some cretin with a golden toupee would approve. Personally, I think there is probably whiter (for instance, around Esperance), but that is probably just supremacist talk.

Regardless, the presence of such beaches is a blessing and I was feeling immensely satisfied early the next morning with an improved coffee overlooking the glowing, becalmed bay. And for a few minutes at least you can breathe it in, cherish what makes Australia so special, what helps to make it so compellingly attractive. And to think such coffee-fuelled nirvana may not have happened without openness to the world. We could all still be enduring that ghastly blend of oversized Americanised coffee mixed with UK ineptitude instead. Something, I suspect, even the Southern Highlands would turn their nose up at.

Australia Driving Food & Drink Green Bogey Photography Walking

March 21, 2016April 12, 2016

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Cool man

Just over the hills yet far away there is a landscape of sweeping upland plains, forested ridges and snaking river gorges. Wild Brumbies gallop gracefully across the grasslands or socialise under the shade of a clutch of gum trees. Kangaroos on a family outing peer up out of the golden tufts, looking fairly nonplussed about it all. Cockatoos predictably shriek and magpies chime sweet melodies. The skies are big and low and can almost be touched.

The Cooleman Plain is about 50 kilometres from downtown Canberra, as the cockatoo flies. For us humans with four decent and independently operating wheels, it takes about 200, detouring south to pass round the Brindabella Mountains. The ride is scenic heading down the length of Namadgi National Park. The border crossing into NSW is modest, marked more strikingly by a deterioration of road surface than anything else. And then the joy of tarmac in Adaminaby is only eclipsed by the sight of the Big Trout.

Other than a giant fibre glass trout there is not much to distract in Adaminaby, so you head promptly in what seems to be – finally – the right direction. Kiandra – an abandoned high country settlement spurred on by gold – sits bleak amongst boggy plains and barren ridges. There is a touch of upland England in the vista, that same sparse striking beauty available in the high parts of Dartmoor or the Peak District. But the gum trees tell you this is unmistakably Australia, as you head down into the sheltered green valley housing the Yarrongobilly Caves.

I have been here before, but that was almost ten years ago. Almost ten years, when I first arrived to live in Australia, intending to stay for a year! I couldn’t remember much of it, though the giant hole in the ceiling of one cave opening triggered something approaching recollection. But the river walk must have been new, at least for my feet, and the thermal pool – a steady 27 degrees all year – offered surprise and consideration for wintertime lolling.

Back up the chasm and across from Yarrangobilly, the upland plains stretch out north and east, interrupted occasionally by hilly islands of trees and the long barrier of the not-so-distant Brindabellas. I am heading towards Canberra again and almost expect to catch a glimpse of the needle tower on Black Mountain. But of course I don’t, the high peaks of Bimberi, Gingera and Ginini standing in the way. I have been up there, and it seems oh so close.

By now the day is moving towards an end and there is a wonderful aura in the light, filtering at an angle onto the grasses and gums of the Cooleman Plain. Keen to take a walk in this golden hour I follow the dirt road towards the remnants of Coolamine Homestead. There is no-one else around and I daresay the Brumbies are more attuned to seeing cars hurtling past than humans gently ambling. A couple seem protective, endlessly circling, snorting, staring me down in an effort to keep me away. I am wary but they allow me passage.

Coolamine Homestead is one of many that dot the highlands within and around Kosciuszko National Park. Practically all are now abandoned, the toil of work and life in such isolated and unforgiving climes proving too much to sustain. Coolamine is at least restored and, with this, promises a certain cosiness and tranquillity, at least on such a beautiful March evening as this. But you just know the winters will be harsh, the life lonely, the work unviable. Plus there is no mobile signal to be able to do anything whatsoever, a sad indictment of modernity that I resentfully find challenging now.

At nearby Cooleman Mountain I set up camp for the night without any signal, without any other people, without the comfort of civilisation. It is perhaps because of this that setting up mostly involves shifting things around in my car to accommodate a swag mattress. For some reason I don’t fancy sleeping outdoors – the remoteness, the impending chill, the inevitable, sopping morning dew. The cocoon of the car feels protective. I’m not entirely sure watching an episode of The Walking Dead on my laptop in the dark shell of my car in the middle of an empty forest without anyone else nearby is smart. But I do anyway, and no zombies bang on the window during a fitful night’s sleep.

Age must be affecting me because I am questioning the sanity of camping, even if I have copped out by reverting to the back of the car. Every little thing requires pre-planning and organising, extra time and increased awkwardness. It is effectively homelessness, perhaps more so when you sleep in the car. But then, in the morning, as the misty murk of pre-dawn is dispersed by a welcoming sun, as the deathly still air fills with birdsong, as the wattle and grasses shimmer silver with dew, as you witness the birth of a new day a part of this nature, you know why you do it.

The pre-dawn murk took a little longer to clear down in the plain, and shifting my car back to the homestead required slow and steady navigation through the mist. Setting off from here by foot I resumed my journey along the dirt track towards Blue Waterholes. Ever closer to the ACT border, the mist quickly lifted to show off the backside of the Brindabellas and then, before them, the steep-sided river banks and gorges which filter water down to the very fish-friendly Goodradigbee.

It is, in theory, possible to clamber your way to the Goodradigbee, but this seems almost as difficult as pronouncing it. Beyond the scenic Blue Waterholes (which enjoyed relative popularity and happy interaction with fellow humans), river crossings and the narrow pass of Clarke Gorge make it too much for someone who is already warm and weary, and has been told to beware of snakes in happy interactions with fellow humans.

Luckily, Nichols Gorge is more family friendly but I daresay unlikely to be any less suited to snakes. I didn’t see any in the end, which is surprising given the many heated rocks of the dry creek bed and the tumbling gorge walls. The walk is pleasant, though today it seems to drag a little. The surroundings certainly offer something distinctive: with a tinge of red and a few more eucalypts it could be within the cherished Flinders Ranges. Not just across the border from the ACT, tantalising close to views of the Black Mountain tower.

Of course, getting back to see the Black Mountain tower requires a three hour drive and, as I launch up from the gorge and back out onto the unprotected expanse of Cooleman Plain, I reward myself with a cheese-filled baguette, true mountain walking food. This will keep me going until Adaminaby, where I can pause and refresh with a giant trout. And that will nourish enough to rumble along the dirt, across the border and over the hills, back to a place not really very, very far away. At least as the cockatoo flies, or, indeed, as the Brumby gallops.

Australia Driving Green Bogey Photography Walking

January 25, 2016

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There’s something about Alice

Well, it is quite something to be thrown back into the thick of it, and quite something again to be thrown into the thick of it in the thick of it. With a hop, skip and considerable jump there could be no pretence of being in England anymore. No tranquil ponds and croquet-worthy lawns, no afternoon teas and broadleaved avenues, no ubiquitous sarcasm and cling-filmed sandwiches. Just right bloody ripper sunbaked Straya with Utes and flies and glad-wrapped beetroot sangas and drongos in high-vis and Aboriginals under trees, with rarely a hipster in sight.

That probably does Alice Springs an injustice to be fair. While there are plenty of Utes and flies and a fair share of drongos, it struck me what a right multicultural melee Alice is. An African taxi driver took me to my resort hotel, filled with – among others – softly-spoken British baby boomer couples and their lairy transatlantic cousins. Here an immaculate receptionist of Southeast Asian heritage checked me in and I passed what passed for a chambermaid from the Middle East. Later, on the way into town for a bite to eat (friendly Asian service again), I strolled along Todd Street Mall to the sounds of German and French backpacker accents and something more rarely heard in other Australian towns and cities: Aboriginal dialects, which are many and varied. For better or worse, it really is a right little melting pot in the middle of nowhere.

There is an oasis town aura to Alice – albeit a little rough around the edges – which perhaps draws these people in. Approaching from north, south, east or west it is probably the first place with a Woolworths and Kmart for a thousand miles, or something stupidly noteworthy like that. You can finally get a cappuccino, but do beware. And there are public showers so you can attempt to wrench off layers of sand and dirt and flies that have attached to your skin while ploughing through the Oodnadatta Track in your big fuck off truck. Frankly, if only more towns in Australia had such facilities, it would have been most welcome.

On the other hand, natural oases appear more limited. The Todd River is mostly a river in name only. Usually it’s just a dry, wide, and sunken swathe of sand meandering through town, almost as if a dreamtime serpent had once there slivered. It is quite striking and also quite beautiful in a way: grasses and short and stocky shrubs flower along its banks and a parade of River Red Gums indulge in a majestic arrangement of bulbous roots, variegated bark and twisted, stretching branches. There really is not a better Eucalypt in all of Australia, in my uneducated opinion. It just looks like it belongs here.

As well as dry (semi-arid is the tour guide word of choice) Alice is – it will come as no surprise – frequently hot. However, having endured a scorcher of a week in Canberra, it actually felt quite pleasantly temperate for my stay. A nice ambient thirty degrees with a bit of a breeze and occasional cloud cover. Pah, call this hot?

Anyway, venturing into the outback from Alice – once work duties have been completed – it doesn’t take long to feel a long, long way from anywhere and anything. You can sense it would be really, really nasty on a proper hot day. Flies would multiply tenfold, crickets would pulsate loudly before passing out, the cracked earth would literally bake a goanna, while giant birds would circle for unsuspecting Englishmen lost in their quest to find a tea shop.

Fortunately, this particular Englishman was on a minibus tour today, taking in the West Macdonnell Ranges. Not the entire length of the ranges mind, because they stretch virtually uninterrupted for something like five hundred kilometres. Technically there are three separate ranges in the ranges, if that makes sense. Named after British conquistadors who got a bit lost, I suspect. I cannot remember, because instead of taking in everything the tour guide was saying, I was kind of mesmerised by the almost repetitive pattern of sweeping ridges rising from scrubby red plains.

Scenery passing by the window, I noticed how once every few kilometres the ridgeline dips and is eroded to varying degrees. In some spots this has created a significant gap and a way through to the north, sometimes narrower than an American tourist. This is where waterholes and gorges form – Simpsons Gap, Standley Chasm, Ellery’s Big Hole and the like – providing opportune stops for purveyors of sightseeing day tours. They are stops worth making, for there is an air of magnificent serenity in such sheltered grandeur.

Further down the road there are some ochre pits, imaginatively marked on the map as ‘Ochre Pits’ (it is a rare thing indeed to find any ambiguity whatsoever in modern Australian place names). The pits offer evidence of mining long before unscrupulous Queenslanders and Chinese corporations arrived. I never realised how rare ochre was, this being one of only nine such pits in Australia. Quite coincidentally I had been to one other, down in the Flinders Ranges, a couple of years ago. And I remember just as many flies there as there were here today.

Beyond noon and the sun was starting to become a little fiercer and, of course, the flies had been stoked into action. Time for a cold beer and a feed I would say. And quite astonishingly there is a place just for that. At Glen Helen Gorge – which really does appear in the middle of nowhere – someone has decided to build a resort. It’s not your resort in the Abu Dhabi or Port Douglas sense – think more shack-like and rubble-strewn. But it has a pub, a pub with cold beer, along with a plethora of touring essentials like fly nets and trail guides and fridge magnets. And just down from the pub you can stagger down to the next waterhole.

Refreshed, you may like to take a post-lunch dip and float on the waters that have collected in the hollows of Ormiston Gorge, ten minutes or so up a side road from Glen Helen. Or, like me and several others, you may wish to feel the full force of the early afternoon sun on a short but steady climb to an overlook. Perhaps it is the sweat from collective hordes of visitors that gathers in the open air swimming pool several hundred feet below?

Still, it is all worthwhile toil, for the view is pure red heart of Australia stuff. With trails and river beds and curiosity beckoning on every rocky ridge top, you can begin to see why Aboriginal tribes were prone to wander. For food and water for sure, but there is also something captivating and enticing about this landscape which is hard to describe. It wants to lure you in, to see what is around the next corner, and, in doing so, to fool you into a frazzled state of bewilderment and possible death because you are not part of it.

Thankfully, an air-conditioned minibus was enough to tempt me away from disappearing into a chasm, but I have made a mental note of the Larapinta Trail – or parts thereof – for future reference.

The pleasingly cool bus happily commenced its return to Alice with another waterhole stop – where you could invariably change into swimmers, bathers, togs, swimsuits or just go stark bollock naked – to come. And then, what will later be re-created as an episode of pure outback horror for some, commenced. A puncture, hordes of flies, hot afternoon sun, circling vultures, probable snakes, likely serial killers. Would we make it back in time for our dinner reservations? What about our flights tomorrow? What if we get eaten by kangaroo zombies? Anyone want any lamingtons? AGGGHHHHHH, lamingtons, help!!

Mercifully, the tyre got changed, with just a little help from yours truly. Being the only male of a certain age on the bus I felt obliged. And a touch heroic, vanquishing the oily grime from my hands with a wet wipe from someone’s handbag. What. A. Man. We still might make the waterhole stop now, and not have to eat lamingtons to survive. Unless we get another puncture, but what are the chances of that?!

And so, ten minutes later with a flat front right, someone opened the lamingtons while others flagged down help to get a message back to Alice for another bus to be despatched. Certain overseas visitors couldn’t fathom that there was no mobile reception here, and it was not as simple as getting a rescue helicopter so they could still make it in time for their dinner reservation. One hour in, an extended family resorted to playing the ABC game and I desperately hoped they would ask me to join in. Two hours, and restlessness heightened. People needed to pee in the bushes and generally say what they would have done differently with the eternal benefit of hindsight and no experience whatsoever travelling in the Australian outback. A man with binoculars scanned the road on the horizon, each occasional sighting of a vehicle bringing brief hope before its despair.

Two and a half hours in, one more vehicle sighting provided another glimmer of hope. With sunlight dipping, the time when kangaroo zombies stir from the caves was nearing. I had resisted the lamingtons thus far and wanted to keep it that way. The vehicle slowed and revealed itself to be an identical minibus, apart from some livery telling us it’s the airport shuttle. Jeez, that’s some transfer, so let us hope it’s for us.

And of course it was, for this isn’t really an outback horror tale at all, just some inconvenient episode that soured a fine day but will find use in a vacation anecdote (or maybe even an inane post on an obscure blog). It may have already appeared on Trip Advisor, thanks to the ruining of dinner reservations. And of course, it’s just another reminder that you’re back in Australia Neil, the real ‘Straya. And there aint a lot you can do about anything in the real ‘Straya, so suck it up, maaaate!

Australia Driving Green Bogey Photography

December 13, 2015December 13, 2015

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Floody ‘ell

So it turns out ‘The North’ is more than just a fictional imagining in George R.R. Martin’s gargantuan head. There is a real place in which gruff folk with grizzled beards mumble about stone walls. The weather can be cold, but it is mostly just bone-chillingly wet; sombrely leaden. Expansive wilds present a bleak, gritty beauty, tamed only in picturesque patches of lowland. Sheep cling forlornly to the slopes, anticipating, finally, the coming of winter. Further North, an ancient wall struggles to keep out wildlings, armed with Tennants Super on the 0900 to Euston. We are in Cumbria.

Cumbria before the floods, but only just. After a soggy few days on the Lancashire coast, it wasn’t much of a surprise to travel up the M6 in a medley of drizzle, dark cloud, and downpour. While a brief period where I didn’t have to use windscreen wipers offered hope, this was dashed with unending persistence once in the Lake District National Park. And so, from umbrella buying in Bowness to umbrella usage in Ambleside to umbrella drying off in a neat hotel in the middle of nowhere, there really wasn’t much to do in this greatest of outdoors.

As the dim skies faded black and the patter of rain continued apace upon the skylight I decided to make a break for it and check out the bright, Christmas lights of Keswick. I was hoping for a Dickensian scene of late night shopping, market stalls with hubbub and mulled wine, brass bands blaring out Once in Royal David’s City, and ribbons of light twinkling above curving cobbled alleyways. The reality offered some lights but little else, as the town appeared to be hunkering down for the night. With sodden shoes and a reduced-price pork pie from the Co-op, I retreated back to the car, umbrella decimated by a gust of wind, facing only the promise of driving through surface water in the dark. I made it, but Keswick did not. Two days later it was flooded.

Oh for a dry day and, for most of Friday, it happened. It wasn’t exactly bright or pleasant, but for a few hours the rain had paused before it was to come back in such vengeance. A few puddles dotted the road alongside Derwentwater on the way towards Honister Pass. Softened valley villages and stonewalled farms yielded to barren upland, coated a deep brown with the dying bracken. A steep decline worthy of the Tour De France returned things to something closer to the idyllic around the idyllic sounding Buttermere.

This was my chance to revel in dreary dryness, to soak up bleak melancholy, to wander lonely as a big grey cloud. The lake could be circumnavigated and it came as something of a surprise that the path was still in good condition during the two hour loop. Only once was a rocky detour required due to a swollen lake edge. Oh, and a couple of steps through a rising brook. Hang on…I almost forgot…that falling ass over tit moment on a small stretch of grass linking the road back to the path. Muddy bottom, muddy camera, but thankfully no-one around to see my slippery fall from grace.

The scenery was undeniably beautiful. One wonders whether it would be improved by sunlight and fluffy white clouds, buttercups and warmth. Probably. I remember it as such on a brief stop ten years past. Today, it was moody and, to be honest, me too. After a week without it, I just really really REALLY craved the sun. But at least it was dry…so mustn’t grumble.

With all the previous day’s rain it was no major surprise to encounter a series of stretched out cascades and falls plunging down the steep-sided fells towards the lake. I suppose this is some recompense for the deluge, but so frequent and incessant is the sound of water that it makes you want to pee really really badly. And there is not much in the way of foliage left to offer shelter and protection.

Still, relieved and closer to the end, an alien sliver of blue sky opened up to the northeast. A chink in the steel armour, it was something to cling to, something to chase. Briefly it illuminated some hills in the distance, but failed to deliver anything of solace on my face. There would be little chance for anything to air for long.

Completing the Buttermere circumnavigation, I jumped back into the car to venture over a narrow pass and down to the western edge of Derwentwater. That chink of blue sky was somewhere in this direction, and I may have bathed in it for all of twenty seconds. Unfortunately I was in the car at the time, but it was still a very special twenty seconds. A valley glowed. A farm building shimmered. The sheep murmured quiet contentment. And then the strong wind sent it away, off into the distance.

Early afternoon in Keswick and things had actually dried out a little – perhaps it too had been briefly kissed by the sun? There were people on its streets and a hint of something Christmas-related in the air. There was no wafting smell of hot pork pie though, but then I began to question whether this ten year old recollection was actually in Kendall rather than Keswick? So, of all things, I ended up with a Cornish pasty in the cute town square.

Determined not to suffer a food disappointment to compound my rapidly redeveloping British glumness, I set out on a mission for afternoon tea. For what else is the Lake District if not the archetypal biscuit tin setting for afternoon tea? Grasmere sounds a likely spot, full of tea shoppes and crafty gifts to cater for poetic dreamers. A place where a pot of tea can – at a single moment – feel like the best thing in the world. Elation amplified by a gigantic slice of treacle tart, sickeningly delectable. A high on which to leave the lakes and to treasure a day of figurative sunshine amongst the December clouds.

Driving Great Britain Green Bogey Photography Walking

October 4, 2015

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More moors

Dartmoor is a very handy place. Particularly on those days where guilt gets the better of me and I engage in the preposterous proposition of work. After instant coffee breaks – a sure sign I have been in England too long and settled for inadequacy – it reaches something like 3pm and I yearn to break free. And there Dartmoor is, through the school and hospital and fast food takeaway traffic, and up the A386.

The area around Burrator is probably the handiest and offers a useful mixture of forests, tors, ponies and a chance to gobble down a Willy’s ice cream. Sharpitor, Leather Tor, Sheepstor, Down Tor all provide the opportunity to scramble around and over clutters of granite, to gaze north and east into the wilds and south and west over the patchwork dream to the hazy ocean on the horizon. Swathes of bracken meander down to gnarly forests and tinkling streams, some of which are occasionally plummeting (conveniently and suspiciously close to the ice cream van).

From such moorland vantages – and practically any other hilltop in West Devon and East Cornwall – the modest mound of Brentor is visible, disconnected from the barren tops of Dartmoor before it slides down into the Tamar Valley. Its distinction not only stems from its prominence amongst flatter surrounds, but its famous church that some dedicated god-botherers decided to construct a long time ago.

I suspect the church provided a symbolic, steadfast two fingers to the heathens, roaming the moor via their crazy stone circles and rows, all wild hair, posies of heather, and rampant Chlamydia. An outpost for civilisation, a rising up from the moral turpitude of the flea-bitten masses towards the light. I feel much the same leaving Plymouth and heading to Dartmoor today, bathed in its pure air and natural light. Swept away in wonderment, even my jeans are feeling holy, what with all the pasties and frequent straddling of giant cracks between granite blocks.

As well as flailing raggedly down from Dartmoor, heathens would have been in profusion west of Brentor and into the dark, forbidding uplands of Kernow. Willing to shake it up a little, I grabbed my passport one afternoon, crossed the Tamar and headed towards Bodmin Moor. Less defined and gargantuan than its Devonian counterpart, there are nonetheless pockets of heather and gorse pierced by shattered tors. Ponies graze and stone rows lurk and the diggings and ruins of the tin industry crumble away in profusion. There is less of the idyllic in this zone around Minions, but there is enough to encourage future exploration.

From these boggy pastures the River Fowey runs south and widens into that rather delightful spot by the sea. Upstream has its highlights too, as I found at Golitha Falls. Verdant woodlands are making the most of the last of the summer, tinges of yellow and orange and red brushing the tops exposed to the sun. A scattering of leaves are floating down towards the mossy branches and rocks of the forest floor. All the while, the pure waters of the river meander and tumble unendingly onward, luring you to follow them forever towards the sea. Cool and refreshing and rejuvenating, there are no excuses not to get back to work, other than more moors.

Driving Great Britain Green Bogey Photography Walking

June 13, 2015October 19, 2015

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June

[Best read in David Attenborough style]: As the temperature cools in the southern part of the Australian land mass, the first signs of an incredible migration start to appear. Senior males of the species are spotted in pockets along the coast, struggling to grasp with the multiple tasks and devices which will propel them north. Reserves are gathered to a state of surplus, and a battle for alpha male superiority subtly ensues, a contest which will last across the season.

But here, it is the female that rules. Freshly groomed and adorned for the long journey, small numbers congregate. While not always harmonious, they band together for the greater good, bound by a common aim: maintaining survival, comfort, and subjugation over their once proud male partners. Hunting out and often gathering the food, directing the placement of shelters, maintaining the hygiene and lustre of their coats. In groups characterised by auburn dyed hair and expensive designer spectacles funded by generous tax breaks, these females underpin the mass migration that takes place.

And so, in June, across the more northerly coasts of this great continent, the grey nomads begin to cluster. They flock in their thousands to known waterholes. Sites like Carnarvon are almost overwhelmed by the influx, its banana-rich pastures transformed into shanty towns and its pharmacy inundated. The males continue to display in a parade of sandals, white socks and short shorts but, predictably, with little impact. After a while they retreat to seek out fish and engage in ablutions, but there is still competitiveness over the size and strength of their equipment. Some will settle here, and see another winter through with their mate. But others, with stronger torque and deeper reserves, will head on, north to the next great gathering place.

[Back to normal voice in your head]: My first significant encounter with a mass gathering of grey nomads was back down in southern Australia, in a pleasantly ambient March. It was apparent that Mudgee – a NSW country town standing out from many of the others thanks to pastoral affluence and providores – was an alluring spot for ripening baby boomers to hook up their motor homes. A caravan park beside the river, close to town, with excellent ablutions that may have won an award for hottest power showers in the west was always going to prove popular. And so it was that the mini street blocks dumped onto a meadow were crammed with a veritable mix of shiny white coaches and ramshackle fibros, often adorned with an auburn-topped lady in a folding chair reading through her expensive spectacles while a rangy male figure stumbled around trying to figure out how to empty the septic tank.

Campers, as so often, were an afterthought. Allocation to a small patch of grass that possibly classifies as a verge. Sited next to the river, but with the downsides of an adjacent public right of way and numerous biting insects. As ever, placed in the most open and prominent position so that all can look on in bemusement at the canvas contraptions that somehow you and your companion manage to be sleeping quite comfortably in. Swags were always a source of much fascination and eternal debate amongst the nomads, with lively discussions around one’s own ability to survive in such a thing and – on occasions lubricated by grape juice and a great Aussie irreverence – the possibility of sexual intercourse in such a structure [i].

Deflecting much of this attention and offering comradeship against the rows of Grand Adventurer 3000s and solar-panelled satellite dishes tuned into Today Tonight, one other person was braving the use of canvas in Mudgee. And quite amazingly it was one of the greyest of the grey nomads, a dear old lady cycling all over Australia towing her belongings, one of which was a stuffed dog [ii]. There is always someone or something to ruin your sweeping generalisations and lazy stereotypes, darn it. Anyway, being one of the few persons on site to actually need the kitchen facilities (I say kitchen, but think sink and a few tables under a picnic shelter), it was discovered over breakfast that she was in need of a cataract operation, possibly because she hadn’t invested in a pair of those expensive designer spectacles. And with a few delightfully cutting comments about the extravagance of $100,000 motor homes, she loaded up and wobbled on to the next stop down what I hope she knew was the main road.

We never did come across this cycling legend again, something I am pleased about in one sense because I had horror images of finding her happily peddling down the wrong way of the M5, the stuffed dog the only one alert to the situation, a terrified expression on its face. But it is quite possible – indeed highly likely – that you will encounter the same nomads, recognise the same Grand Adventurer 3000s, bump into the same old guy off to the ablutions for his dump, during the migration season.

Rob and Sue – well we think they were called Rob and Sue so that is how they became known – spotted us first. Apparently I had overtaken their car and trailer about ten times that day on the most boring stretch of road to cross the Nullarbor. I can’t say I noticed, because that boring stretch of road was so soporific that senses became dulled, and the caravans and trailers all took on a likeness and started talking to me and whispering sweet nothings as I hazily overtook them at 140kph, all entirely safely as pink elephants blew champagne bubbles through their trunks and out into the endless sky. But over a roast lamb fiesta in the quite delightful Fraser Range Station that night, they recognised us. I suspect a shiny blue Outback with a roof box and what were relatively young people inside (it’s all relative) were a more distinctive site. And as Rob recounted being overtaken ten times that day by some young hoons in a Subaru, my mind tried to recall whether any of those manoeuvres were in any way dodgy [iii].

Rob and Sue were quite lovely, in that quite lovely way where everything is quite lovely. Kind of like the quite lovely aunt and uncle who would have a quite lovely lovingly kept home and would happily let you stay for a lovely dinner and sleep in their quite lovely spare room. They were younger nomads; indeed there was a chance that Rob might still go back to work after their little test of the waters. They didn’t even have a proper motor home, just one of those plain trailers that somehow transforms itself into a suite at The Ritz. I’m sure they didn’t quite see themselves in the same mould as the wildebeestian hordes of socks and sandals and designer spectacles, and were glad to speak to some youth for a change [iv].

Anyway, the next day as the end of the Nullarbor beckoned, we passed Rob and Sue a few more times as part of that drive-rest-stop-drive tango, but now always with a friendly flash of lights and gesture to the pink elephants blowing bubbles in the sky. We marginally missed each other down in Cape Le Grand National Park near Esperance, a fact I discovered when we came from opposite directions to cross in the quite amazing Fitzgerald River National Park [v]. Later, I think they may have been a few vehicles in front of us at some lights in Denmark. And we fully expected to bump into each other once more, migrating north up the west coast of WA. So it was with some disappointment that Rob and Sue vanished into the great tarmac ribbon on red dirt, never to be seen or considered to possibly be stalking us again.

I reckon they were always a few days ahead, due to us lingering around in some backwater like Perth, finally drinking good coffee and wasting time in its breweries and beachside cafes. They were not there among the few souls braving the annoyingly icy waters of Shark Bay to see dolphins being fed; neither did they emerge from the masses crammed into the favelas of Carnarvon, a site which appeared to be only one step removed from a season finale of The Walking Dead; perhaps they weren’t brave enough to stop at the the very rustic setting of Quobba Station or enjoy the jackaroo appeal of Bullara Station, even though a few alternative, non-stereotypical nomads could.

[And so, back to Attenborough]: In the northwest corner of Western Australia, Exmouth is the next staging post for the nomads. Here though, they come up against some younger bucks who could represent a threat to their existence: outsiders from France and other wild lands with extravagant plaits and body features that are proudly displayed, yet to sag. Competing for prime locations next to the ocean from which to alternately strum guitars and read books, there is an uneasy peace between the two groups. As the fine weather holds, an air of acceptance persists and the species cohabit side by side, with Derek very friendly towards young Amelie much to the disapproving over-the-spectacles glare of Margaret.

[Cue crack of lighting and thunder rumble scene, signifying, uh-oh, trouble]: But an unseasonal low pressure storm approaches. Some hunker down, others retreat to the cheapest motel to make the most of the downtime and look at some research publications and transfer the content into an excel spreadsheet in order to save the world. Trouble and coffee brews.

As the rains continue, the wily nomads now sense their opportunity. Secretly unhitching the power and emptying septic tanks in the quiet of dawn, a convoy gathers on the one and only main road of Exmouth. Emboldened by their superior torque and sixteen speed automatic military-spec drive, the nomads traverse the flood plains to settle in drier and warmer climes. Basking in Broome in tinted designer spectacles, they leave behind a melee of Wicked campervans bedecked with misogyny and potentially fatal odours. The grand migration of the common grey nomad carries on unstoppable, and we leave them on their endless roaming and return south.

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[i] Important interpretative note: by ‘possibility’ I refer to consideration of the practicalities of such actions being feasible in such a structure, rather than a request to give it a try!

[ii] Now, I am no Lance Armstrong, but I would imagine that you would do everything possible to minimise weight when cycling across Australia. Apart from those important coke cans for transporting syringes of unicorn blood.

[iii] I mean, we could have been singing out loud to songs from Eurovision 2012 or something. For instance: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O_9QaVC-NKw or https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mrIaxnjeJ58

[iv] If there is one thing to be said for surrounding yourself with grey nomads it is that wonderful feeling of being made to feel a youngster again. Having said that, typically we were the first to bed and departed the site the next morning before many of the older ones had stirred!

[v] If ever you have chance, go there.

12 Months Australia Driving Society & Culture

March 17, 2015June 1, 2015

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Great divides and sunny coasts

Wagga Wagga. Ballarat. Dubbo. Albury. Bendigo. Rockhampton. Geelong. Bunbury. Mount Gambier. These are the recurrent regional research towns, in which there is sufficient population to extract a small selection of locals to talk about everything from the design on a bottle of shampoo to the delight of doing tax. I have been to each and every one, mostly for business but sometimes for pleasure, and now and again for both. Until this past week though there had been a noticeable absentee from the list, and, as if hearing the crucial number in a game of bingo, the Queensland town of Toowoomba delivered a full house.

Toowoomba is a touch inland from Brisbane and, with a sizeable population over a hundred thousand, benefits from good road links, appreciated in the rush that I somehow managed to contrive one working afternoon and evening. It rather dramatically emerges atop the Great Dividing Range, perched on a plateau over this somewhat ill-defined chain of ridges and hills which meanders along the entire eastern fringe of Australia. Thus, the edge of one side of town is adorned with tabletop views as fingers of parkland and bush thrust into the lowland expanse of the Lockyer Valley, cut by hairpins of highway and – because we are in Queensland – no doubt teeming with spiders, snakes, and snag-stained singlets.

The emergence of the town is quite sudden; one minute you are chugging up a protracted series of bends through the bush and then, as soon as it levels, suburban concrete and commercial highways spread out west. I suspect it could almost be the modern equivalent of reaching Machu Picchu, with a city that is shielded from view until traversing a final mountain ridge. Once crested, the ancient civilisation of the Supercheap Autans fills intrepid travellers with awe, as the sun sets over the Darling Downs.

Away from its edges, the remainder of town could easily be Wagga or Ballarat or any other regular research regional resort. There is a city block with some familiar and some uniquely local stores, a typical amalgamation of elegant turn of century buildings and functional blocks. A giant mall draws shoppers from the older town centre while between the two a strategically placed drive-thru Maccas casts its magnet on the alloy wheels of ute-borne bogans and the iron fillings of schoolkids. Amongst this, one small alleyway has been transplanted from Melbourne, adorned with street art and beards making coffee. I stopped by there twice.

Leaving Toowoomba with a decent coffee and mushroom-focused breakfast, I had a free day to return to Brisbane and decided to take a different route back down. First stop was the small village of Hampton, from where I attained necessary booklets and maps from the tourist information centre. Nearby, Ravensbourne National Park, offered some scenic views of the fairly lush and productive countryside of the region, and the first of several mixed rainforest-bush-type ambles.

Heading down to the town of Esk, the road continues in the picturesque Brisbane Valley, fringing the immense Wivenhoe Lake. It was this massive body that bulged with too much water a few years back and released its content into the Brisbane River, causing flooding all the way down to the coast. This was responsible for awful scenes, in which Kevin Rudd – then deposed as PM – waded gleefully through shallow water in his boardies to deliver an empty box of mixed metaphors and cringe-worthy superlatives to despairing locals. Today things were more sedate, though the occasional flood marker and rough strip of tarmac indicated that flood damage is always a risk.

Above the floodplain, more ranges rise on a very winding and sometimes precipitous alternative route to Brisbane. Crossing through D’Aguilar National Park with a touch of je ne sais quoi and foux du fafa, the road takes in several beautiful viewpoints, patches of subtropical rainforest, and sleepy wood-bedecked villages. Of course I stopped at the viewpoints, and partook of a decent walk through forest near Mount Glorious. Ferns, palms, fig trees and fungus were signals of something a little moister and a touch exotic; a setting in which snakes probably hide to wait for ill-footed southerners, and ants are poised to nibble on fleshy toes. Mercifully, I made it out there alive, accompanied by the rumble of thunder and the sweat of ridiculous humidity.

Plunging down away from the rain, the national park ends and immediately Brisbane suburbia grips. There are parallels with the emergence of Toowoomba, as traffic clearways and junctions and shopping malls spring up, traversing The Gap and Ashgrove and a very different kind of Red Hill. The CBD appears, the Brisbane River crossed, and a reminiscent friendship blue sky laksa is taken for old times’ sake. Afterwards, more traffic and concrete and now lights stretch on north, before the city finally gives up, and the motorway allows a speeding up towards the Sunshine Coast.

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From experience I know it is not always sunny on the Sunshine Coast. A now somewhat distant Christmas in particular sticks in the mind. Recently, cyclonic remnants turned fields into mud and streets into streams. This weekend, however, the region was true to its name.

Indeed, it was rather warm. Not drastically higher in temperature than Canberra but with added humidity and night-time sweatiness. Mornings were a bit fresher, meaning that coffee and brunch was not out of the question. But building heat later in the day was more conducive to iced coffees and cold beers, and some relief beside the ocean. In this regard, Coolum Beach at least sounded the part. Certainly, the noticeable sea breeze was causing significant chop on the water and taking some of the perspiration away. Most soothing though was a wade through the ocean itself, as sand and water and feet met in perfect harmony for some brief entanglements of bliss.

The last thing I would want to do in this weather is run. Swimming would be okay I suppose, if you could cope with the oversized waves and not get dragged under by sharks or stung by jellyfish or hit by a wayward surfboard. Cycling might be fine too, if you can mainly stick to going down the nine hills plunging from Buderim, breeze flowing through Lycra, and refresh with an iced latte afterwards. But running doesn’t seem to come with any benefits. Nonetheless, thousands of people decided to engage in all this and more in the Mooloolaba Triathlon, taking place on a perfect, breezeless thirty degree Sunday.

It was hard work, conquering breakfast and then standing by the road, seeking shade, occasionally clapping and snapping and still questioning why on earth you would be doing this when there is a beautiful beach and ocean you could surely be having far more enjoyment out of. I guess there is admiration, but not a logical one because the endeavour seems so senseless. Strangely and surprisingly though I quite enjoyed watching some of the triathlon, and took satisfaction in encouraging all sorts of sweaty bodies towards the top of their final hill.

Needless to say, following all this frivolous activity I had a nap and then an iced coffee in the afternoon. A little bit of work accompanied the iced coffee but the iced coffee just about made that all okay. It also generated a bit of extra energy to do some exercise myself, though more of the sedate sunset walk type than the extreme ironman sweatfest. With daylight fading early, particularly as Queensland are backwards when it comes to moving clocks forward, the signs are of seasons changing. And indeed, on the shores of Mooloolaba, still gently wading through warm waters as the halo of twilight captured the skies, I felt as though this could be the last dose of real summer. It may soon drop below twenty-five degrees and Queenslanders will soon reach for the scarves. And for me, research days in the freezing fog of a Ballarat or Wagga winter are closer to realisation.

Australia Driving Food & Drink Green Bogey Photography

November 15, 2014October 19, 2015

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Gee, 37

It has been a while! As Mum reminded me on the phone recently. It feels just a little like a scolding but one understands that not much has happened; or has it? The sedate cosy green of spring has been baked off, culminating in a top of 37 degrees on the day that a pasty, sweaty-faced David Cameron came to town. Haha. I am not sure if this is just some false summer heat build up that then disappears and transitions to cool dreariness, or yet another sign that we are set to break numerous temperature records, burn to cinders and face encroaching desert sand for our gormless self-serving leaders to bury their heads in.

Meanwhile, in other news, it is a pleasure to write about things that come from my head without having to back them up with a reference (Stafford, 2014). Hay has been in the making while the sun has been shining and escapades too far out of Canberra have been put on hold. My yearning for a trip is gathering like the heat, building until it suddenly relents with one welcome bounty of thunder and lightning. I think both will come very soon.

Red Hill has been poetically inspirational, offering as it does an escape to the country within five minutes. At certain points the suburbs disappear, the ugly tall building in Woden hides behind a tree, and a background composition of the Brindabella Hills frames the golden waves of grass littered with rosellas and galahs and the head of a kangaroo poking above like a marsupial periscope. Here, the green of October is now a yellow brown of November, and the westerly sun of an evening is warmly alluring with undertones of menace.

Elsewhere, my urgings for a road trip take on gentler forms, with small forays out into the fringes of Canberra. One Sunday evening took me out and up to Mount Stromlo; the observatory here a brilliant white egg shell, sitting under the kind of blue sky that extends forever past the moon and into deep space. More down to earth, the landscape of the Murrumbidgee corridor has a touch of African savannah to it, as rolling flaxen grasslands and clusters of trees congregate between looming hills and ridges.

And a trip to space and Africa would not be complete without a sunset beside a big, tepid lake, teeming with beasties and smells and otherworldly things that probably shouldn’t belong to this earth and which you would rather didn’t chew on your legs.

Further outings have been on two wheels, four wheels or four wheels plus two wheels with the added option of two legs for little side trips. Inspired by getting in the saddle in the Lake District and approaching that period when you become middle-aged and suddenly decide that you look good in Lycra, I made the decision to purchase a half decent bike. A bike certainly better than my previous bike, because the lumps and bumps of this town seem a lot easier to navigate, albeit at times still requiring a begrudging grimace. I did not buy any Lycra with the bike and am so far resisting, for middle-age can wait just a while yet please.

The bike offers a different means to pop out a get a coffee, to buy some provisions from the supermarket, to become engrossed in maps and altitude profiles and speed statistics. It is a tool that has empowered a re-appreciation of Lake Burley Griffin, with its blessed 28 kilometre cycle path and assortment of inlets and monuments and riverside meadows. It is a magnet for magpies, but they have calmed down somewhat now.

It has taken me around Tidbinbilla, which is a 17 kilometre ribbon of despair and then delight. The despair coming from a succession of what would seem gentle jaunts uphill in a car but feel like the Pyrenees to my pair of knees; the delight the remainder of the loop, through beautiful bushland rarely disturbed by cars. Just the birds, roos and views for companionship before plunging downhill in a mixture of exhilaration and dread. And still no Lycra.

This very morning it was a bike that made it to the top of what I consider my first genuine hill climb. I was wheezing (Lance, hand me some EPO in a coke can, quick!!) but the bike was just fine ambling in the lowest possible gear. Up to the top of Dairy Farmers Hill in the National Arboretum. I climbed it and, after recovering one hour later, could see what I had never seen before: the appeal of going up a hill in a bike. But still no Lycra.

Tracking my rides and speeds and climbs and – supposed – calories burnt, the bike has undoubtedly become a cake and / or ice cream enabler. So, even if you can’t appreciate cycling or would never consider climbing a little hill on two wheels, appreciate it for that. Any positive savings I may have made are generously counteracted with a treat. Sometimes handmade, others times bought.

So, you see, not a lot has happened over the last month really. Just pictures of trees and kangaroos and sunsets and – why of course – cake to blog about again. And all that is just perfectly fine thank you.

Australia Driving Food & Drink Green Bogey Photography Walking

gbpilgrim

Wanderings in the world. Meanderings from the mind.

Category: Driving

Gold rush

South to North

1577 kms to go

Back on the road

Remain?

The other side of the road

Over the hills

Green and white

Cool man

There’s something about Alice

Floody ‘ell

More moors

June

Great divides and sunny coasts

Gee, 37

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