Kangaroo Mini Blog

Kangaroo Mini Blog

It has occurred to me since posting a picture of a kangaroo against the skyline on facebook, that you folks back home may not actually be properly acquainted with this whimsical and flighty critter. This lack of understanding is a bit odd given that they have very slyly hopped into American culture. Consider all the ways we see kangaroos manifesting themselves in American society. Winnie the Pooh has friends named Kanga and Roo. We have movies like Kangaroo Jack where the show is stolen by a troublesome kangaroo. Kangaroos show up in about half the David Attenborough documentaries. Who hasn't recently seen the adorable picture of the joey hugging his teddy bear on the internet? What American school child doesn't know that a kangaroo's signature attribute is it's pouch? It just all seems rather odd considering these creatures make their homes half way around the world from us.

For all your average American does know about kangaroos, there is a whole host of information that they are probably not aware of. There is not just a “kangaroo” but many different species of these bouncing herbivores. On a daily basis I run into at least two distinct kinds. One is the famous Red Kangaroo and the other is the Wallaroo. Red Kangaroos are often brown but can have a deep red coat and are indeed the poster child species for the whole of Australia. Wallaroos are usually very muscular and live in the rocky hills whereas reds often live on the wide open plains.

Since we've all seen David Attenborough a host of times, if you haven't you should, and since I, while sitting on my front porch, refuse to do any scientific research whatsoever into this matter, we will merely confine ourselves to the social and phenotypical oddities of kangaroos.

The simple fact that must be stated right way and adequately stressed is that kangaroos are EXTREMELY silly animals. I have often told Allan that he should get a dash cam and post every hilarious thing that happens involving kangaroos to youtube. This would grant him instant internet god status. From the passenger seat of the Landcruiser I have often beheld kangaroos first waking up, then bolting only to find that their flight is blocked by a tree, stream bed, or in one case... another kangaroo. There is no chardenfreude like the feeling of watching a kangaroo wipe out in a giant cloud of dust and panic. This is a fate usually suffered by does. The big bucks will often simply sit there and stare at you with a begrudging look on their face as if to say, “hey buddy, this is my dried up tuft of grass. Go find your own.”

Red Roos waking up from sleeping in the road. 

Since we'd be here all day if I were to try and tell you every story of kangaroos losing it in a hasty escape, I'll just tell you my personal favorite. One day I was riding the dirt bike through the outback when I saw a very small joey standing next to his mother. I stopped at what I thought was a respectful distance to let them get out of the way. They seemed to agree with my presence at first but after a couple of seconds of thoughtful staring the joey decided that this was the most startling and frightening thing he'd seen all day. Unfortunately this was news to his rather placid mother who turned around to find her terrified youngun scampering over the spinifex grass. She hopped after him with her long bounding strides until he had the presence of mind to decide that where he ought to be was in her pouch. Upon making this decision he stopped on a dime and abruptly ran into his mother and fell down. Still in a profound state of panic, he jumped up and began clawing his way into his comparatively safe abode. His mother gave him a practiced scoop at which point he flopped head first into her pouch. The perturbed kangaroo then looked at me as if to say, “see what you've done?” and hopped off. Our friend the joey still hadn't calmed down enough to right himself and so as mama bounded away there was the distinct flailing kick of panic stricken legs protruding from her belly.

This is just the kind of scenario that should have you rethinking the assumption you have always held that kangaroos are dignified majestic creatures. They are, in fact, some of the goofiest and most entertaining animals I have ever had the fortune to run across. That being said, there is something about them that inspires a feeling of respect. They are obviously very caring parents and often stand between you and their joey while trying to decide if you are a threat. Kangaroos are also usually seen in family groups of four or more so there is no denying that they are social creatures. This is also apparent from the anecdotal tales I have heard that they make extremely good pets. Sometimes you hear of an orphaned wallaby or small species of roo being taken in by humans. The story always goes that they're tiny and cute at first but the moment they hit puberty they begin to bound around and randomly headbutt stuff seemingly in a misguided attempt to assert their social position.

Well I would like to go riding my bike as it is the usual 80 degrees and sunny here so if you excuse me I'll be off. If I see any roos behaving badly I'll be sure to report their antics on facebook.

Keep on hoppin' friends!

Mustering Cattle at Hillside Station

Well readers we're about half way through our outback cattle station experience. During our time here we've been fortunate to take part in two musters or roundups as you call them in the states. Most cattle stations do this by bike or chopper but at Hillside the preferred method is on horse back. On the second of our two musters we called in a chopper because we had a road train coming in that day to pick up the cattle and Alan wanted it done fast but the first muster was done on horse back with help from one 4-wheeler and the Toyota.

A map of Hillside that Ellen and I had to jury rig to get on the computer. I think I might be a little off on my paddock naming too but the geography is more or less correct. 

For a muster at Hillside the whole family gets involved. Everybody gets on horseback except Pete who usually rides the 4-wheeler and Joan who was driving the Toyota that particular day.Put all that together with the dogs and you have a pretty large company working for the day. All the kids came along since the first muster we did was more of a relaxed affair. We also had some neighbors over to join in the fun and they brought their kids as well. Brooke and Alan saw fit to give Ellen a horse for the event but they said they didn't have one for me. You might think I would have been put out by this but I'm actually not incredibly in for horseback riding and was perfectly happy to observe from the Toyota and 4-wheeler when I could pry Pete off it. For this reason, I was hoping to get Ellen to write this blog but she deferred to me saying she would add content as she saw fit. Our dear Ellen is nothing if not shy :)

Ellen and Oakey 

So on a Sunday morning we all set out into the paddock for the muster. I must admit that I was very apprehensive about the whole affair. I haven't ever seen Ellen ride a horse and I know nothing of her skill so, as her husband, I was naturally concerned for her safety. You may laugh at this but since she won't worry about herself I consider it my job to do so. I was told to keep a good distance from the horses by Brooke. I got the distinct feeling that this was more about preserving that ambiance than about spooking the horses but what ever the reason I was happy to oblige. As we got under way we found some stray cows in the Hillside paddock so we moved them into the Cameron Creek paddock to join them up with the rest of the herd. Moving these cows turned out to be the beginning of the action for the day. One of them decided that she had had enough of us and ran mad. Alan had to chase her down on his horse which was no small feat. Generally he seemed to be trying to get her to gallop toward the gate by keeping on the outside of her. The trick was that she didn't want to go through the gate so Alan had to run her until she got tired of these antics and walked through. We ran them all down to the gate to the Corella Bore paddock then turned West to get the main herd.

We found the herd by going up to the troughs on the western side of the Cameron Creek paddock. That was when the real work began. The riders rounded up all the cattle and started pushing them to the East toward the Corella Bore paddock. Brooke was in front leading the herd while Ellen and the kids kept them together on the sides. Pete, Joan, and myself brought up the rear with the dogs doing most of the work. I had never thought about it before but the whole process is done very slowly. The musterers can't go faster than walking pace for the cattle. This makes horses rather ideal for the job. A horse and cow walk at around the same pace, furthermore, a horse doesn't have a clutch begging for constant attention. Sitting in the Toyota I reflected that it seemed natural that mustering would be done with horses. I would reflect on this more later but for now let's get back to the action, it's about to get interesting.

Following the Herd

As we pushed the cattle East along the road we came to Cameron Creek. I know my poorly drawn map doesn't have Cameron Creek meeting up with the road but it does so bear with me. Once we hit the creek the cows decided to do things their way and took off. One of them went barreling up the creek and Alan, who was riding out to keep such beasts from escaping, took off after it. They were going flat out when they hit a soft spot in the creek and bit the dust. Alan is more or less indestructible and none of us were the wiser until that evening when he said he'd been thrown.

In any case, we got the heard back under control and pushed them through the gate into Corella Bore. Since everyone had exerted themselves quite a bit we decided that we should stop for lunch. This was an interesting affair. We pulled up under a tree and got out a collapsable table. There were biscuits (cookies), sandwiches, fruit, hot tea and coffee, chips, and vegemite. It was like a full meal out in the bush. This was about the half way point but Pete, Joan, and I were sent down into the Corella Bore paddock to look for any cattle that were down there. We found some and drove them up the fence to the corner of the Black Rocks paddock. There, we met up with the rest of the herd and, all together, we pushed them through the paddock to the house and into the yard for counting and weighing.

Like I said, I was in the Toyota for all this so the view I got was dusty and not too interesting for the reader. Two weeks later we mustered them again and I was upgraded to dirt bike status. This was to prove much more interesting.

ELLEN INTERRUPTION!!!

Ellen here to provide a little insight into what it was like to be on horseback for the muster. The main reasons for the horses here is mustering so they have a pretty good idea about what they are supposed to do which is nice as long as they behave. But of course, they didn't always behave especially the longer we were out there. I was on a horse named Oakey who was known to kick at other horses and to be a bit unruly at times. He never kicked but he did get unruly. When following behind the cattle he really wanted to walk up into the herd instead of hanging out behind, and there were a few times that he did not want to get moving again after stopping. He would almost always do this when Brooke and Allan were around. There was also a moment when he decided he wanted to go for a roll in the dirt which required a really quick dismount from me. I had to give him a kick and a bit of a yell along with the other riders around me for being a bit of an ass. Overall it made for a really nice day of riding around the station.

</Ellen>

The horseback riders went to get the herd on the day that the truck was coming to pick up the ones we had slated for sale. After the first muster we put them in back in the Corella Bore paddock to await transport. On this particular occasion we had a helicopter at our disposal and the pilot, whose name was also Dan leading to a lot of confusion over the radio, told Pete and I that some cows were still hanging out near the troughs in the Cameron Creek paddock. We zipped up there to drive them down to the rest of the herd. There were two cows and a calf when we got there. One of them was a crazy old grey cow that decided that instead of doing what we wanted her to she would, instead, run for the scrub. The chopper pilot told us that they had laid down in there and that he couldn't get them out. We rode the bikes into the scrub and chased them down.

I'm not sure how familiar every one here is with riding a dirt bike through heavy scrub but I can attest that it is a difficult and painful task. If you're not being hit in the face by a turpentine bush then your getting caught on a log or a gidgee tree. We slogged on though, and eventually the grey cow decided that she'd had enough and broke into the clear. We spent the rest of the trip tailing our small herd down to the rendezvous at the gate between the Black Rocks paddock and Corella Bore. This was easier said than done given that that stupid old grey cow made a bolt every time she thought she was in range of a patch of scrub and much of our time was spent chasing her down. Eventually we got her where we wanted her so we stopped under a tree. When the rest of the heard caught up we all pushed them back to the house.

The rest of that day was spent sorting cattle that Allan wanted to sell from those that he wanted to put back in the bush. It was an arduous process given that we had to weigh them all again and it seemed that a rather surly demeanor had settled over the herd. Allan was in the pen with them trying to drive them up to the weight station. Often times they'd run mad and attack him which usually ended up with my boss cursing loudly while quickly climbing a fence.

Eventually we got them all weighed and it was just a question of pushing the ones we wanted to sell on the waiting road train. Again this was easier said than done. The cows were all pretty hot and tired and had no inclination of getting on the truck. To make matters worse, the driver seemed to be a bit of a numb scull and forgot to keep count of how many cows had made it on the truck. I have to give Allan his due, he kept his cool after being attacked by cows all day and we got the truck loaded with relative ease.

That evening Ellen and I sat down and had a beer. As we laid down to watch some T.V. I think I must have fallen asleep before my head even hit the pillow. It was a good day.

Keep on cattle truckin friends!  

Sleepy Bruce is Sleepy

Life on an Australian Cattle Station

Well we've been working on a cattle station for three and a half weeks now and I feel like we're starting to get the hang of it so I will now relate to you what our basic daily activities are. Before we begin there are some terms you will need to know so we don't lose each other. Australian cattle farmers are very set in the names that they have arbitrarily handed to many of the implements that you, I, and most of the rest of the world have common terms for. I will relate some of them to you now, note that not all of these terms will be used in the blog but are placed here to give you a general sense of confusion and belittlement.

Station- ranch

Shifter- adjustable wrench

Spanner- regular wrench
Stilson- pipe wrench

Toyota- land cruiser pickup or troop carrier model

Truck- large flatbed

Bike- dirt bike/motorcycle

Push Bike- bike

Smoko- break

Lucien- alfalfa hay

Killer- cow brought in and slaughtered for personal consumption

Grog- alcohol

Quad Bike- 4-wheeler

Fair Dinkum- usually said under the breath as an afterthought but actually means “REALLY?!?.”

Camp Draft- a drafting competition at which one camps and often drinks exorbitant amounts of grog

Shed- garage

Holiday- vacation

Bore- well hole drilled for the purpose of getting at water.

Bore Runner- someone who goes out to a particular bore and turns the water on or off.

Turkey's Nest- large storage area for water at a geographic high point. Covered by a tarp to decrease evaporation

View from the Gold Show Turkey's Nest. Note my office sitting in the foreground 

When we got here there were two British backpackers living working with us. We quickly found out that this was because we were replacing them and had to learn their duties as best we could in a week. You will see a large number of British backpackers working on farms such as this because they can get a second year added to their visa by working for three months in the agricultural sector of the Australian economy. There are other nationalities that can earn this “second year visa” as well but for Americans it is unattainable. We had decided to take this particular job for two reasons. The first was that, as Americans of the 90s, we had grown up watching Steve Irwin and Rescuers Down under as well as the Crocodile Dundee franchise. For our generation this paints life in the Outback in a very romanticized light and I personally wish to check this sentiment for accuracy. The second reason that we chose this job is that we were broke. On second thought the reasons for our being here should probably switched if you enjoy reading in order of necessity.

Our employers are Allan and Brooke. Allan usually takes me out on the farm with him for general maintenance purposes during the day and Ellen stays at the house and does domestic duties during the day.

Good, now that you've continued reading after your inevitable spell gripping your ribcage and rolling on the floor at the thought of Ellen cleaning and doing laundry all day, you can appreciate the fact that she doesn't seem to mind it too much that I'm off galavanting around the farm doing cool manly stuff most of the time.

We also hang out with the three kids, Grace, Luke, and Ben who are 10, 8, and 5 respectively. The kids are our major source of companionship during our leisure time which usually commences around 5 PM. Usually they get out their pushbikes and we ride around in front of the shed practicing our mountain biking fundamentals. They are all incredibly intelligent and active so we get along great. Often times they help us decipher the sea of Australian slang in which we are wading around and assist us in showing us the ways Allan and Brook like for things to get done.

Allan's parents also live in a separate house about 100 meters from the main farm house. Their names are Pete and Joan. We haven't seen much of them because they've been away on holiday since the day we got here. They seem pleasant enough and Allan's dad has a little Cessna airplane that lives over in the hanger. Craig Ferguson will be sitting there wondering what model but, sorry Craig, I'm feeling too lazy to get off my butt and check so you'll have to be content with single engine Cessna.

My parents will be happy with this because we have a very unique and wonderful way of dealing with emergency response over here. They are called the Royal Flying Doctor Service and they're the eye in the sky that watches over all the good little girls and boys as they go about on their horses, bikes, and heavy machinery. I'm not going to insult the intelligence of my entire family and pretend that working on a farm isn't a little dangerous at times. Since we have the Cessna, we also have a quarter-mile-long runway that begins about 30 meters from where I'm sitting. I certainly hope (but doubt) that neither Ellen nor I will ever have to use the RFDS but, the fact that they are there is nothing short of heroic. If you're looking to give a donation to a good NPO that really makes the deciding difference in the life or death of many rural Australians, the RFDS is a good one.

As cattle stations go we are on a small one. Being only a cozy 80,000 acres, Hillside doesn't rank highly in the size department for an Australian cattle station. Our neighbors to the East own about a million acres here and a couple million over in the Northern Territory. They also have a couple of choppers which balances our plane out nicely.

So now you're asking “where exactly is here?” Hillside is situated 30 km North of the town of Cloncurry on the Burke Developmental Road. Once you turn off the highway we are about 15 km back a dirt road. Our station is unique among cattle stations in that, like it's name suggests, we have hills. For me this is a bonus since I always feel a little uneasy in terrain where I can't see some promontory or another. I think this comes from being brought up in South West Virginia but who's counting?

Most of the land I've had a chance to see goes in a circle around a mountain to the west of the house. A lot of what I do is bore running. This gives me a chance to see a good chunk of the farm on any given day. Often this includes doing minor repairs to pump systems and keeping an eye on the hardware. During these forays into the Outback I often run into interesting animals. I rarely go out without spotting a Red Kangaroo. Every once in a while I'll see an emu and one time, on the way back from town, Ellen and I spotted a couple of dingos. Seeing all the wild life around here is definitely one of the perks of the job. Mostly what I see, however, are cows.

Most of the cows we have here are brahma cows. Every now and then you see a black or red angus but mostly it's the brahma. This lean towards a less desirable breed is because the brahma cows are the only ones who can stand up to the extreme heat usual to North West Queensland. In the summer it can often get into temperatures in excess of 40 degrees centigrade. Angus just can't stand up to that kind of heat. For that matter neither can humans, all of the vehicles around here are very well air conditioned. Even the oldest Toyota has a working A/C and when one of them brakes it is fixed very quickly. This seems to have slackened since it has started getting cold recently but Allan is still fairly emphatic that he wouldn't suffer an air conditioner to be broken for long.

The vehicles, for all you petrol heads out there, are numerous and enjoyably stereotypically Australian. The Toyota Land Cruiser in all it's variants are used religiously in this part of the world. Every now and then you come across some poor soul driving a Nissan Patrol but they are generally derided for their abysmal decision making skills. The Land Cruiser comes in two basic variants in this area, ute and troopie. The latter is called this because it is the long framed troop carrier model that is held in almost god-like regard by Australians and 4wd junkies from any other country. We have both variants of Toyota here. The ute has the old flat six and the troopie has the new V8. Having driven both I can honestly say that it is driving on a whole other level. Things that jeeps and broncos would have a hard time with the Toyota just eats for lunch. Most of the time you don't even need to use 4wd although it's a good idea since the person who destroys a road gets to fix it around here.

- Brief interjection from Ellen regarding the Troopie. Before coming to Australia and throughout this whole trip Dan has been talking about almost no other vehicle than the Troopie, and I just kept giving him the you are being an idiot look. Now that I have driven it a little around the station I understand his obsession with the vehicle and agree that it would be really awesome if we could find a way to get one and send it home.

How does one fix a road? We also posses a Caterpillar front-end loader. To go with it we have the fork lift, bucket and blade attachments. We use the loader for clearing roads, picking up stuff, getting herniated disks etc. It's a very useful tool but it's not the most comfortable of rides. Allan often jokes that it is a Perk-a-pillar since it actually has a Perkins engine in it which suggests that it was made in Britain. I haven't asked him how he divined this fact seeing as all the writing on the thing is in Japanese but we'll give him the benefit of the doubt. If something needs to be pushed over, lifted up, or forced back into place the loader is generally the tool for the job.

Dan unloading hay from a road train into the barn

If you don't need to carry a load but you need to get somewhere remote quickly, the bikes are the best choice. They'll go pretty much anywhere in first gear and if they get stuck you can pick them up and move them or jounce them around until they're un-stuck. Usually if Allan and his dad Pete are using their Toyotas, I will get stuck on one of these to do what I have to do for the day. When I go out on the bike I always take a radio, water, and my hat. It's not the most comfortable ride but they are quite fun.

Now that I've mentioned water, it seems appropriate that I should mention that everything we do here revolves around it. Ninety percent of the jobs I do involve moving water from one place to another. There are big tanks everywhere to store it after we bore it up from the ground and troughs that distribute it to the cattle. Often times our job involves fixing a tank or filling a Turkey's Nest. If we don't keep a constant eye on it cattle will die. A person can really see how a bunch of Australian films rely so heavily on water as a theme. It is the most important thing out here. I suppose it is at home too but we've grown so accustomed to having plenty of it that we forget that some people don't have enough. If you forget to drink enough during the day you'll find out about it the next day. You know how when you were in college you got that feeling that you might have drank a bit too much vodka at that party last night? It's like that, no bueno.

During one of our weekends we went to a camp draft with the family. This is basically just a drafting competition at which one camps. To get there we drove north for about two hours and stopped along the side of the road at a little crossroads called Burke and Wills. The only thing at Burke and Wills is a road house and this little site for the annual camp draft. Station owners had turned up from all over and were competing on horseback.

For those of you who don't know, drafting is a competition in which a person on a horse tries to drive cattle around course. It is very difficult and highly dependant on the cow that they cut out from the herd in the beginning of their run.

We were just spectators at this event but I wanted to mention it because during the camp draft something hilarious and quintessentially Australian happened. After the adult competition but before the kids came out to have a go there was a thing called a lolly drop. Now I can see this happening from the inside of an arena where some guy with candy could get at a catwalk properly distribute it to the kids but the Australians had another trick up their sleeve. All the kids ran out into the riding ring as a small helicopter swooped in and started dropping candy on them! The guy couldn't have been 50 feet off the deck in one of the small helicopters that is typically used for mustering over here. Eventually he dropped all his bags of lollys and swooped away as startlingly as he had showed up. I believe that this properly represents that the true Outback spirit is alive and well. If a man in a helicopter can't hover at a completely unsafe distance above a bunch of kids for the purpose of throwing candy at them, things are in a sad way indeed.

Lolly Drop at the Burke and Wills Crossroad Camp Draft

On the whole though, Ellen and I are doing very well out here. I've been riding my mountain bike a lot on the dirt roads around the station and Ellen has been doing a lot of running. The sunsets are pretty and the sunrises are even better. There are two tiny dogs named Bruce and Charlie who are very good natured and love to go on runs with us. We see kangaroos every day and we are in better shape since we've more or less cut out beer due to it's debilitating price. All in all we're quite happy.

Now if you'll excuse me, there is an eight-year-old that is asking very politely if he can ride my bike so I have to go put the seat down for him.

Keep on Truckin Friends! But please... keep it to a maximum of four trailers, otherwise you'll look like an idiot trying to navigate around town.  

The Top End

Well I know it's been a little while since I've written. A lot has happened since Alice Springs so I will try to outline how we got to where we are now. Exactly where we are now is Hillside Station just North of Cloncurry in Northwest Queensland. How we came to be here is a bit of a tale so I'll just start from the beginning.

Ellen and I came across a marker on the highway shortly after leaving Alice Springs. As we pulled over we noticed the flies were especially terrible in this area. We jumped out of the car just long enough to realize that we had crossed the Tropic of Capricorn. We had now gone Troppo. According to the only part of the sign I read, before being driven temporarily insane by the flies, going Troppo means that you've gone crazy due to being in the Tropics. It may not have actually been the tropics that did it to me but I was certainly crazy from the flies. We jumped in the car and continued towards Darwin.

We continued up the Stewart Highway for what seemed like an eternity when I realized that there were trees around us. This wasn't the barren desert we had been in for days. I must have zoned out in the passenger seat for an indeterminate amount of time because when I looked up, low and behold there were clouds as well! Imagine my surprise at that. Here we were driving across the interior of Australia and all of a sudden there were clouds. It was the biggest thing to happen in days.

About an hour after we got into the cloud zone we came across a most welcome historic landmark. I saw the sign and let out a shriek of delight. We had stumbled across the Daly Waters Pub. Well, actually, we had stumbled across the community of Daly Waters but the sole existence of this wayward municipality seems to be to house this most historic pub. The Stewart tree was there as well but since they didn't serve beer we were not nearly as interested. I told Ellen that I was going to have a pint no matter what the cost so we turned off the road and drove the kilometer or so to get there.

Walking through the door we were greeted by a more or less run of the mill outback pub. The beer was over priced and the conversation was dominated by grey nomads in the usual pissing contest, this being how far they had driven or, my personal favorite, the remote road competition. One of them commented that we took the “easy way” to get there by coming via Adelaide instead of Perth. I met this annoying bit of tom foolery the same way I always do, with a smile and another sip of beer. Still, it was nice to have a cold beverage given that we had been drinking only hot water for days. After a brief respite we were back on the road. *

Later that day we came across something truly breath taking. Some French people had told us a few days before that there was a swimming hole at Bitter Springs near Mataranka. They had also said that it was truly exceptional. As we cruised through I saw the sign. It was about five in the evening and I had been sweating all day so I decided to stop the car and have a dip. You know how when you were a kid you always yearned for a hotel that had those little lazy rivers with inner tubes along with the pool? This was like that but for real. The water was crystal clear and very cool as it had just come up out of a spring. The national park service had installed steps that led down into the water to a depth of about chest height. The water was over my head around the middle of the stream. This realization took some trial and error to figure out because the water was clear enough that I couldn't judge depth. There was quite a flow to the which took me through a dense fern forest. At the other end there was an identical set of steps to get out. It was most certainly the most beautiful swimming hole I've ever encountered. Ellen didn't choose to get in because somehow she was cold and didn't feel like swimming but she agreed that it was lovely. If you're ever in the Mataranka area you must certainly visit Bitter Springs, to pass it would be folly.

Stopping that night I realized that the clouds I had been seeing were a harbinger of something truly horrible. The humidity in Alice Springs when we had left two mornings before had been 23%. Here, just south of Katherine, it was a balmy 75% and stopping meant that we would loose the cooling breeze from the car. As I cooked dinner I realized that the water that had so recently been in the clouds was now sticking to my skin. I think I acted as a personal condenser for at least five rather large cumulonimbus clouds.

I consider myself a fairly tough individual (Eric Stanley will, at this point, be chuckling to himself and thinking of about half a million different bits of repartee that he would unleash on me were I in his company upon uttering such an obviously ludicrous remark) but I draw the line at night time humidity. I can't stand it. If it must be hot and miserable during the day then it stands to reason that the night time should be a respite. The only choice was to get into the wine and wait it out to go to bed. We had a lovely conversation with a biker from Melbourne who was riding the Stewart Highway. At that point I realized that I didn't have a leg to stand on, ceased complaining and crawled contently into my camper.

The next day we arrived in Darwin. I will say this up front, I didn't like it. It is my belief that every city has a vibe. Melbourne, VIC feels trendy and upbeat, almost excited. New Orleans, LA feels like the sound coming out of the trumpet in your favorite jazz song. Darwin, NT feels like it wants to sink it's fangs in you and wring you dry leaving you a lifeless heap on the side of the street. It should be noted that I get a similar feeling when in Atlanta GA, but I digress. The hostels there were like giant barracks and the ones that weren't felt oppressed and big brotherish. The first hostel we stayed at queued the soundtrack to Grease at 10 PM right as we were trying to nod off. The second told us that there were cameras EVERYWHERE and that we shouldn't use the kitchen for fear of dirtying dishes. We stayed there a few days and saw the sights trying to find the good part but I was just not impressed.

All this being said, the museum and Charles Darwin Park are very fine indeed. Since Bryson touches on the museum I will briefly give an account of the park. As we turned off Tiger Brennan Road to get into Charles Darwin Park I began to think that we'd come across something hideous. From the road it looks very mundane. As we wound our way through the tropical forest we started to come across huge earthen mounds. These turned out to be bunkers left over from the Second World War. Someone had turned one of these into a display of the story of Darwin's role in the conflict. Darwin was at the frontier in Australia in that time period and was, therefore, very poorly supplied in the article of weapons when the war broke out. The city was rather poorly defended and all the munitions for the fleet operating in the area were kept on a ship in the harbor. The bunkers were built to store explosives when it was realized that storing them where they could be torpedoed or easily bombed was dumb.

The old bunker was lined with anecdotal accounts of people's experiences during the war along with the typical government messages put out for civil defense that we are all so familiar with. My personal favorite was a newspaper story put up with the display called “The Naked Gun.” This told the story of a soldier who was showering at the time of the first air raid on Darwin. Grabbing his towel he ran to his gun emplacement where his loader was waiting for him. Upon realizing that he couldn't train his gun high enough for an areal attack, he stood up and rested his gun on the shoulder of his loader. The brave defender fired on the Japanese bombers while being strafed and harassed by enemy fighters. In the end he managed to shoot down a Val dive bomber (this according to the picture). It was only after the battle that he realized he had lost his towel. Only in Australia folks.

Still it wasn't enough that there were cool anecdotes about WWII and museums with giant stuffed crocodiles. I only met one friendly local while I was there and he was from England. I'm sorry if I have offended any territorians but thems the breaks.

So that's how we decided to leave Darwin. Too many meat head backpackers and not enough culture to justify staying. We set out back down the Stewart Highway not wanting to end up trapped for months there trying to earn some money. By this point our funds from Lake Pedder were running low so finding work somewhere was imperative. We decided that the East Coast was the place where all the people were and therefore all the jobs were.

At this point I will make it quite clear that, since we had left Hobart, our car had been making a strange noise from the passenger side front wheel. At the time I was convinced that it was from the drivers side but, of course, I was incorrect in my diagnosis. We wrote it off to a bushing and kept going. While crossing the Barkley Tablelands we had to do some less than smooth driving to avoid road trains. Upon our arrival at the Barkley Homestead we realized that the noise had become much louder and more pronounced. I checked the drivers side wheel thinking that it was the source of the noise but seeing nothing wrong we decided to press on towards Mt. Isa in Queensland. This was another 500 kilometers but the car wasn't acting especially funny so we figured that we could nurse it there and figure it out.

Stopping at a servo in Mt. Isa I pulled the wheel off and a significant portion of the axel came with it. For all this time we had been driving a ticking time bomb! We didn't know it at the time but the wheel was a hairs breadth from coming off. Goodbye to the last bit of money from Lake Pedder.

Still, it wasn't all bad. We found a backpackers and hunkered down to spend some time in The Isa. Mt. Isa is a mining town that is on the wrong end of the mining boom. Jobs are going and houses are impossible to sell. Here's a tip for those of you working in the mining industry, rent don't buy, these things never last. Still we were astonished to find that the people on this side of the boarder were extremely friendly. In the Northern Territory it seems like everyone is just putting up with you hoping you will go away shortly. In Mt. Isa we felt like we were genuinely welcome. We figured that since we were out of money we would stop and try to find jobs there.

For the next couple of days we wandered around looking for some hospitality or retail work generally to no avail while our car was being repaired. The day we got the car back we scored some jobs delivering phone books to the good people of Mt. Isa. This was quite a stroke of luck given we were now borrowing from our US funds. It was also an interesting look into the lifestyle of a paperboy. I never realized how many people own evil dogs. The number of dogs who want to rip you limb from limb as you deliver useful information to the homes of the working class is simply staggering.

A couple of mornings into our new employment I just looked at Gumtree (Australian for craigslist) on a whim. Not five minutes before, someone had posted a job over in Cloncurry, about 150 km to the west, for a couple out on a cattle station. This was a the quintessential Australian opportunity. Working with graziers on an outback cattle farm. This coupled with the fact that the station wasn't too far from Cloncurry was a perfect match. We agreed to deliver the Cloncurry phone books as well in exchange for a night in a hotel added on to our pay and headed over that way.

After delivering the Cloncurry phonebooks we rolled out to our new home on Hillside Station. The proprietors of the hostel in Mt. Isa had told us that the people who owned Hillside were lovely which bolstered our confidence they having been helicopter musterers who had worked at Hillside some years before.

Now we're here, there is an airplane sitting in the hanger across the driveway and a couple of Landcruisers that we can take out on the station to complete our business. On Monday we are taking a loader and some diesel fuel out to a remote part of the 80,000 acre property to help some geologists who are surveying the area. I'll write another blog post when I figure out some more of our duties on the station and give a general account of station life in the next blog but for now I'm gonna pass out. Tomorrow is Ellen's birthday so I've got to get my rest for partying (and by that I mean butchering a cow).

Keep On Truckin!

*we only had a very small amount of beer due to the crippling price and waited quite a long time before driving.

P.S. Sorry for the lack of pictures. Our internet is very limited and I can't afford to put any up at the moment. I will try to get some in next time we're in town.  

Melbourne and Southern Australia DOUBLE HEADER!!!

I am writing this from the front passenger seat of the Rav riding across the outback somewhere between Coober Pedy and Woomara. The reason for the delayed nature of the Melbourne blog is that we were having too much fun hanging out with our hosts Sarah and Kath on the final evening before restarting the most massive road trip possible in Australia. Now sit back and relax as I fill you in on the state of the streets of the Richmond of the Southern Hemisphere.

Before I say anything else let me give a massive shoutout to my boy Stuart. He let us stay at his house and helped us locate some tires as well as feeding us. He also allowed us to use his house as the OFFICIAL START POINT OF THE LONGEST ROAD TRIP EVER. For those of you who don't know Ellen and I are in the middle of a huge road trip from Hobart, Tasmania to either Broome, Western Australia or Darwin, Northern Territory. This last decision will be made by coin flip in Alice Springs. THANK YOU STUART! As for the rest of you, I'm sure you're all eagerly awaiting the decision.

Ellen and I jumped off the ferry in Melbourne at 7:00 PM coming from Devonport, Tasmania. I am here to tell you that having your first driving experience of Melbourne should not be in the dark. I may or may not have received a traffic violation from a red light camera. The jury is still out on that though seeing as I have not heard from Craig regarding any mail from the Melbourne Police. We made our way up to Thornbury where we met our friends Sarah and Kath. Ellen and I met our Melbournian friends in the Southwest National park of Tasmania while hiking up Mt. Eliza (you may remember them from a previous post). After some conversation we realized that they wanted us to stay for the weekend and cat sit for their roommate. We were all too happy to do this to take a break from traveling.

In his book In A Sunburned Country Bill Bryson suggests that Melbourne is a city generally in decline. At least socially I can attest that this trend has reversed. Many areas North of the city are being gentrified. Never was there a city more ripe for the hipster culture to take over. The houses look Victorian, the bars look grungy and the bike paths are abundant. Gentrification has caused some of the cool places to go out of the price range of your typical backpacker but there is still plenty of room for the budget conscious traveler to hang out. Lots of the bars run specials and the beer is fairly cheap. All together it's my kind of town.

The city of Melbourne boasts old school infrastructure with a tram system running on most major streets and historic low rise housing. These facts in conjunction with their newer infrastructure has led to a commuter paradise. I refer, of course, to the world class bike trail system the city has created in the last 20 years. Most major streets have bike lanes and some residential streets have been segmented by greenways. This makes them impassable for car traffic but renders them perfect for bikes. There is also a major trail system based on the Yarra river that snakes through the town.

To facilitate this biking culture there are cafes and shops that have sprung up along the bike paths offering certain exclusive services for people who choose to ride in. There are also truly interesting attractions located on the paths. One of these is the Collingwood Childrens Farm. Someone had the bright idea of putting a farm in the middle of the city so children could gain some access to farm animals even if their means wouldn't allow them to leave Melbourne. There are also some bouldering walls scattered along paths throughout the city. A person can have a delightfully eventful day just biking through Melbourne. That is the major reason I thought the city was great. Melbourne seems to have a very flowing feeling in it. Everything feels put in place for a reason and it all feels like a well oiled machine.

Federation Square also rates mention. Fed Square has a large wooded area and boasts the National Gallery of Victoria art museum,Deakin Edge concert hall, among other interesting points of interest. While we were there they had a bat exhibit on. Anyone who knows Ellen is aware that we couldn't possibly stay away from that. The exhibit, named bat mania by Kathy Holowoko, consisted of hundreds of sculptures of the large fruit bats found in Victoria. Ellen and I were impressed.

The famous Melbourne Cricket Ground is there along with the Olympic park are very nearby which adds to the feeling that you are in a very cultured place indeed. This is a city which can do it all does do it all.

Ellen and I took advantage of all the inner city mobility while we were there. Using the old mountain bikes that we've been carting around the entire time we've been here, we explored every little nook and cranny that the Yarra track had to offer. That was how we spent our Easter Sunday :)

The next day we decided to go check out something a little more high octane. The Lysterfield Mountain Bike Park is about an hour from where we were staying in Thornbury. The trails there are very flowy with some really good downhill bits. In true city fashion they have made the best downhill “One Way” so that there is no chance of your awesome downhill bomb being ruined by some noob who is ignorant to the rule of “you don't mess with a man's downhill.” As we weaved through the track I realized that it was not guilty of a sin so prevalent in Virginian mountain bike parks today. They hadn't put a bunch of stupid man-made features in the trail every couple hundred meters. Some people like this sort of behavior but I personally think it ruins the flow and natural feel of a track. It was all true Victorian flow, very cool.

After a couple hours of bombing around the gumtree forest Ellen and I decided to head home and eat some chicken Tikka Masala. Half way through our meal Sarah and Kath showed up from their camping holiday which was a most welcome surprise because it meant we got an extra evening of hang out time.

The next day was spent getting ready to drive across Australia and working in the garden. Sarah and Kath have an awesome little veggie garden behind their house and I figured that, since I would be sitting in a car for the next few days, I should go out and put in some work. It was nice to get a little taste of the old landscaping.

That evening we went over to High St. for some Indian food. Perhaps Sarah or Kath will grace us with the name of the establishment. I just remember that a platter and a beer was $16 which is a steal in Australian money. This truly was the height of living considering the next week we would be on the road living out of the car and off the fat of the land.

The next morning we said our good byes and hit the road. Our next stop on the epic road trip was the southern Victoria coast. This is a well known tourist destination called the Great Ocean Road, then up to the burning heart.

DOUBLE HEADER!

Well now I'm sitting at a hostel in Alice springs on the porch of a very nice little flat Ellen and I rented for the night. Let me tell you right now, the shower I just took was the best I think I've ever had. We've been driving through the desert for 5 days now and at no point have we had a chance to bathe. I think last night was about the longest I could have gone given these conditions but we shall see I'm sure.

After leaving Sarah and Kath's we headed down to the Great Ocean road. This is the highway from Melbourne to Adelaide on the southern coast of Australia. The road starts in the legendary surf town of Torquay and heads west twisting and rolling over the rocky landscape along the Bass Strait. There are a scattering of little towns and hamlets along the way with a charming collection of lighthouses and other reminders that you are by the sea.

Since the Great Ocean Road runs along the South edge of Victoria into South Australia the ocean we were bordering was the Great Southern Ocean. This is the ocean that sweeps right round the world only touching New Zealand, Tierra Del Fuego, and Tasmania. This ocean is notorious for its huge rollers and extremely blue water. As we drove along we saw the waves breaking on the coast and some of them were of epic proportions. The first people to come this way certainly had their work cut out for them!

Leaving the Ocean Road we came across a place called Cheese World. Ellen and I exchanged glances and I immediately whipped off the road and we were out of the car before it was fully stopped. This was your true road side attraction. A giant cheese factory right on the road with a road house outlet. Being backpackers we were in heaven. Free samples of all the gourmet cheeses you could ask for. It was like being at Kroger right when they put out the free cheese plate. Grey nomads and dirt bags like ourselves were having a feeding frenzy in there. We tried all the cheeses and perused the selection of consumables before hurriedly slinking out. There is something I find abhorrent about stopping and using someone's restroom, eating their amazing cheese, then bolting before I get the irresistible urge to actually buy something, and yet, I do it all the time.

Back on the road it was time to start thinking about where to camp for the evening. Ellen, being a prime navigator, realized that if we got off the A1 and started running up B tracks that we would not only get there faster, but run into a wonderful campsite as well. You see why I love this girl? Thanks to this brilliant stroke of logic we ended up staying our first night out of Melbourne in a place called the Annya Road Picnic Area off the C195. This proved to be an amazing decision.

We rocked up just as the sun set and pitched our rooftop tent. We quickly cooked a little dinner and then went looking for some company for the evening. The way Australia camps work, there is usually a little road side stop set about 100 meters off the road with a few weekend warriors, grey nomads and backpackers scattered around it. We went up to some people with horses and a fire but were flatly rejected hanging out with them. They did, however, suggest that we hang out with a more boisterous group on the other side of the area. This turned out to be a wonderful idea. We found a group of backpackers who had “made it” as we say, and had just received residency from a job they had taken in Western Australia. They were on holiday having just gotten their residency and bolted from the job. Excellent company on the whole and Ellen and I have been kicking ourselves that we haven't gotten their details.

The next morning we got up and had a little walk through the forest to look for Koalas. For those of you who know Ellen, she's pretty hard to get stirred up under normal circumstances, but put a fuzzy, or for that matter, a disgusting creature in front of her and she lights up like a Christmas Tree. I seriously don't know what was more adorable, the Koalas or Ellen looking at the Koalas.

After getting our fill of these adorable little creatures we packed up the car and headed out. It was to be our most daunting day of driving yet. We were en route from South Western Victoria to Port Augusta in South Australia. I didn't realize how slow moving Australian roads were at the time and we got to our camp site just after dark again. I would relate the drive across Southern SA for you but, truly, there was nothing of note. We skirted Adelaide and really didn't see much.

We camped at a place called Horrocks Pass. This was my dream campsite. It was on a mountain overlooking a large expanse of desert with the lights of trucks and cars down on the road plying between Adelaide and Port Augusta. I'm not sure why but ever since I was a little kid I've had an image in my head of sitting on a hill in the desert watching the headlights on cars as far as the eye can see moving like ants down in the valley. Well I had found this place, and as a bonus feature, there was an ocean there too! That meant that not only could we watch the stars and the headlights but there was also the possibility of lighthouses. I was in heaven.

Well, as you can imagine, this dream turned into a nightmare. As we got in bed and snuggled down for the night we were reminded what happens on desert mountain passes in the night. The wind begins to howl. We laid in bed wondering if our little car top camper would survive the blasts and generally cursing our misfortune and stupidity for camping in such a place. We figured it was time to call it quits when the wind started picking up the deck of the camper. We hustled out and folded the thing up. Quietly we sat in the car drinking our final beer and contemplating the abject wretchedness that comes with spending the night in the front seat of a smallish car.

At about that moment another trick of the wind revealed its self. The people camped next to us had built a fire earlier that evening. It being perfectly still at sunset they retired to their camper and, due to the snugness of their den, were not stirring due to what was actually quite a lot of wind. From our unique vantage point we started to see sparks and flames build up next to their camper. Ellen and I cursing these fools for their obvious ignorance of the basic rules of fire dutifully got out of our uncomfortable perch and hurriedly doused the fire with a liberal amount of our drinking water. This was a foolish idea. The search to replace our lost water would become a constant source of annoyance for us for days to come.

The next morning we woke (footnote: to actually wake would suggest that we had been asleep which was not the case) bright and early and hit the road. This was to be a landmark day and our tired grumpiness was soon replaced with giddy anticipation. We cruised into Port Augusta at 7:30 AM where we ate breakfast at McDonalds before hitting the famous Stewart Highway.

For those of you who don't know, the Stewart Highway is the road that bisects Australia longitudinally. It runs through over 3000 kilometers from Port Augusta to Darwin through some of the harshest desert in the world. In the 1800s this is where many explorers met a grizzly fate, some of them dragging boats for the inland river systems that they were sure they would find. Oddly enough that trend has continued today. We were astonished at the number of cars towing boats we encountered. We were a bit surprised by this there not being a drop of water within, sometimes, 1500km of where they were. Why would someone who owns a ranch in the heart of Australia buy a boat just to drive with it for two full days whenever he/she wanted to use it. The Australians are nothing if not hearty.

The other thing about long distance desert driving is the stark beauty of everything around contrasted with the amazing mind numbing effect of it. God forbid you start thinking about something vexing like finances, or fuel economy or Miley Cyrus because there your brain shall sit until something like a road train or a road house pulls you out of it. After a couple of days of driving and nights camping in the desert we came across the first major side road we had seen. This sign said Uluru 265km. Uluru is the name of Ayres Rock since it has been placed back in the hands of the Aborigines. In fact Uluru was always the name of the rock, it just had a little stint like Prince did around the year 2000 where it was called Ayres Rock.

Uluru

The cultural center was very interesting before going in to see Uluru. The description of the various legends and aboriginal beliefs surrounding the rock. One of the things that struck me is that the Aboriginal beliefs prohibit them from climbing the rock. It struck me as odd that even though they request that you don't climb Uluru people do it anyway. There are hundreds of people a day that climb up despite the repeated requests that they do not. Personally I would have liked to climb Uluru but I couldn't bring myself to insult Aboriginal culture in such a way. The obvious counter argument to this is that if they really don't want people climbing it they should just close it to climbers. Indeed this did occur to us as strikingly odd. Chalking this up to one of the little eccentricities of life we stayed a respectful distance away and basked in the glory of a giant rock in the middle of the desert.

The next day we got up and did something that I had been looking forward to for some time. There is a 99km stretch of “road” that runs parallel to the Lassiter Highway 67 km to the north. This unlikely piece of thoroughfare is called the Earnest Giles track. It runs out through the sandy desert between the Kings Canyon road and the Stewart Highway. Ever since I had seen it on the map I had wanted to drive it. The Giles track just seemed like the perfect amount and placement of desert driving. It didn't take us out of our way but it did place us in a fairly remote location.

Not Gloating about our Rav4 or anything. Taken on Earnest Giles Highway

The road it's self was marked at it's beginning by a sign stating that four wheel drive would be required to pass and that in the wet season the road was not recommended to anyone. Excited, Ellen turned the car down the track and started in on it.

What followed was less of a road and more a place where the trees and scrub had been replaced by corrugated (washboard) segments of passable terrain. An added bonus was discovered when we saw on the sign that 11km out from the Stewart Highway there were meteorite craters to be gawked at before returning to the monotonous open road.

The track led through some amazing desert landscapes. There were hills and groves of eucalypts that looked charmingly like palm trees. There were many groups of cattle along the road giving it that true outback feel. Once we even came across a herd of wild horses called brumbys in the colorful desert vernacular. We saw only one car out there, a Nissan Patrol that came suddenly out of our wake of dust and overtook us in a surprising shower of red dirt and small rocks. We slowed to let their dust settle and continued on our merry way swooning over what seemed like our private piece of desert road.

http://youtu.be/pmU-UJ9FBMc youtube video of the Earnest Giles road.

Near the end of the trip we came to the Henbury Meteorite Craters. This was, without a doubt, the most rewarding experience of our outback adventures thus far. At the end of a 5km side track there was a very well kept little conservation reserve. A self guided tour of the meteorite craters took us on a 1.2km walk through the desert. Someone had painstakingly put signs at high points around the craters explaining the explosive formation of craters and the biologic anomalies that they were. Each crater was a more or less round hole about 50m in diameter with a little ecosystem living in the bottom. One of them was fortunate enough to hit where a wet weather stream filled it from time to time and was actually quite green. We dutifully snapped pictures and admired the silence.

I was taken back to Bill Bryson's book and his experience at the Devil's Marbles. He concluded that if you took this site and placed it in America or Europe that in every family home there would be a picture of mom and the kids picnicking under the rocks. I could very much see what Bryson meant when he observed this. Here we were at a site of no astronomical insignificance and, aside from the lizard that I scared into dropping his tail upon opening the box to sign the register, we were the only ones there. In fact we neither saw any one driving in or out on our way back to the Stewart Highway. I will grant you that it was 16km on a rough dirt road off the Highway and one would have needed at least an all wheel drive to get there but still, this place was at least worth looking at!

We cruised the last 120km into Alice Springs ready for some respite from the drive. Upon getting back in the passenger seat I consulted our book Camps 8* as to the frequency of sites like the Henbury Craters and to my astonishment they were everywhere! All along the road from Port Augusta to Darwin there were sites of infinite interest. I resolved to check out at least one a day for the remainder of our trip.

Coming into Alice Springs was a bit of a surreal experience. We had been driving for two and a half solid days and had come upon nothing more than some road houses and a curious underground town called Coober Pedy where they mined opals. Now here was a town about the size of Blacksburg VA and apparently it was inhabited by permanent residents. Charmed by the existence of such a town we immediately checked ourselves into a hostel of a quality I have rarely seen. Anyone who has stayed in a hostel will agree with me that they are indeed, a dubious form of refuge. For those interested then name of the establishment is Alice Backpackers Lodge. There was chill music playing in the background, the people were friendly and the pool was clean. We quickly resolved to stay for a couple days and relax, restock and write blog posts.

It is from the front porch of the cottage we rented for an unfathomable $68 per night that I am writing this inordinately long blog post. Ellen is talking with her brother and her mom sitting next to me as I write. And it is from this deeply contented position that I will bid you my adieu. I plan on polishing off my third cup of coffee and then setting about the wreck that is our car/living space. We then plan to tackle the upper half of the Stewart Highway and lazily meander our way to Darwin looking for jobs all the time.

View from the porch of the hostel where I am writing this post.

As my usual sign off of keep on truckin Blacksburg seems to have been rendered obsolete by the reading of this blog by our Tasmanian and Melbournian friends I will now revise it to the more contrite Keep on Truckin World :)

<3 Joker and Ellen

*I don't think I've explained this yet. Jasmine and Craig McCarter told us about a book in Australia called Camps: Australia Wide 8^thed (hereafter referred to as camps 8). It is a comprehensive guide of free camps and points of interest along with road maps of the entirety of Australia. Clearly for people like us this is a necessary wealth of information and is where we get most of our information about places to stay and things to see. We have also been annotating it and will have it available for viewing when we return home.

Postlude: Any stylistic or references to places and experiences that seem to bear an eery relation to Bill Bryson's In a Sunburned Country are purely incidental. I do, however, recognize that we are using that most esteemed author as something of a guide where applicable. I do not imagine that Bryson will ever read this unprofessionally (if someone wishes to pay me for writing this I will gladly up my standards :) written travel blog of a dirt bag backpacker, but should he come across it, thanks for the help Bill.  

Adventures before the Ferry Ride

Ellen was sitting in the seat across and aft from me guiding Footloose to a marker unseen across the horizon. The wind was out of the East Southeast so we were beating up out the Derwent river from the Bellerive Yacht Club towards the ocean. Damon, the boats owner, was standing on the windward side next to me working the main sheet and giving directions to Ellen. I was sitting forward working the jib sheet. There was a moderate breeze coming over the port bow and a blue sky with high puffy clouds. Suddenly Ben the bowman called out that he'd spotted the marker just to windward of us. That was why all the other boats had started in a spot where there was less wind closer to shore; they'd given up speed for a position upwind to round the marker on the first or second tack. We chucked in a tack to get in position to round the marker. The Footloose is money on a close reach so we overtook two boats that were moving slower up wind. Damon was expertly teaching Ellen how to steer the boat while Ben and I were just generally relaxing and talking about the East Coast of Tasmania. In true Crowder sailing fashion (Sandy you'll relate to this) we had timed our tack so that we would just round the marker. We believe in living on the edge to get an edge when it comes to sailing.

An array of orders from Damon and the boat came up into the wind then fell off the as the sails came out on a run for the next marker. We had been coming into the mark a little low so instead of losing valuable seconds playing it safe and tacking for the mark we let fly all the sheets and used our momentum to round the marker. Sailing with Damon is like that. He's an aggressive sailor full of tricks and maneuvers. That coupled with having a lot of natural skill and you have a man after my own heart.

Rounding the marker and headed down wind meant that we were going wing to wing so I grabbed the pole and handed it to Ben on the bow. He rigged it to the mast and soon we looked like a square rigger with our jib flying out to port and our main flying to starboard. Ellen held us on toward the next marker just off Battery Point in Hobart. The light wind meant that we were able to hold our position in relation to the other boats on the downwind leg. We came in on the second marker hot on the heels of the boat in front of us with another light sloop just off our stern. Damon said to bring in the pole and just like that we rounded the second marker back to a close reach on the starboard tack. At that point the Sundance took a lower line as we stuck high. Coming up the wind toward the gate we had an unfortunate turn of the wind. It backed into the South and the Sundance shot ahead. The Footloose being so small we jumped away from the remaining three boats that were on course behind us but the Sundance slipped away. As the light faded we came through the mark at the club and brought the sails down. Everybody congratulated each other and especially Ellen that being her first time ever steering a sailboat.

I would like to take a brief interlude to say that I really appreciate the entire McCarter family. If you're a McCarter and you're reading this blog you are entitled to a shout (I'll buy you a beer) next time we're hanging out. [/touchyfeelymushystuff]

After dinner at the yacht club we were off to Stuart's house. Stuart is a member of the Tasmanian Jet Sport Boating Club. We met this crazy band at the Lake Pedder Chalet as they were skiing lake Pedder. We moved down to Cygnet after Lake Pedder to get our bearings. While we were there two other members of the TJSBC, Kylie and Pricey, very kindly shouted us tea (dinner). They had mentioned to us that they were going to circumnavigate Maria Island the next weekend and we should come along for the weekend. We figured that was a pretty good idea so we were at Stuart's house after sailing to prepare for the coming weekend of camping and fun. Stuart asked us what we had been doing since we left Lake Pedder so recounted the following story:

Our Canadian friend Amanda was really keen to climb Mt. Ossa, the highest peak in Tasmania. Ellen and I, having nothing else specifically in mind, agreed to take her up there in the rav and hike it with her. We started at the Arm River carpark on Tuesday and went up to a high plateau on the Arm River track. The Arm River track is an in feeder to the Overland Track, Tasmania's main hiking track. As we climbed up we found some simply stunning landscapes. There were temperate forests and high tussock grass plains with thin, yet deep, creeks running through them. The mountain landscape was simply stunning.

Ellen on the Arm River Track. 

After about three hours we came up on the New Pelion Hut. It was more like a house than a hut but people do pay $200 to walk the Overland Track so you can see why it's posh. I can see why they do, the Overland is simply stunning. After leaving our packs at the hut we walked the rest of the way up the Overland Track to the turnoff to the Mt. Ossa massif. Amanda was powering up it while Ellen and I came up at a slow burn as we usually do. About 300 meters from the summit the whole thing got socked in by fog so Ellen just sat and looked at the view while I ran up to the top to tell Amanda that we were headed back down. Ellen doesn't really care so much for peak bagging and the view was stunning where she turned around. I got up there and ate an apple in the fog.

The next day, after spending an uneventful evening in the Taj Ma-hut we walked down. Saying a temporary goodbye to Amanda we dropped her in Deloraine and beat feet down the Midland Highway to Hobart and Damon for the boat race on Wednesday evening.

Stuart gave us a bed for the evening and a nice conversation which we desperately needed after a few nights of sleeping on hard wooden beds and in our camper.

For the next few days we toured the East Coast and Port Arthur camping and getting our car set up the way we wanted it. We have a book called Camps Vol. 8 that has all the free and low cost campsites in it for Australia. That coupled with the widespread availability of rooftop campers over here makes it absurdly easy to camp. Also, on a sidetone, we now have one of these campers that we've dubbed the upside down mobile hooch and it's decidedly cooler than Philip Balister's.

On Saturday we got into Triabunna for a local festival called Seafest. The jetski club had come up to give rides for charity but due to an insurance snafu they weren't allowed to do so. We made the most of it by eating crayfish (lobster) and hanging out at the resort where we were staying. We spent the afternoon chatting with the Wheatleys about jetskiing and sports and ouzo, just generally enjoying ourselves.

Eating Crays with the TJSBC, Photo Courtesy of Kylie Price.

The next day we got up and donned our wetsuits to go around Maria Island. This would involve 90km of riding on jetskis around an island 15km out to sea. The views were stunning. On the way out Ellen had to switch out of the over heating jet boat to Stuart's ski (I still think he sabotaged it to get her on the back of his ski :). Our first stop was off a small island to the Northeast of Maria to get everyone caught up. I was riding on the back of Pricey's ski videoing. The cliffs on the island were stunning. The shoreline on the eastern side of the island was full of sea caves and canyons. The benefit of being on a jetski is that you can ride into caves and explore due to your short height and shallow draft. We did just that. I never imagined that my first Australian cave trip would be on the back of a jetski. The cave that we were able to go through all the way looked to have formations in it, it seemed that it had possibly formed above sea level and been cut into by the ocean. Ellen noted some flowstone on the walls, very cool.

Coming out of the cave region of the island we made our way down to a little bay. There was a white sand beach with some nice rollers coming into the surf off the ocean. A bunch of the skis were playing in the surf so Pricey and I took our turn wave jumping. After all, how hard could it be to jump a jetski with two full grown men on it? After a couple jumps we got caught on a sand bank and had to jump off. I noticed another ski that had run into the same problem so I ran over to lend a hand. In true Joker fashion I bit the dust in the surf on the way over to the stricken craft turning my Hasselhoff like rescue into more of a Spongebob affair.

After getting the ski righted and back into the ocean I learned I was on with Mark. His ski had a suspension system which made the back seat much more reasonable (not that I'm complaining about Reel Pricey, it's an awesome boat with a very cool paint job). Mark and I took off around the southern end of the island where we saw a pod of dolphins. Moving on down the south coast the club was able to bring it on wide open around the southern point of the island. It took me back to the days when we'd try to make formations with the Boy Scout jet skis.

We stopped into Chinamen's bay on the other side of the island for lunch. The weather was starting to close in as we made our way back across the strait for the mainland. At Chinamen's bay I got on a ski with a guy named Trevor. He had a ski with a supercharger in it which was cool since it meant we could move fast enough to just skip over the top of the waves instead of hitting them all full on.

http://youtu.be/jlOhmRwc9T0

 http://youtu.be/HEWkII4Tz3k

These are some videos of the trip around Maria Island

Getting back to the boat ramp we said our goodbyes to the club and promised we'd be back next year. We asked Stuart if it would be ok if we came back to his house to BBQ. He mentioned that we should certainly spend a couple days relaxing for which we are very grateful. On Thursday morning we are boarding the ferry for Melbourne. We're very happy to have started our trip in Tasmania and are certainly looking forward to coming back at the end of our trip for some R&R before the next step of our trip.

Now if you'll excuse me, it's my Mom's birthday in the states and we have a date with her on FaceTime so I'm going to sign off for now. Keep on truckin!

<3 Joker and Ellen