MOOMINS M.C.

Friday 22^nd Feb.

Early start from Boulia today to try and get some distance in the cooler hours of the morning. All well and good but with all the photographic opportunities on offer that distance seemed to get longer and longer. I did get a bit of photographic goodness in and some of it required going off road and employing my car’s 4 wheel drivability to get it. I did in the end make it to Birdsville after checking in to a caravan park I made some dinner. Whilst waiting for the sun to get low enough to take some shots of one of the old buildings in the town I laid up for a bit of a rest in order to digest the two steaks that have been in the fridge since Sunday. All of a sudden I realised that it had gone dark and went outside to investigate. There was a sandstorm coming. High up in the sky was a roll of cloud coming straight for me. Never been in a sandstorm before. As the wife of the caravan park owner same over and asked me if I intended to walk to the pub or get a lift with her I nodded my head and kindly accepted her offer. Standing outside the Birdsville hotel with a cold can of beer the sudden heat of the wind driving the storm hit me. Like opening an oven only with much more force.

I ended the evening chatting to the hotel owner who was a keen photographer and four wheel driver. We swapped tips and I got some good advice about tackling Big Red, a sand dune about 40km outside of town. I might have a crack at it tomorrow and then continue on south to Maree. See how far I get eh.

Saturday 23td Feb

First thing I did this morning was to tackle Big Red which is the biggest sand dune in the Simpson Desert. Why? Because it was there. On my third attempt I managed to get tot the top of this substantial dune, and took a few quick photos as it was blowing hard and the sandstorm hadn’t really cleared properly.

Didn’t quite make it down to Maree. Got as far as Mungerannie Hotel which is about 400km south of Birdsville. Maybe I didn’t get enough local info about attractions and things, but there really wasn’t a lot going on. It could have been the remnants of the sandstorm obscuring things too as well. I did go through some of the roughest road so far though, not corrugated, not potholed, not anything in particular, just very rough. I was also starting to get that pain in the arse back again and at times my right hip was starting to play up, maybe it’s just too many hours at the wheel or something. I did end up having a couple of off road excursions though. All planned of course. I went to check out a river crossing, where there was no river flowing and then had a look at some hills covered in giber stones. The latter being far more visually interesting.

At the Hotel I decided to park up for the night. After setting up camp and cooking dinner I went back to the bar and ended up having a rather lengthy and lubricated conversation with the owners Phil and Pam. I will never the forget the annoying flies though. Insolent little buggers would crawl into your eye if you gave them half a chance!!!!

Sunday 24^th Feb

Early start once again to make the most of the cooler morning temperatures saw me driving in the remains of the sandstorm. I decided last night to head towards Cooper Pedy, about 600 km away. I got about 2/3 of the way there and decided to camp. Along the way though I’d had a lot of fantastic photo opportunities, mainly old derelict cars off the side of the road. Like the locals up this way they all have a story to tell. All these shots were done the film camera and required much focusing ( no pun intended ) due to the insolent flies once again trying to invade my personal space. The wind didn’t help either. I did come across some wonderful bits of human and natural wonders along the way: some bizarre sculptures in the middle of nowhere, and some springs in the middle of the desert. All highly interesting and fodder for my curious and artistic mind. I spent some time driving with more willy willies around me again and passed the long kilometres thinking about things like my photography, loved ones and mates of old who have passed away.

At the end of the day I pulled into a camel station to have a look at their natural artesian bore spa. There I came across a couple of blokes from Melbourne, who were camping up for the night. Turned out they had a flat tyre and no second spare so I got out my tyre repair kit and compressor and fixed it for them. At least it looked fixed, we’ll see in the morning I guess. They offered me some beers for which I was very grateful for and we spent the night drinking and talking crap like blokes do when they’re left to their own devices.

Tomorrow I will make Cooper Pedy and see what happens. Hopefully get to go and see a real working opal mine.

// posted by ZUBA @ Monday, February 25, 2008