Termites, travellers and road trains

Wednesday, July 22, 2015
McKinlay, Queensland, Australia
Day 5

Roadkill

We awoke to a godawful racket when a coupla hundred, well probably about 50 white corellas decided to wreak havoc on the tree near our sleeping quarters . I made a little video which I'll try to upload. G meanwhile was singing la cucaracha for some unfathomable reason, maybe it was this or maybe it was the flash from my camera, the jury is out…but the corellas soon left!

We passed a monumental box in Barcaldine, well it’s the tree of knowledge which, if memory serves, was the founding site for the union movement in Australia. Quite an imposing landmark it is too.

The roadside between Barcaldine and the next stop, Longreach, indeed the whole day’s travel really, was littered with roadkill. It is astonishing how many roos, foxes and assorted types of wildlife don’t make it across the roads. It’s carnage. Today we saw just one small roo which had the common sense to attempt the feat in daylight, and we happily avoided it.

As we approached Longreach, our first fuel stop, we noticed a series of well spaced billboards, quite incongruous after acre after acre of flat plains . Of course, G decided that it was necessary to read every single word on every single one! Naturally, by the time we hit "town" I knew where every motel, tractor service repairman, garage, outhouse, whorehouse and flophouse was to be found!

I visited the Stockman’s Hall of Fame as one does when visiting Longreach, whilst G went off to visit a relative of a friend. I almost needed to be picked up off the floor when I asked for a general entry ticket and was told “Thirty two dollars thanks”! Try as I might I looked for the walls paved with gold but I couldn’t find any! At least I guess my 71 cents per minute that I spent there has possibly helped keep someone in work!

The museum, so far as it is, is ok. The architecture is pretty nice and that lends interest to the contents. Some of the exhibits exude a great sense of the time and are very rustic. Naturally, given a few hours one could fully experience it and leave with a better understanding of the period in our history . I do feel that the entry fee is far too high, $20 would be ok at the most. The souvenirs are also pretty steep, $9.00 for a keytag? Graeme’s friend said that there is some disquiet in town amongst the locals who feel that it is also becoming a bit run down.

I finished my visit by wandering through the attached art gallery which has some really lovely works. It also has a a themed library where books can be read on site but not borrowed. A reasonable coffee saw me on my way.

We refuelled at Longreach, a decision I regretted later when, after averaging about 15 L/100 km for the last few days, suddenly we were averaging 19.5! Methinks the unleaded petrol was somewhat dodgy. We refuelled at Winton with premium and again at Kynuna with premium 98 and we were back in the sixteens (litres per hundred km).

When we approached Longreach my phone suddenly started picking up a signal again! I worked out that it doesn’t like some 3G only towers, unfortunately, Telstra seems to have installed towers in this neck of the woods with some strange characteristics! This is a situation made worse by the fact that GG’s el cheapo Aldi phone is picking up signals from bloody Mars and my decent Nokia handset stubbornly refuses to pick up anything! Honestly! We were in the middle of abbasobloodylutely nowhere, at least 50 or 60 km from anything resembling habitation and ..."bing!" GG gets a message!

In Winton we stopped for a quick bite and I had a nice chat to an exceedingly cute lass in the coffee shop who, it turned out, was from Ukraine! A long story she said and I almost wanted to sit and listen to that story told by those blue eyes as long as it took! Almost...

Alas, I had an old fart waiting at the van for me so somewhat reluctantly, I trudged off in that direction!

On the road we came across a small area of resistant strata and some formations that could only be described as mesas and buttes. Quite strange but lovely, pictures will be loaded!

We refuelled at Kynuna and in the roadhouse was a lady speaking in genuine frontier gibberish about something on the TV…she seemed like a local, I’m not sure jow I know but I’m reasonably sure…

We arrived at McKinley at about 4 .30 travelling a tad farther than we had originally intended. The Walkabout Creek Hotel, (named after the one in Crocodile Dundee and it would appear, trading on that, though I think the original was in the Northern Territory) provided its last site for us (I’m glad I told GG to overtake that last van!) and we rapidly set up and did a load of very necessary washing shortly thereafter. The lady in the pub was very nice though, we also met a nice lady accountant from Manly travelling in a “Troopy” with her lovely Labrador and had a nice chat over the din of the washing machine.

A lovely sunset heralded the catching up on the days events, which you are now reading, and I’m hoping, a nice snooze!
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