G’day Boatbloggers® and welcome to this year’s first Boatblog® brought to you from the Land Down Under.
Or should that be the Vanblog®. To be honest we haven’t done very much sailing so far this year. We got back in March to Brisbane where we had left Domini and then spent a few weeks getting her ship shape and ready for the passage north.
There was plenty to do, including replacing the trampolines.
That’s nearly TWO HUNDRED knots! And Ju made the mistake of volunteering to help Darrin the Rigger to do it, which was something he was beginning to regret after three days of tying noose knots.
Unfortunately, even though Domini and her crew were ready to sail, we couldn’t leave straight away because it was still the cyclone season, so we decided to do a road trip.
First we needed a van.
Then it was time to hit the open road. And it sure is open.
It starts off pretty green (and stormy),
…and after a thousand miles or so, it starts getting pretty red.
Which is how you know you’re in The Outback.
And then the road runs out completely and becomes a dirt track.
Now it’s just you, the bush, and the emus…
If you look closely you can just see Rod Hull working the one on the right.
There’s kangaroos as well of course. And 40 billion flies. Not to mention Death Adders, Taipans, Brown Snakes, Funnel Web Spiders and Redbacks. But fortunately you don’t see too many of those, though Ju did find a giant green frog living in one of the bush dunnies which rather put him off.
But really this is cattle country,
…and the cowboys still round them up in the traditional way – with helicopters and quad bikes.
Some of the wild camp sites were idyllic.
But we were a long way from Domini.
The Australians love to gamble. Unfortunately, as the quad bikes and motorcycles took over for the stock work, there just weren’t enough horses around to hold any decent race meetings. They had to have something to gamble on and the answer turned out to be Lizard Racing. And every August, Eulo hosts the Lizard equivalent of the Grand National.
The most memorable day for lizard racing occurred in 1980 when champion Frilly Woodenhead flashed across the line in a record 1.8 seconds. Frilly Woodenhead was however later beaten by Sydney, a cockroach flown in by the Sydney Cockroach Club. Unfortunately at the end of the special match race disaster struck. The cockroach club members were all excitedly jumping around when one of them landed on the champion insect. A memorial service was later held at the pub.
We’re not kidding.
Aussies speak a strange language. They shorten words and add an “o” or an ‘ie” instead. So ‘afternoon’ becomes ‘arvo,’ and a morning break is ‘smoko’ – short for smoking break, even though no one smokes anymore. They drink stubbies, and wear thongs on their feet. And in the bush like to name their towns after things they like to do. In this example we see that they like beer and French emperors.
But alas all too soon we had to leave the giant bottle trees,
…the bush barbies,
…the roadside lunch stops.
…and deserted campsites,
…and bid farewell to the Big Red,
…and make our way back to the sea.
And so we bring to a close this special one off edition of The Vanblog®. Though there is just time for The Arty Farty prize. Is this drone footage of a tree in the desert, or a little weed?
And the caption competition.
Why did the emu cross the road?
Answers on a 50 dollar bill to the usual address.
Hopefully we will be back to the Boatblog® very soon.
G’day muckers.
Ju & Lyn
Domini 