Just sometimes, when you have a corker of an idea, and no bastard steps up to the plate, you just have to say, "Fuck-em!", and go ahead anyway.
The idea was a long, long run, a thousand miles over four days. We were to start on a Friday with a transportation stage of over 380K's to get us to our real starting point, the Murray River.
The usual excuses were offered from the mob, or just ignored. In the past I have abandoned runs if this happened, but I thought, "Why worry about them? If they want to sit on their arses and do nothing, well, let them! It's their loss, not mine."
Bluey reckoned he'd come on the Friday, but was not sure about the rest. That's OK, we organised to meet at St Arnaud.
He turned up with Disco Dave, the Pub Minder from his Korongvale Boozer, at the St Arnaud Botanical. he was sporting a very fetching floral straw hat, with which he had optimistic views about keeping the wind off in the Bluey Rocket. Quite quixotic we thought.
One of the endearing things about Bluey, and one that makes him a Feral natural, is that he is unpredictably predictable. He'd moved from Friday allday, and camping, to Friday, and in the end to driving up the highway with us for 60K's or so, to go to a pub at Wycheproof, for a couple of beers, and attend to some family business matters while he was there.
But one should not judge interactions just by elapsed time, and I'm sure that both Her Musical Indoors and I valued the precious moments spared from Bluey's Universal Business Plan. He is the Milo Minderbender of the Ferals.
So, freed from any encumbrances, the HMI and I journeyed north at a steady 95-100 kph. We had hoped to pick up some LPG at Manangatang, but this was a dream that didn't happen, and so we kept going till we hit the Murray, in plenty of time to set up camp, gather the firewood for the night, have a few beers and glasses of reds, and just enjoy the ambience of that magical place.
We'd done 380 or so K's that day, and such is the ease of riding in that enormous touring car, that neither of us felt at all tired by it. By contrast, 100 k's in the MGTC, and you're ready for the broom.
As stated earlier, the Murray was magnificent as always, wide and flowing rapidly, with squillions of birds, and fish jumping everywhere, but, there was also something different about it from the days of the 1970's when the Lupino frequented it, or even 3 years before when he , and Arthur and the Mauler toured down it.
It took a day to put the finger on it.
The next day was spent touring the Hattah-Kulkyne park. The Lupino had spent the early 1970's in the area, and had definate recollections of visiting a Kulkyne Station Homestead, which was a private enclave of the State Park, and is so still designated. He recalls it was a slab built homestead, of the mid 1850's, with wide verandahs, and with a roof held down by saplings, in the bush style. It was even then abandonned, but was, nonetheless, in good nick.
One of the things that stuck in the Lupino brain was that the shearers of the time had had a bit of a contest with their manual hand shears, and one of them had thrown his up into a tree, about 10 foot high, where it had imbedded. In 1972 the tree had started to swallow the shears, and the Lupino was anxious to see how far the bloody tree had got!
But try as we might, turning down every possible track, real or imagined, in, or out of the vicinity of the Kulkyne Station, we just could not find it. Was the place burnt, or carted of to a theme park? If anyone knows, please let us know.
Spent the rest of the day touring around what used to be the Hattah Lakes, but except for the main tourist hub lake, none had water in them, and looked like they had not had any since the last time the Lupino was there. Then they not only had water, but also fish, but, as stated, that was in the 1970's.
We returned to the river, and it was at the place pictured at the beginning of this little account, that the penny really dropped.
We were sitting on the cliff top watching the river, with a beer, when some fishermen in a flatbottomed tinny came up the river. They were zigzagging back and forth, which we found a little curious. A bloke was standing in the bow with a paddle. As they came closer we realised that he was plumbing the depth of the river so as to avoid snags. The paddle never went down more than a foot or so! It was even dangerous for a tinny drawing about 4 inches to travel on the river.
We then noticed, or rather looked at again, the rock banks across the river we had not noticed in the 70's, and the islands that seemed new, and saw that they had trees growing on them that were 20 or 30 feet high, and obviously had never been flooded for....how many years?
The river is stuffed. Fucked up by Magic Puddin' agriculture that believes you can take out more water from a system than goes into it, year after year. No doubt when the river stops flowing altogether, which can't be far away, everyone will be surprised and point the finger at everyone else, and just like on Wall Street, ask the taxpayer to bail them out. And just like with Wall Street the gormless lifeforms that govern us will oblige, cause after all, it's not their money.
Quality of life can often be ruined by bad neighbours. And so it was for us on our second camp on the river. No, it was not a bunch of rednecks, but rather 30 or so sulphur crested cockies who had decided to roost directly above our camp. They are the most cantankerous of birds. There is always a couple that will continue to squawk raucously way past birdie bedtime. But this is as nothing to what happens at dawn. It seems as if the entire roost wakes up with a bad hangover, and shrieks for every other bastard to shut up at the same time. It's like 40 Jimmy Barnes's on full amplified throat. Sleep is murdered, but what a magnificent alarm clock!
The next day we decided to go to Murrayville, because we'd never been there. Is there really any other reason to go there?
Gassed up in Ouyen and headed west, surprised at the extent of agriculture along the way. For some reason we'd imagined it to be Mallee Scrub, but it was wheat all the way.
Stopped at Underbool for a beer, but the pub was closed!
And this on a Sunday, Sacrilege!
The localities of Linga and Boinka suggested to us that there were educated folks at the naming with not much to do.
Finally rocked into Murrayville to find... the fucking pub closed! Thank Christ we carried ample supplies!
We called in at the local garage to get a bit of oil, and were charmed by the nicest local we had met in yonks.
Charlie was about 80, and had lived there all of his life. He served us with oil by pumping it out of a 40 gallon drum into a proper glass quart bottle, as it should be. He liked the Huddo, and said that his Dad, at that very garage, used to be the local Hudson-Essex-Cadillac-La Salle dealer. Instant bonding!
He told us how the garage was actually built as a grain storage, but the early post-WW1 recession came in, and cars were more profitable, so it changed.
He and the HMI hit it off, because she had been to Papua- New Guinea in the 60's, and he had been there in the War, so they spent a great deal of time discussing the intricacies of Papuan domestic architecture.
We asked him about the Nhill track, and he reckoned we'd breeze through it without changing gears. Nuff said as far as I was concerned, and we took our leave of the old
gentleman, but vowed to see him again soon. Some people are just like that.
After a quick tour of Murrayville, which I must say seemed to have had a prosperous past, we hit the Nhill track. Fortunately, the HMI, who is of a nervous disposition (no doubt aided and abetted by 40+ years of cohabitation with the Lupino), did not notice the note on the map saying "Extreme care required."
She did however notice the large signs saying: "Dry Weather Road, 4 Wheel Drive Only." She also noted that her infernal mobile-fucking-phone did not work ( a blessing I told her). But by a process of logic, ie, it had not rained, and we had 4 wheels, we proceeded. "What if we broke down....again!" (underhand reference to a previous unfortunate experience). "Nah, won't happen, and besides, we have water, we have food for at least a week, then we can eat the dog, or one of us. By the way you seem to have put on some weight recently." Well, maybe the last comment was thought rather than articulated. There are limits to bravery.
The track was well worth it, but I could see the danger in the wet. The track is essentially clay with drift white sand on top. The rough ridges of the surface were all created by 4WD's in the wet, and they looked monumental, completely going off the road, or deep plowing in the centre. but in the conditions of dry and cool, any passenger vehicle could do it, and should, because it is truly wild and beautiful.
The scenery of the Big Desert is stark: sand ridges of a base of pure white, with low vegetation and on the ridges, often native pines. The vegetation and the trees are such a dark contrast that the whole looks like a chinese ink painting. Photos, with their diminishing qualities cannot capture the beauty, it must be experienced within the dome of emptiness that is the sky, and with the accompaniment of the soundtrack of the wind. Nothing like it.... go there.
After that we journeyed our way back to Central Vic, via the Grampians. Of interest, maybe, to the car freaks, the Huddo running entirely on LPG did about 380K's on a tank which cost us about $60 per fill. This equated to about 35mpg in dollar equivalents. We did over a thousand miles, and it cost us less than $300, including oil, which the bastard pours out when you go up too steep a slope, which we tended to do. All in all, bloody cheap motoring from a large truck weighing about two ton, fully loaded with camping gear, booze, two adults and a dog.
