The old saying that you could fire a gun in the main street and not hit anybody certainly applied to Cairns on the May Day public holiday. We rolled into Cairns, far north Queensland’s biggest city, believing we would struggle to find a car park. Turning into Sheridan Street, we spotted an RV Parking sign. Once we’d picked a shady spot in the deserted car park (six cars and a motor home), we went to…
There’s a misleading headline for you – ‘way out west’. At best we were 400 kms from home at any one time. All the while, though, we were keeping our distance, as Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk encouraged us to do. Regardless, she also said we should to go forth and do tourist things in the State of Queensland. Spend money and support our small towns, the Premier said, while reminding us to meet COVID-19 restrictions. These include…
In downtown Dubbo, NSW, the checkout operator at one of the major supermarkets described the day as ‘crazy’. Shopping late (6pm) we managed to buy enough food to tide us over, mindful of Scotty from Marketing’s exhortation to stop hoarding, because ‘it’s UnAustralian’. But the PM was at least three weeks late with that edict, which fell on deaf shoulders (in Dubbo at least). There were plenty of empty shelves and shortages. No rice, mince,…
Although I find the Australian outback fascinating and a little scary, I am unlikely to join the increasing numbers of people whose bucket list item is crossing the Simpson Desert. It’s not just that we don’t own a 4WD. I/we lack the essential Australian pioneering ability to fix things that break down. Regardless, thousands of people trek across the Simpson Desert each year, from Birdsville in Queensland to Dalhousie Springs in South Australia. The…