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Day's 1 to 6 12/8/2014 to 17/8/2014
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- Day 1 - Wangaratta to Renmark
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Day 21 - Birdsville to Noccundra - Sun 1 Nov 2015
Sunny Sunday started well with us all in good spirits. We were sad to see Ohso and Eddie leave our sides as they headed back towards Northern Queensland. Following them was a little too far away for us to contemplate at this stage as we were realising that we were only five days away from our objective. Breakfast was served in the rehab suite and we also gave Macca another call, catching his producer who said she would try for us but he was on an outside broadcast and difficult to contact. We had a fairly big day planned for today so we couldn’t hang around all day for the media. Fifteen kilometres out of town the phone service ran out anyway.
The plan today was to get across to Innamincka and then push on as best we could and make some distance. It was going to be another hot day and the further south and east we got the better. We headed south down the Birdsville Track towards a simmering storm that was sweeping across from the south west. Enough rain fell to wash across the windshields of the bikes but not wet them. The cars saw the rain and chased it down but never got the water. We gathered together again at the intersection of Walkers Track and the Birdsville Track. Walker’s would take us across to Innamincka. The wind was quite strong pushing the bikes down to the turn-off; wind would be a theme for the day. Going across the crossing the wind was still buffeting the guys as we went south west towards Innamincka, in particular giving them grief as they travelled through the gas and oil fields to the north west of Innamincka.
Walkers Crossing Track was a good call for the day. It was a track that was in some ways a review of what we had done in all our previous days. At the start there was stony desert, a sea of red rocks to travel through. Then across the landscape to meet the stones came marching dunes; long lines of orange sand dressed with green shrubs and dead trees. The dunes and the stones lay next to each other for some time before the stones slipped away, replaced by sandy swales. The landscape then changed again as we went into floodplain country, with trees and washouts pushing the track left and right, up and down. Walkers Crossing itself had a nice bridge laid out to cross the river, dressed for the use of B Double trucks that support the oil and gas industry in this area.
There was quite a lot of infrastructure across the ground here, pipes, valves, signs and roads. A camp was in place with two blokes sitting outside having a smoke having a lazy look at us in the 40 degree heat as we cruised by. Navigation was an issue as the intersecting tracks were signposted but with small writing; you had to get close to see ‘Innamincka” and there were more than a couple of overshoots. Finally we got down into the area of the Cooper Creek and up the hill to the shop and pub and one or two other scratchy buildings. The bikes were in well ahead of the cars for a nice meal served up by Michelle at the pub who was good for a chat and happy to share local experiences from her time in this pub and at Birdsville.
The storms that we had seen coming out of Birdsville were still chasing us across the landscape. The bikes shot off as the support team sat down for lunch. The next target was Noccundra across in Queensland. To get there we had to whip out past the iconic ‘Dig Tree” of Burke and Wills fame, and from there pick up the Adventure Way across to the Bulloo Development Road and then down into Noccundra. The storms were wrapping themselves across the countryside, driven by heat and moisture, generating their own winds. A portent of what was to come was felt by the support crew guys. They stopped when they picked up the bitumen near the Dig Tree to pump up their tyres and watched as a storm front swept in on them, with lightning that Rips and Larkie couldn’t catch in a photograph, dust that caught in our eyes and thoughts and finally a sprinkle of rain that mixed with the dust to make mud.
The 200-odd kilometres from Innamincka to Noccundra were reeled off by the two teams then with the storms coming up and across from the south west. The bikes got to Noccundra dry to be met by the publican Noel who really looked after us all for our stay. The cars turned from the Bulloo Development Road onto the Noccundra Road and pushed directly into the storm, which hit them 15 kilometres before Noccundra. First was a storm of swirling, writhing dust, and then followed drops of rain mixed with the dust before finally torrents of rain fell. Under the verandah of the pub the riders experienced the same thing, watching the wind and the rain mix in an unholy storm across the dry land; it had not rained in this area for 12 months.
Finally we came together at Noccundra, sharing a beer as the rain stopped and we gathered together to share experiences on the damp road amongst streams of rainwater. The cars had pushed through the storm ok. Carl was suffering as he had placed his bike gear under cover only for the roof to leak and wet it for him anyway. Noel had arranged for us to set up our swags in the Noccundra Hall next to the pub; some opted to stay outside. Either way the rains had cooled and calmed the atmosphere for us and relieved our sweat. We were able to enjoy our beer and tea, which the publican, surprised by our arrival at this location in the middle of nowhere, was able to rustle up at short notice. As the evening slipped away we set up the projector in the bar and watched last year’s movie again, joined by Beat and Doris Kornor from Switzerland, who were nomads like us, travelling the roads of Australia but in a slightly different manner. Their story is even better than ours and won’t be told here as it would not do it justice, and truth and justice is important to us. We never let the truth get in the way of a good story!
Sunny Sunday started well with us all in good spirits. We were sad to see Ohso and Eddie leave our sides as they headed back towards Northern Queensland. Following them was a little too far away for us to contemplate at this stage as we were realising that we were only five days away from our objective. Breakfast was served in the rehab suite and we also gave Macca another call, catching his producer who said she would try for us but he was on an outside broadcast and difficult to contact. We had a fairly big day planned for today so we couldn’t hang around all day for the media. Fifteen kilometres out of town the phone service ran out anyway.
The plan today was to get across to Innamincka and then push on as best we could and make some distance. It was going to be another hot day and the further south and east we got the better. We headed south down the Birdsville Track towards a simmering storm that was sweeping across from the south west. Enough rain fell to wash across the windshields of the bikes but not wet them. The cars saw the rain and chased it down but never got the water. We gathered together again at the intersection of Walkers Track and the Birdsville Track. Walker’s would take us across to Innamincka. The wind was quite strong pushing the bikes down to the turn-off; wind would be a theme for the day. Going across the crossing the wind was still buffeting the guys as we went south west towards Innamincka, in particular giving them grief as they travelled through the gas and oil fields to the north west of Innamincka.
Walkers Crossing Track was a good call for the day. It was a track that was in some ways a review of what we had done in all our previous days. At the start there was stony desert, a sea of red rocks to travel through. Then across the landscape to meet the stones came marching dunes; long lines of orange sand dressed with green shrubs and dead trees. The dunes and the stones lay next to each other for some time before the stones slipped away, replaced by sandy swales. The landscape then changed again as we went into floodplain country, with trees and washouts pushing the track left and right, up and down. Walkers Crossing itself had a nice bridge laid out to cross the river, dressed for the use of B Double trucks that support the oil and gas industry in this area.
There was quite a lot of infrastructure across the ground here, pipes, valves, signs and roads. A camp was in place with two blokes sitting outside having a smoke having a lazy look at us in the 40 degree heat as we cruised by. Navigation was an issue as the intersecting tracks were signposted but with small writing; you had to get close to see ‘Innamincka” and there were more than a couple of overshoots. Finally we got down into the area of the Cooper Creek and up the hill to the shop and pub and one or two other scratchy buildings. The bikes were in well ahead of the cars for a nice meal served up by Michelle at the pub who was good for a chat and happy to share local experiences from her time in this pub and at Birdsville.
The storms that we had seen coming out of Birdsville were still chasing us across the landscape. The bikes shot off as the support team sat down for lunch. The next target was Noccundra across in Queensland. To get there we had to whip out past the iconic ‘Dig Tree” of Burke and Wills fame, and from there pick up the Adventure Way across to the Bulloo Development Road and then down into Noccundra. The storms were wrapping themselves across the countryside, driven by heat and moisture, generating their own winds. A portent of what was to come was felt by the support crew guys. They stopped when they picked up the bitumen near the Dig Tree to pump up their tyres and watched as a storm front swept in on them, with lightning that Rips and Larkie couldn’t catch in a photograph, dust that caught in our eyes and thoughts and finally a sprinkle of rain that mixed with the dust to make mud.
The 200-odd kilometres from Innamincka to Noccundra were reeled off by the two teams then with the storms coming up and across from the south west. The bikes got to Noccundra dry to be met by the publican Noel who really looked after us all for our stay. The cars turned from the Bulloo Development Road onto the Noccundra Road and pushed directly into the storm, which hit them 15 kilometres before Noccundra. First was a storm of swirling, writhing dust, and then followed drops of rain mixed with the dust before finally torrents of rain fell. Under the verandah of the pub the riders experienced the same thing, watching the wind and the rain mix in an unholy storm across the dry land; it had not rained in this area for 12 months.
Finally we came together at Noccundra, sharing a beer as the rain stopped and we gathered together to share experiences on the damp road amongst streams of rainwater. The cars had pushed through the storm ok. Carl was suffering as he had placed his bike gear under cover only for the roof to leak and wet it for him anyway. Noel had arranged for us to set up our swags in the Noccundra Hall next to the pub; some opted to stay outside. Either way the rains had cooled and calmed the atmosphere for us and relieved our sweat. We were able to enjoy our beer and tea, which the publican, surprised by our arrival at this location in the middle of nowhere, was able to rustle up at short notice. As the evening slipped away we set up the projector in the bar and watched last year’s movie again, joined by Beat and Doris Kornor from Switzerland, who were nomads like us, travelling the roads of Australia but in a slightly different manner. Their story is even better than ours and won’t be told here as it would not do it justice, and truth and justice is important to us. We never let the truth get in the way of a good story!
