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Published: June 22nd 2010
On Fire
The familiar sight of bushfires.DAY 589
... Or does it?
As Andy has gone off for his Mexican evening with the Hanily’s I find myself alone to finalise my packing but it is not long before the taxi arrives to take me to the airport.
The darkness is just beginning to descend on Canberra as the day slowly slips away from me along with my long weekend, as it gets darker it gets colder and I am grateful for the warmth inside the airport.
Awaiting the arrival of my colleagues, I read and drink coffee and as they arrive the conversation steers itself around to work and the trip ahead of us. We are all looking forward to this journey, albeit this is a work thing it is exciting to think about where we are headed.
The flight takes off on time, we are dispersed around the aeroplane but it is not a full flight so there is a spare seat between me and another lady, as soon as we are in the air and the seat belt signs are off, I fire up my Ipod to listen to some good tunes to keep me occupied on the trip
A Welcome Sight
only for 5 hours sleep but much needed and many levels above the outback "hotel" that cost the same per night! and read my book, I have decided to read Bill Bryson’s Down Under for a second time as the first time I read it was after a previous trip to Australia and now we have completed our Australia wide tour, for the first time, I want to read it again to familiarise myself with the places we visited.
My journey this evening takes me toward Adelaide and instead of driving across the Nullarbor as Andy and I had done before I am now flying over it and the Great Australian Bight, somewhere around Esperance the flight will turn right and head toward Perth.
I eat my aeroplane food and think of everyone back at the Hanily’s tucking into Mexican and enjoying a challenge or two of Rummikub. Still I cannot possibly grumble my work is affording me some great experiences in this fabulous country, and at least I have a mini Toblerone to chomp on for my desert!
It is now past the ungodly hour of midnight in Canberra and we are two hours behind here in Perth, I am tired although having slept a little on the flight, we now have to get our taxi to
Road Trip
Back on those familiar roads again..... the hotel where we are to have about 5 hours sleep before catching the first flight out to Broome in the morning.
Perth is warmer than Canberra, I have it on good authority that tonight in Canberra the temperature is in the minus figures, I later find out that it actually dropped to minus 5! Thank goodness I am out of that for a short while.
The hotel is lovely, I have a large room and apart from finding a great kitchenette, separate bedroom the bathroom is huge and I open a cupboard door to find a washing machine and tumble dryer, but I am not here long enough to enjoy it or take advantage of my lovely surroundings.
I have dropped Andy a text to let him know that I arrived although I am sure he is fast asleep by now! It is time for me to get my head down, but first I have to work out what time it actually is, I feel tired and realistically know that we are two hours ahead but I just have to make sure that I am right and that my alarm is set correctly.
I sleep
but not that well, conscious of my very early start I seem to wake up every hour just to check the clock until finally around 4.30 my alarm goes off to wake me. It is still dark and is now pouring with rain outside, yet the temperature feels quite balmy and there is no need for a fleece to keep warm.
I take a shower to help wake me up, but in a short space of time I find myself in reception to await the company of my colleagues once again, this time picking up the company of an additional colleague for the journey.
This is where I find myself in a different world again, the world of “FIFO”, the club lounge is mainly full of big burly men dressed for the outback, many of them sporting 10 gallon Akubra’s but one thing is clear to me that they are mostly “FIFO’s” which means “Fly In Fly Out” and indeed our friend Cliff is himself a “FIFO”, many of them live in and around the city or suburbs and for work they fly out to a remote location, mine or oil rig perhaps for a month or so
and then get to fly home for a month off before having to fly back again.
No wonder they are in the club lounge they must get a lot of air miles!
The flight takes off, we are all dispersed around the aeroplane once again, the flight is not quite full but at least I have a space between me and another person again, well that is until the seat belt light is extinguished, all of a sudden this huge guy comes and sits on the seat in between, he must be 6 foot tall with huge shoulders and suddenly my space is invaded.
This chap explains briefly before getting back to his book that he had a draught in his face and they could not do anything about it so he had to move, I was surprised, this guy looks like an outback chap and my impression is that these guys are rough and tough and expect harsh terrain and working conditions yet was disturbed by the draught.
I was watching the landscape below, I could see it gradually change into the terrain that became so familiar to us on our journey, from the skies
Termite Mound
...they get everywere and take over.... above it looks pretty spectacular and I wonder what phenomenon created the ridges in the land below us.
Landing in Broome was great the temperature is exactly as I expected it to be, no less than 30 degrees C and after loading the car with our cases, grabbing some coffee to go, several bottles of water we hit the road and headed into the red dirt.
How pleased was I to be up here again, not just for the temperature but the experience and I have to say there is something about the Kimberley that seems to get under the skin and it’s not the dirt, this place is enchanting and I love it.
Watching the scenery go by I watch for the wildlife but wonder how Andy feels about me doing this journey without him, last time we shared this journey together and experienced the delights that Australia had to offer and now I am doing this without him.
Our journey is long, and the drive is several hours, it is a challenge to do this with colleagues, you have to be able to get on with each other, I am pretty sure they already
The Beach...
... or not as the case may be... at Derby... think I am mad, I explained how great it would be to see a snake and where we are headed is heavily populated with snakes, especially the King Brown.
This experience is great and I relish how good it is to be back in the Kimberley and reminisce to myself about the last time that we were here, also thank goodness that I remembered to pack the Aeroguard to keep the blasted mozzies away!
As luck would have it we saw two King Browns, it was late afternoon on our journey the time was right for snakes to sneak into the road to enjoy the warmth emanating from the bitumen that has soaked up the heat of the day.
I know Andy has already told you all of this but I just need to tell you how I experienced it, and thankfully we were behind the metal and glass cover of the car, it was not a good photo, there was no choice in that matter, these snakes are deadly and you don’t mess with them, this one was aware that something was in its space and the head came up to the attack position and yes
everyone screamed like a girl (not me, I was still trying to climb over the seat to get a photo!) but it was acceptable for one of my other colleagues as she was also a girl, but show me a man that would also not freak out if one of these things was poised to strike!
We all agreed that after that incident “what goes on tour stays on tour” no one wanted to admit that they screamed! Of course all that changed as soon as we emailed the picture of the snake back to the office, then the rumours over who screamed were in abundance!
The nights are warm but I have not indulged in the air conditioning I am just enjoying the warmth but when 5.00 comes I find that I am wide awake, I even called Andy at 6.30 one morning and he was most impressed to have a proper lucid conversation with me.
It has been a busy week, I have thoroughly enjoyed my business trip to the desert, what a terrific experience for me and next time I may be doing this trip on my own, but I don’t have a problem
with that, I feel familiar with the terrain, I know and understand the dangers here but above all I also know people in the area now so I would not truly be alone.
A few days later we were done and now it was time to do the journey in reverse, and as I mentioned earlier, “what goes on tour stays on tour” so I am not going to share the work stuff with you, especially as this is a travel blog and at the end of the day the most important aspect is the travel bit.
I was looking forward to seeing Andy I was not looking forward to heading back to the Canberra winter. The journey back was a long one, but we did find some time to have a paddle in the Indian Ocean at Cable Beach I felt so lucky to be there again, it was bliss the water was warm it was just so good to be there and the last time I was here we were sharing the fabulous Cable Beach sunsets with the Travelin Trueys!
Eventually I arrive back in Canberra, Andy is waiting for my arrival at the airport,
it is cold but not as cold as it was when I left, it is nice to be back with Andy and if I dare say back home although the house we are staying in at the moment is not home, it is still familiar.
My work is going to take me to some interesting places in the coming months, and I relish at how lucky I am to be able to experience these things through work, for now it looks as though I need to get used to hanging around airports, and the reality is that life has returned to the same accelerated pace that we used to work at in England, but that is ok, work serves a purpose and we do what we have to do.
It has been only a two hour time difference but all the same I do feel some kind of jet lag as the tiredness is catching up with me I feel as if I could sleep for a week, but thank goodness the weekend is here.
Speaking of the weekend, this morning I got up and made a cup of tea for both of us and went back
to bed, I opened the blinds to let the light in and what do I see outside the window but 5 King Parrots in a tree at the end of the garden, what an amazing sight!
Until the next time
Mrs KJ
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MichaelnFaye
Michael & Faye Johnson
Oh Broome... Those bushfire pics just reminded me of the awesome time we spent there... Red sunsets on Cable beach... Seriously beautiful stuff! :)