A Mad Dash

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Blog Day 716



I got home on Friday from Christmas Island, Caroline collected me from the airport in the Patrol, drove us to the office, where we will now both be based, go out, I got in and drove home, as I had travelled through the night and just wanted to go to bed and I fealt I had earned the right to do so.

I had planned to pick her up at the end of the day and before she got out of the truck I asked her if she would be able to sort my Blackberry out as I had not switched it off at all whilst on C.I and as I had to when I got on the plane, when I came to switch it back on, it asked for a code I did not have.

Anyway, when I picked Caroline up, she said I e-mailed Allan, (My Boss) today and he asked me to ask you to be up in Weipa, (Far Northern Queensland) on Monday for a Tuesday meeting on site at 09.30.

As you are all well aware Caroline and myself have been lucky enough to circum navigate Australia, so even though we have never been to Weipa we know exactly where it is, and strangely enough, we were in Cape your exactly a year ago which is in the same vicinity..

This weekend has just a melee of un packing, washing, ironing and re packing for my departure oh and having beer and Pizza, Caroline asked me what I had missed the most whilst being on Christmas Island, it was Beer, Barefoot Radler, Domino’s Pizza and Rummikub, sadly we did not get the chance to play.

Anyway soon it was Monday morning and we were off to the office in Brisbane avenue which would be my new base.

Well I set my laptop up in the small conference room and just picked up my e-mails, in between introducing myself all all my new colleagues, and being mindful not to keep bothering Caroline, as this was here place of work too.

Caroline, had booked me a taxi to the airport and gave me the nod that it was own stairs waiting, I hurriedly packed my office stuff away, grabbed my wheeley case and headed for the lift.

Caroline took the short lift ride with me and stood by the taxi, again, we said our good buys, It would be another 3 weeks before I saw her again, as she was heading home to the UK on Wednesday for a surprise birthday.

My word Bab’s, you don’t know how hard Caroline worked in keeping this a secret, I reckon the military don’t put as much effort in.

My flight plan was Canberra to Sydney, Sydney to Cairns, then Cairns to Weip, which was all quite uneventful except for the getting on, sleeping, getting off an so on.

I have to say that the Cairns airport was quite exciting, there was a lot of people heading to various parts of Northern Queensland, to the mines. I sat a few chairs down waiting for the information board to flash up and heard a guy on his mobile phone talking to his mate, well I wasn’t being nosey, he just was loud.

He said that he had finished working for BHP Billiton, (The Mega Miners) and was working for Rio Tinto, he was heading up to Gove, which I think is in Arnhemland and was on $250.00 an hour, which would equate to $155.00 pounds and hour, not bad, in anyone’s book.

Well again, I climbed aboard my Dash 8 aircraft, I defiantly prefer the smaller planes, you get more of a sense of flying, to be honest.

Fifty minutes later, I was touching down in Weipa, the door opened and even though the outside temperature had been diffused by the planes air conditioning, man it was hot.

To Say “Weipa Airport” would definitely be stretching the point, may be Weipa cow shed would be a more accurate description to be honest.

Well I walked through the “Cow Shed” and I was in, then out in 5 seconds and that is not an exaggeration, and looked out side just on the off chance somebody was waiting for me, with a piece of paper that said “Andy Trenfield” nope, oh well, so I went back in side to the Carpentaria Car hire place and the lady said, and I quote, “If you want a vehicle we haven’t got any.

Thanks for that, I said.

The lady asked me where I was staying and I told here I was staying at the XXX hotel which I had not a clue where it was, kindly enough, she said that if I was prepared to wait half an hour then she would take me as she went past it on her way home.

No worries I said, I will just go and collect my luggage.

Well the luggage Carousel, was a little tractor pulling 2 little trailer, it arrived in the shed and was a free for all, very similar to when we were on Hamilton Island in 2006.

Once the vultures had collected their luggage, there was nothing left on the trailer, nothing! I said to this fella is there anymore luggage and he said, nope that was all, I shouldn’t have asked such a stupid question as the aircraft was only fairly small anyway.

I walked back in and said to the lady on the Qantas desk, well desk could also be stretching the point, that my luggage was missing and she cheerfully told me, that is occurrence happens quite a lot.

Excellent, and it has happened to me, I have been travelling all day, I smell like a Baboon, and I have not got any cloths to change in to.

After we go through the exercise of describing my bag, the lady asked if I have a Qantas over night kit, and I so wanted to tell her, that I always travel with one just in case my luggage gets lost, but instead politely said no.

The Qantas lady hands me a tiny little bag, which I thank her for.

I go back to the car hire place and was just about to explain to the lady who was going to give me a lift, that I was ready when she was, when I heard a voice behind me, say, “Andy” you were on Christmas Island weren’t you” and spin around to see a guy, who just happened to have been on the same flight as me and was the guy, I was meeting on site in the morning.

Chris said, mate, I have already hired a car, where are you staying, I told him and he said that he, to was staying there and would be happy to give me a lift..

Know I have to tell you about car hire in Weipa, no you can’t hire cars only 4 wheel drive vehicles, as the roads are just corrugated, compacted Balksite, which is what they mine, and Weipa funnily enough is the largest balksite mine in the world, mines by Rio Tinto Alcan.

The second reason you have to have a 4 wheel drive is when it rains, it rains you really to know you are in tropical Queensland.

Chris and I get back to our hotel and I thank him profusely, we check in and I ask the receptionist who is from Manchester in the UK if they have any washing machines, which they did and must have felt sorry for me as she gave me two bags of washing powder.

I got to my room and dumped my laptop bag down, took all my cloths off and got in the shower, no hot water at all, as it was still baking hot.

I had agreed to meet Chris in the bar, and we sat and ate diner and just talked about Christmas Island where I had met him and what we were here to achieve.

With Dinner finished, I head back to my room, spoke to Caroline on the phone, the excitedly opened my Qantas overnight kit.

One pair of Qantas short, big enough to fit a horse’s back side, one Tee shirt big enough for a eight year old, girl.

One Tooth Brush, tooth paste and Comb.

I walked over to the washing machine, Jesus I must have looked a sight, thank god it was dark, I loaded all my worldly belongings in and set to wash and went back to my room, which was no more than a Donger, and watched the TV, then went back an hour later and put every thing in the dryer, switched it on, again went back to my room and went to bed.

I was up early the next day, covertly when to collect my Hopefully clean washing, opened the dryer, collected my trophy and ironed it all ready for the forth coming day.

I had agreed to meet Chris at 07.30 to drive out to RAAF Sherger.

Being up in the Territories or up around Cape York, which Incidentally was exactly a year ago, in the mornings has this slow, calm, gentle feeling of tranquility, and here in Weipa it had that feeling again which was lovely.
Chris behind the wheel of the rented Nissan Patrol, I was inquisitively looking around the cabin to see what parts I could nick for ours, It only had 34,000 K’s on it and was nearly new, but I reckon ours was in better condition.

We drove along the corrugated roads, and watched the Roo’s, disturbed by us, bound off in to the distance, I never get tired of seeing Kangaroo’s.

I would so love to get Harry and Lilly, my niece and nephew over for a while and give them the Journey that Caroline and I have been lucky enough to experience, the things we have seen and done have been truly amazing, and feel we have grown through our experience.

Anyway, we arrived at RAAF Sherger on business and were greeted by the military personnel who were more than helpful, but unfortunately that is all I can say about that, oh apart from our RAAF induction.

The guy told us all about the base, where we could and could not go, not that we would have been shot dead, as it is not an active base, but what they call a bare base, basically it could be ready, operationally in 24 hours should Australia, or anyone else for that matter need a tactical base very quickly.

Mike told us, not to wander off the bitumen in the vehicle as they had a weed that had been introduced when the place was build in 1997 and they could not get rid of it, if it had been smoke able and new a few guys who would have given it their best shot, but sadly it wasn’t.

Mike went on to say they get a lot of Death Adders, Taipans and other highly venomous snakes and showed us some pictures of air force personnel and the catches, when the snakes were basking on the runway.

I attended an afternoon meeting at 2.30 on the base and a guy sat down who worked for the same company as I did and said, “I have got something for you” cool!! What is it, your luggage he replied.

Oh well better late than never, we walk outside in to the bright sunshine and about 36 degree’s to his vehicle to collect my bag, and take it over to Chris’s Hired Patrol and put it in the back for safe keeping.

I go back inside and carry on with the meeting , in side I am delighted by the fact that I can at least have a shave and make myself look gorgeous.

We get back to the hotel towards the end of the day, and again sit down with Chris and have our dinner, a couple of beers, then wander off and give Caroline a call, I speak to her to make sure that she is ready for her flight out tomorrow heading for the UK.

It has started to rain, and I mean rain, it had that feeling all afternoon it was so muggy and we were getting natures reward and plenty of it.

The morning I woke to a very hot crisp day, that felt as if it was going to be a scorcher, which was fine as it was my day of departure, I was on the 3.05 back to Sydney where I would stay tonight before my final flight on the week Thursday back to Canberra.

We had to go in Wednesday, extra early as our day was so fragmented on the Tuesday we didn’t get as much as we needed to done, so it caused us to do that much more on the Wednesday.

With only a few minutes to spare literally, I make it to the airport, as I arrive I check my bag in and the same Qantas lady, makes some smart arse remarks about my lost luggage, I explained to her that when my luggage arrived the top part was open, the lady insists that it was. So I just could not be bothered to argue with her and let it go.

Soon there were people disembarking the aircraft and walking the 5 second walk through the cow shed terminal, soon I was boarding the very same Dash 8 ready for my flight to Cairns.

I always like a window seat, as I like to see as much as I can, and I was doing my best to look at the possible route Caroline and myself took last October when we went up to Cape York, but I had difficulty actually spotting where we would have travelled.

I touched down in Cairns then hopped a 2 ½ hour flight to Sydney and after the taxi ride, I finally got to My Hotel room at 11.45pm, it had been a long day.

Thursday morning I took a taxi ride across Sydney which took about an hour in the morning Traffic had my meetings then took a another cab ride, to our North Sydney office, did some more work then took another cab finally to the airport, at last I was on my last leg to Canberra.

I walk in through the door of Bec’s house at around 7.45pm exhausted from a some what busy, most eventful week, had a quick coffee and retired off to bed.

Today, Friday 15th October would be my very first full day in the Office I think now is my base, the desk I am sitting at belongs to Mrs. Kangaroojack (Caroline), and I have been made fully aware that this is her desk and will have to give it up when she gets back.
Caroline has also NOT given me the keys to her desk, as she said the keys are lodged with Peter, her boss and he was under the strict instructions not to hand the keys over to me at any costs.

Friday evening is here, I am home at Bec’s I e-mailed Bec today as I intended to go to our favorite Farm “Woodstock” in Wagga Wagga, to see our very special people in our lives Helen and Robert and the dogs.

Helen recently had a small medical procedure and I had promised tht as soon as I was back I would go to Woodstock to do any little jobs Helen wanted me to do, and when I spoke to her she said she had a lawn that needed mowing.

Oh great, I get to mow 2 acres of front and back lawn at Woodstock, seriously you don’t know how much I love to do this job, since I was a young boy I have always wanted to own a tractor mower, so using Helen’s personal tractor mower, that Robert had got her as a Christmas present, is just the next best thing for me.

Now Bec, (Rebecca) is considering a move to Wagga and went up only last week to scope it out and look at some houses, I thought it would be beneficial to come to Woodstock to see why we are always raving about the farm and it would give Bec another insight to another part of the surrounding area.

Saturday morning, we left at about 09.30 and headed off towards Wagga, I have asked Bec to be a guest writer in the next blog, which covers our time at Woodstock as I wanted another prospective view.

So I will leave this blog here, and you can read the follow on.

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Photos

RAAF base Sherger
me, outside the main gate, it was stinking hot

Comments

[Gary]

Good stuff
Your blogs are just about getting back to the great stuff you wrote when you were travelling around the country. Which is what you are doing right now, I guess. Anyway. Love the blog Caroline, it must have been really, really difficult to keep such a secret. I am sure your mates were shocked and excited to see you. Great work guys. Continue it. Can't wait till you are on the road again.