Sex in the Desert - Crossing the Carpentaria

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August 22nd 2006

Published: August 27th 2006

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John Miranda

Road Sign

Beware of car eating cows

Darwin seemed as familiar as Perth had been and largely unchanged from 2002. The weather is still hot and humid and the party continues on Mitchell Street. It was the Darwin Festival - we'd missed the big horse race and the Port Adelaide AFL game transferred up north, but there was plenty of music events on the go. The title of this page was borrowed from a band we went to see - changed slightly originally to avoid possible censorship - but changed back in the unashamed bid for hits. A confused 4 piece Australian rock band featuring Billy Idol on drums, a reincarnation of the B52s former frontman and none other than Egyptian Rick (moonlighting from his day job abd football commitments in Loughborough) on lead guitar. The track to watch out for is Stuck in the queue at Woolies with the Check Out chick. Sadly for the desert combo, they didn't surpass Miranda's Darwin faves, the Amazing Drumming Monkeys, as featured at Mindil Beach Sunset markets or the regular electronic didge group, Emdee. If anybody out there is having a boring afternoon at work check the AMDs out at amazingdrummingmonkeys.com

After a few days of trying to keep

Heartbreak Hotel, Cape Crawford

Miranda meets the locals 2 - running through the 10 reasons why smoking and drinking pints of rum and coke are not good for your health...

cool and visiting the outdoor deckchair cinema, we left for Cairns on the Desert Venturer - a road trip and not a tour - across one of the more remote areas of the country. The first part was actually down the main Stuart Highway towards Alice - Charlie the Buffalo from Croc Dundee is still stuffed on the bar and unmoved by his visitors at the Adelaide River Roadhouse, the Bitter Springs near Mataranka are not bitter at all and Daly Waters remains an obscure pub in the middle of nowhere. We left the main highway and headed along the single lane sealed road to our overnight at the Heartbreak Hotel, Cape Crawford. Cape Crawford sounds like it should be near the sea and apparently it was way back in history. It is now in the middle of nowhere and near nowhere! The evening was best described as an experience - backpackers meet ringers from the surrounding cattle stations (most of which had obviously driven 150km to get there and would probably drive back when refueled with a dozen bundies and coke.)

The next day the sealed road disappeared at Borroloola and it was back to the dust punctuated

NT Border

Lyndsey, Rachel, Mitzy, Katrina & Matt

with regular excursions across the rivers and creeks that cut the places off in the wet. The road is littered with rusted cars abandoned by those who did not take local advice before travelling. We left 2 Canadian girls intent on being Jillaroos for a few weeks at Calvert Downs station, passed Wollogorong Downs (apparently a small place at 1.7 million acres), Hells Gate Roadhouse (complete with airport and international arrivals terminal) and on to overnight near Lawn Hills Gorge. The local ringers were out in force to see if there were any young ladies to entertain them.

Lawn Hills Gorge was quite pristine, although given it's location you can see why it is apparently one of Queensland's least visited National Parks. We remembered those sea kayaking skills from Milford Sound and canoed down the gorge. The majority of the rest of the day was on unsealed roads past Gregory Downs (population 9) and on to the Burke & Wills Roadhouse, where the local rodeo was in full swing. Unfortunately there is nothing to report about the imaginatively named Bang Bang settlement, as there is nothing of note there. We spent the night in another local hostelry, the Club

Desert Venturer

Hotel in Croydon (population 150 down from 30,000 in 1890 something when there was gold and another 57 pubs in town). The locals have obviously seen it all before, as the only occupants of the pub were an accountant from Leicester and 2 Irish backpackers working behind the bar and in the kitchen respectively.

We arrived in Cairns via Millstream Falls, Milla Milla Falls and the Atherton Tablelands. The former Palm Cove residents will be pleased to know that Innot Hot Springs has that most important of commodities in 2006 - water!!

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