I used to do an amazing amount of travel shortly after I left home. I joined the army as an apprentice at the age of 16 and spent the first two years at a military school in Victoria, Australia. From there, I moved to Sydney at which time I had bought my first car. Naturally I had a girl friend in Melbourne and that is when the weekend road trips started.
I recall one particular trip that for reasons I still don’t fully understand I made a decision to take a longer coastal route from Melbourne back to Sydney. Great idea at the time but it is a long trip by the shortest route 12 hours back in the days before the highway because a 110kmh dual lane expressway that now bypasses most towns.
It started out really well, lots to see but then night set in. At about midnight, I was getting quite tired and decided to pull over for a bit of a sleep. I picked a nice place surrounded by enormous trees on both sides of the road, and shortly after I turned in to sleep, a thick fog dropped down. There was not another car on the road for quite some time and after a while I started to hear things that I now suspect was a figment of my overactive imagination. I began to think about every horror movie I had ever seen and sleep suddenly became a really bad idea. After a while, my imagination go the better of me and off I went until I eventually came to a small town where I felt much safer. A real hero in the making here folks!
In 1992, I had the pleasure of doing an official trip up the entire length of Cape York Peninsula in Queensland. This is a trip that is over 1200km (about 900 miles) of dirt road and it takes about three days. The main party headed back while myself and another technician had to remain behind and wait for a new generator to replace a failed unit where we were staying. After completing the task, we headed back down the road and had one of the most memorable trips in a long time.
At dusk each night, we pulled into one of the many watering holes and purchased a six-pack and a bottle of port. It was hot enough that we only needed to drive a few miles out of the small settlements and set up a stretcher beside the vehicle, light a small fire and relax for the night. Three days later, it was dusk when we reached the top of the Atherton Tablelands and stopped at a scenic lookout. It was postcard perfect sunset, looking out to sea from a great height. We could see the lights of Cairns and a number of sugar cane fields were on fire absolutely spectacular.
Three more days later until we reached our home base in Toowoomba (about 150km North West of Brisbane)
My days of long road trips are over but the memories of those that matter are still with me.
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