Zelma’s Trip

I got up and left Lake Maraboon and headed South on the Great Inland Way towards Roma.  I had the whole petrol dilemma again and realised that I still hadn’t learnt.  At least I now knew that I could do around seventy kilometres once the petrol light had come on.  I think I was actually using the nearly running out of petrol thing to inject a bit of excitement into the driving.  This section proved to be a -very- deserted section of road.  I had got better at overtaking by now and actually trusted the road trains when they indicated right to signal to you that it was safe to overtake.  It’s often very hard to see past road trains and, if you drop back far enough to see then, by the time you get close enough to overtake, the straight section of road has run out.  On the dreaded Charters Towers stretch it was night time and it took me some time to figure out what the road trains were doing.  I swore at them for indicating right without actually turning a fair few times before I figured out that they were actually trying to be helpful.  Then I questioned whether they were trying to lure me to my death by indicating when another road train was coming.  Eventually I trusted one of them, although I did it so hesitatingly that when I got half way passed them a bend arrived.  They then started helpfully flashing various other lights at me in case I hadn’t realised I was heading towards a rather sharp bend, rather too fast.

After some time, several road kills (not mine) and plentiful gallahs and cockatoos later I arrived in Springsure.  There was little of excitement here other than a petrol station, which I chose to ignore, so I carried on to Rolleston where I did fill up! 

The drive from Rolleston to Roma was long.  I listened to the radio which quickly turned from current hits to old……(use your own ryhming slang).  Actually I did like the country stations.  For a while they felt very apt for my trip through Australian nothingness.  I particularly liked one song about, “Brother Bill and brother Jack der der der der put the roo in the sack”….l kid you not!  Actually it reminded me of my Dad.  Not that he’s a kangaroo hunter or anything, just that he likes country and has some eclectic music.  He has one record of people playing flute like instruments whilst wearing baskets on their heads.  Adds to the acoustics or something.  Anyway, enough on that subject.  Actually, maybe not quite, one station I found on AM reminded me of my Mum with Elton John, the Beatles and other classics.  While I’m still on this subject yesterday I managed to get some Happy Hardcore which not only made me laugh for a good 10k but also reminded me of my brother.  Just before I leave the subject of the radio, which I’m sure must make thrilling reading, a quick moan about the fake football, I mean Aussie rules (AFL).  At one stage there was nothing other than about twenty channels dedicated to Aussie Rules commentary.  Maybe it was the equivalent of the F.A. Cup or something but it was seriously doing my head in.  One more thing, can anyone tell me the difference between FM1 and FM2?

Okay, enough now.  Can you see what happens to your brain on long, monotonous drives?  Actually you get to the stage where you think, “Oh my God this is dull”, and can’t take any more fake football commentary and then you see an amazing bird, remember how beautiful the vast emptiness is or see a  mountain in the distance.  That or you play the road kill game, i.e. trying to figure out what the animal was before the road train hit it!  There is a crazy amount of roadkill here which reminded me of the worrying absence of it in Asia…..mmmm Thai Green curry!

One continuous source of amusement were the signs.  The kangaroo signs may seem straightforwards but I started to question the distances.  Basically there’s a picture and a different distance written underneath it.  Now you can see how this makes sense with cattle.  For example a sign with cows on and 3km underneath would normally coincide with you driving over a cattle grid and then another in 3 kilometres.  This doesn’t really work as well with wild animals and isn’t one of the core traits of a kangaroo that it can jump?  Okay, maybe I am being overly cynical here as I can concede that kangaroos, for example, do tend to travel in certain ways and cross certain open sections to get to areas to feed and the like.  Certain signs though like “kangaroos, 300m”, made almost no sense to me.  Maybe the signs are -for- the kangaroos so that they know how long a section they are allowed to cross the road for.  Okay, so now I’m just being facetious.  I also had the thought about the anal American who measures the distance and then prays he’ll hit a kangaroo five metres outside the 3k so that he can sue!

Another sign which I didn’t really understand was “koalas 5km”.  Although I may not have appeared to take the whole kangaroo and road thing very seriously hitting one is deadly serious, often for both parties.  Now explain to me firstly how hitting a koala can hurt you and secondly how you’re meant to hit an animal whilst driving which is a tree-dwelling stoner?  Having thought about this I wondered if it was one of those signs which countries have to make themselves proud of their fauna and heritage.  If it was the latter it was a bit stupid as it meant that I spent the next 5km staring into the trees trying to spot the koalas they had so helpfully told me were abundant in the area and consequently paying no attention to the road.  Thank God there wasn’t a kangaroo -and- koala sign, now that would have been dangerous!

Another sign which confused and amused me was a, “blind people crossing” sign.  I was bemused on several levels by this.  Firstly, was one to assume that there was an abundance of blind people in this certain village?  It sure didn’t look big enough, or near enough to anything or anywhere, to have an eye hospital.  Secondly how are you meant to tell from a distance?  Do they wear signs out here?  Also, what exactly is one meant to do with this helpful gem of information?  If they were blind and deaf I could see how this could pose a problem but blind people are normally quite adept at such tasks as crossing the road.  I expect this would be made slightly easier when firstly there is no other noise and secondly it’s hardly spaghetti junction with about two vehicles passing every hour.  Now that really would be unlucky even for the blind, deaf and intellectually disadvantaged individual now wouldn’t it?  Ow, I think I’ve spent too long in Australia.  I’ll stop now lest I offend.  Although with the medium being text based and all I’m guessing that might be a tad difficult given the current subject.

Anyway, so I’m driving along for hours, going slightly insane and getting overly attached to dead animals and signage, when I arrive in Roma.  Roma didn’t really do it for me so I continued to Miles.  Yes I said, “to Miles” and not “for miles”.  Although the signs again proved yet further amusement to my numb brain.  I mean, imagine the hilarity when I saw the sign which pointed to miles and then had a number of kilometres next to it!  Woah I seriously need to take someone with me on my next road trip!  So I arrived in Miles and decided to carry on to Chinchilla.  There should be no explanation necessary here as Chinchilla is perhaps the coolest place name ever.  Well other than “Zelma” which is a place in Australia according to Google.  Once in Chinchilla I found a nice cheap caravan park ($15 a night) and settled down for the evening.