This morning quite a bit of a shower, but then the rain stopped & we could make some coffee, right opposite the Pub in Windorah, that usually so quiet place.. 4WD-cars, motor-bikes, campervans & even motor-coaches – there was nearly no place left to park the car & we needed to stand in row to get some gas! The same filling station attendant as in ‚95 was still there, the elderly, blind man. But this time, in this hullabaloo, he asked a colleague to handle the electronic purse. He took it from us, though, that we filled the car up for $ 37,50 – guess he can hear that, too?
Afterwards we took a hot shower for $ 2 – what a good deed. It makes sense now that Windorah has about 8-12 toilets for the women only! In ‚95 I was wondering...
& halleluja, what traffic!If there was no Road Train coming towards you, you were pushed from behind, no matter if the track was wet and slippery from all the rain or not! They pace like crazy! OK they pace to the Birdsville Race, but hey guys, you got that wrong, huh?
We wait til tomorrow and head into the people-turmoil then - so long we have another turmoil - blowies...
What´s a party without music? Folks are standig shoulder by shoulder in the Pub or on the verandah, drink & talk. Others stroll around – there are sales booths: 4 with food, one shooting gallery, 3 T-Shirt-booths - one from RFDS
, one from the hospital & a second-hand-one. Some smaller ones with hats and „jewelry“ , a boxing- and a rodeao-arena. The attraction: rides on camel and later on an electrical razor that is run by a push-bike-dynamo. One drunk guy „rides“ the bike, another gets his head shaved. The guy who is shaving, is he drunk as well?Apart from that it´s just dusty & people keep coming & coming – by car, by motor-bike, by bus, by plane. Just to stand there and drink. With no music or such. Party is something different, right?
Some concert was due at 06:00 pm, so we came back for it. Same as before just with even more beer-cans on the ground in front of the Pub. We waited some time and left the place, disappointed. And will you believe it – there was indeed a Britz -van *** that has found the way to Birdsville. & - certainly... Just outside of Birdsville you find the probably at the moment biggest freebie campground in Australia – only burden is the plea for not littering & to camp outside town. What is Britz doin’? Right, he wants to stay IN town – and even needs his wifes´ help to park the darn campervan...
This morning 23 °C already. I know this for sure cause this second thermometer is still intact! Around 07::00 our neighbours put a steak on the barbie – for breakfast, yuck! But, well, we saw that before, in ‚95 on Easter-Monday...
On we head to the Big Red. The info-board for the Simpson Desert says you should have at least 250 l gas with you. Definitively nothing for us. The Big Red is orange & climbed on it the view isn´t that great either.The view on Birdsville though was impressive, though. DUST whining over the road, endlessly. 36 °C. We gotta refill the car – which means to get in row and wait, wait, wait. Not funny in this heat with the window nearly closed down. Outside it´s even more uncomfy, the dust finds ist way in the smallest gap, you run around half-blind. For sure I don´t wanna live here!
So we went on to the Birdsville-Track direction Maree . Through wind & dust. You could hardly see the racetrack! Highest temp today 44 °C! Even though we have the windows slightly open – the wind comes in like from a hair-dryer so warm. The dust is just everywhere, on the skin, on the clothing. Thw wind teasrs at the roof-construction, the sky is rather brown than blue and below this the endless plain. And the heat!
We found a nice but windy place to stay. Full of annoying, agonizing, excruciating, nagging, pestering blowies, it´s pest!
It´s cooling down, Ingo is wearing a sweater, whilst I still sit in a T-Shirt and have goose-bumps - 27 °C – that´s some 17 °C colder that at daytime!
Ingo is a good boy, he washed his hands – you see the difference between clean/dusty clearly (if digital cams had been payable those days....) – well, tomorrow we gonna have a shower!
*** Disclaimer: Those days Britz-drivers were horrible drivers. They did seemingly everything wrong that you possibly can do wrong. Like parking on disabled parkings or picking wildflowers although they just passed the sign "Please don´t pick wildflowers". I do hope everything is better today and yes, it was not only Britz, also Hertz & Co. Guess many of those guys were german people as well. Not used to right-hand-driving was just one of many reasons for this behavior.
