Day 84 Jundah, Windorah

 Today has been a pretty cruisy and relaxed day. I am writing this as I sit by Cooper’s Creek, just outside of Windorah. The wind is blowing gently through the trees, trees that still show signs of the immense amounts of water that flowed through here, only a couple of months ago. Budgies flit and fly about, chirping and chattering to each other; whilst whistling Kites float in the thermal air flows above, occasionally whistling as they do. The creek water is flowing steadily and has apparently returned to its normal levels. Matt may drop in a line to see if he can grab a catch, or not. A pelican flies and lands with a splash as the momentum of flying perpetuates the Pelican, until the water slows it down, and then it paddles away.

Today was a chilly start in Longreach, and the warmer clothes have been pulled out from the  back of our drawers, dusted off and worn. We headed out and watched the scenery change to flat plains with golden dry grasses and a scattering of trees amongst the paddocks. There was the occasional burst of bright colours, as the wildflowers are appearing. In places you could see new fencing had been installed and the road had been patched up from the flood damage. Some fences had debris caught up in them, revealing how high the water reached. We climbed up a few ‘jump ups’ as they are referred to out here, in other words, a small, rocky mountain range. Up here you could see everything, it was a great place to appreciate the vastness of the area, especially if you had your glasses on (getting old😜) to see that far! We stopped for lunch by the Thomson River at Jundah, after a brief drive around town (didn’t take long, it’s not very big). Matt spied some budgies and we were finally able to film and photograph the tiny little colourful birds, so we can share with our niece who loves Budgies. Matt was also having a go at trying to photograph the whistling Kites, soaring above in circles, occasionally swooping down to the river. fun fact, this council area , the Barcoo shire, covers 61,974 square kilometres and has a population of 462. Today was about 320km of single lane bitumen road. The etiquette for the single lane is as follows.. if you’re bigger you get to stay on the road, caravans and cars have to move onto the dirt verge to let the large vehicles pass on the bitumen without throwing rocks. So usually I get to stay on the hard stuff but there are still plenty of road trains and large trucks on the road that I have to make way for ( in the video )

We are in the thick of the channel country now, and the channels are as green as they get due to the recent floods. Seeing the country at its best . 

We ventured on to Windorah and stopped in at the Visitors information Centre and checked out a couple of sites they had with museum displays. There was an old slab hut set up with items that would have been in there for a family living in it, back in its day. Matt found an old Austin A30, in mint condition, (more original than mint, it was rough but original)
no rust and original very old Queensland number plates. He reckons it never left town after being registered. On another site, was an old Cessna plane that had belonged to a member of the community that had used it for anything from rounding up cattle on properties to rescuing people in floods, or taking people to access urgent medical care. We did the obligatory lap around town and headed back out to where we have camped up for the night. Our big adventure is quickly disappearing, and I wonder how well we will readjust to normal life and work, after all this freedom to explore and relax and enjoy our beautiful country.

Day 83 QANTAS Founder Museum, Stockman’s Hall of Fame

 We got another sleep in, which was nice. We headed into town to do some groceries and a quick look at the op shop. We went out to the airport, and on the way Matt spied a tour coach with one of his former Coach Drivers driving it. Of all the places to run into someone you know! You could find the museum easily, someone parked a dirty big 747 out the front 😜. We headed into the museum and this time we happily accepted the mistaken seniors identity and took the cheaper price, so we could have more access and it meant seeing the big planes. There was an art exhibition on display there as well. The museum was very busy and could have done with more space, so people could walk around the displays more easily. I say this because at one of the visual displays, a screen on the wall playing a story, there were 2 seats right in front of the screen about 1m away from the screen on the wall, and the sound was directed so that you could only really hear it if you sat in those seats. So we sat in the seats and were watching the story being told, when a few seniors from a tour group started to walk past in front of us, that was until one lady, totally oblivious to us sitting in the seats and watching the screen, stood right in front of us and watched the screen, of course totally blocking our view. She stood there for a good couple of minutes, before walking away. Some people are really in their own little world and unaware of their surroundings. The story boards told of how the founders of Qantas came together after fighting in WW1 and the journey it was to get support and sponsors to make it all happen, yet alone buy planes suitable. There was a few replica items in the showroom, including a replica model of the first plane they flew, there were plane engines and a Model T Ford made as a replica for the one the founders had used to get around the top end of NT and QLD to mark out places for runways for an airplane race that was going to happen. They had barbie dolls dressed up in all the uniforms that staff had worn over the decades, depicting the fashion changes and colour choices. There was a joystick simulation to control a plane and for the kids to climb in and try to fly too. We then had the tour out to the planes in the original hangar and also outside under an awning. The oldest planes were in the hangar and outside were all the big ones, including the last remaining 747-200 jumbo jet in Australia. One thing our guide pointed out, which confirmed my suspicions about the claim to where and how Qantas began, yes there is indeed rivalry between Winton and Longreach on that.  ( the guides account is that the first meeting for Qantas was in Winton, and at that meeting they decided to move to longreach from that point)  We got to see the DC-3 which was Matt’s favourite due to the classic shape, a Catalina sea plane, a Constellation plane, which we got to walk through, a 707 that was once used by the Jackson 5 and was fitted out for the use of the rich and famous. John Travolta had flown this one apparently, and we got to walk through and see how the rich fly around in opulent luxury, and the main ticket item was the last 747-200 that was used to bring home those in the Bali bombings. We also got to walk through this and climb the stairs to the premium lounge, where the suite had been originally fitted out in ‘70’s and ‘80’s bright and gawdy colours and wood paneling. It was all very interesting and our guide was lots of fun. We could tell he wasn’t a QLDer as he spoke too fast😂! 

After lunch we headed across the road to the Stockman’s Hall of Fame. This was another fascinating museum full of history about droving in Australia, surviving the outback, the cameliers who brought goods to sell to the remote properties, and the hard slog it was to travel and survive our harsh weather and country in remote areas, so we can have wool and meat and food. You were given a headset to listen to as you walked along, and you could listen to some personal recounts of stories and adventures. They had a guy showing you how to make a whip, a display on the Royal Flying Doctors, and another on rodeos and country singers. Our brains were exploding by the end of it all. Just realised that I only took one photo in the Stockman’s hall of fame. Proof that guys can only do one thing at a time and cause I had headphones on, that one thing was listening.  There were a lot of words.  

We headed back to our camp site to rest our brains for the rest of the afternoon and evening.

Super constellation walkthrough. 

Boeing 707 luxury plane walkthrough.