Road Trip - It Begins

The trip began from Ballarat at 9.30am on Thursday the 13th of December, just Steve and Charlie the dog, fortunately the girls decided to fly up to Brisbane. Travelling with a dog enclosed in a car is always a challenge but thankfully Charlie was in full retard mode (he doesn't cope well with change) and decided to sulk on the back seat of the Hilux.

First stop was bogan central - Shepparton Victoria, pulled in at SuperCheap to get some supplies to stop the tarp on the trailer flapping and flaying about and then grabbed a quick bite to eat. The less time spent there the better!

Next was a quick stop at Jerilderie to let the dog have a walk, what is it with country towns and redundant army/navy equipment?

In this photo a capable go anywhere, reliable and well armed vehicle, oh and a Leopard tank as well.

The drive then continued through the afternoon with little or nothing to speak of I was only interrupted by a couple of phone calls from the Solicitor to inform me of settlement issues, but more of that later!

The first fuel stop was Dubbo, I grabbed a bite to eat and added 100 litres of diesel. The generosity of strangers is a wonderful thing, a kind lady offered me a discount voucher at Shell and saved me $8 - bonus!

I was starting to feel a little drowsy by about 10.30pm, 40 or 50k out of Coonabarabran a couple of text messages from the Hereford Head kept me going and I continued on until the other side of town then stopped at a busy truck stop for a sleep. Two hours later I was rudely awoken by the sound of cattle stomping and banging in a cattle truck that had just arrived in the stop. Realising I would not get any further rest I walked the dog then prepared to continue on through the Pilliga towards Narrabri. As I departed the truckstop I noted that every other truck that had stopped had now departed, it seems no one can sleep in the same stop as a cattle truck!

It was a mind numbingly boring drive only briefly interrupted by infrequent stops to water and walk the dog. I was absolutely amazed by the number of trucks on the Newell Highway it was incredible, and don't they motor, if you went anything less than 105km/h they were all over your backside like a bad suit. In my tired stupor, I was continuously reminded of a song as each truck in a never ending procession went past me - and I am sure I was not the only one singing the song that night.

The drive through the Pilliga was a shocker, the sheer number of Kangaroos on the road was frightening, it was a very slow part of the trip. I was also aware of a story of the Pilliga Princess, and the thought of meeting Clare Wibson along the way was one I wanted to avoid. Many stories of Pilliga Princess can be found on the web.

I had prepared a couple of MP3 CDs for the trip and one song played at a rather appropriate time and I can all you Springsteen fans that your  eyes get pitchy in the wee wee hours! On a long flat straight stretch of road out of Narrabri I took this photo, at the time it looked perfectly clear, only after resting my eyes completely did I see just how blurry the photo was.

A blurry shot of some boring road north of Bellata

I stopped shortly after this photo just north of Gondiwindi, grabbed a little more sleep then decided to finish off the last stretch to Brisbane. I felt like I was finishing down hill with a tail wind and a wet sail. The sense of euphoria that the journey was nearly over was smashed flat by a simple phone call.