Coober Pedy to Alice Springs

The next stop along the way after we left Coober Pedy was an overnight at Marla South Free Camping area - which is, well, south of Marla by about 35 km. Good spot, but no facilities, which is ok because Marla, the last “town” in South Australia is essentially a Roadhouse - and it has  ........a Telstra 3G tower - whoopee - so I was able to communicate with the outside world after all that worry about not having internet access, TV and all the usual conveniences of life, the most essential of which is, at 9.30am in the morning after breakfast - a toilet. What a relief ! We then stopped at the Northern Territory (NT) border and had a look at the information bay there., It’s very well done and gives a good history of the main explorers and a geological explanation of the NT landscape. 

The Northern Territory was, by Government decree, designated as the” Northern Territory of South Australia” and placed under South Australian Government administration in 1863. In 1908, the South Australian Parliament and the Commonwealth Parliament passed respective acts that surrendered the Northern Territory of South Australia to the Commonwealth, in which the Commonwealth was to be henceforth responsible for future administration, which remains the case today. The agreed northern most State/Territory border was set at the 26th parallel (that would be latitude 26 degrees south) whilst still retaining the previously agreed Longitudes that border the current western side of Queensland and eastern side of Western Australia. From what I remember from the last trip, moves are/were afoot for there to be a vote by Territorians on whether they wanted full State status.  Haven’t heard or read of anything since then so maybe it was just idle chatter, although I think was a vote many years ago, and it was defeated.

The Kulgera Pub Emblem

Stopped at the Kulgera pub - I like this pub. It’s about 30 km inside the NT and touts itself as the first and last pub in the NT, depending on which direction you’re headed. It has a great advertising symbol which is immediate recognisable - it’s a bloke with an Akubra (I assume) leaning against a wall, and a cattle dog standing next to him. Yellow background, black figures - brilliant encapsulation of what the NT is about, and you see plenty of these characters about along the way.

Brahman Cattle with the distinctive hump on the spine

Whilst having a beer (a must-do at the Kulgera Pub), got talking to a local, who was a roustabout on the local cattle station. He’d been working as a general Station hand since he was 15 and he’s now 18. Can’t handle the big cities - he’d been to Melbourne once and found it too hectic - but then when you look at the environment he works in, which is literally just wide open country with the odd rocky outcrop and mesa, a city would feel claustrophobic and threatening. Anyway, we got talking about the ban on live cattle exports in 2011 - a favourite topic throughout the entire Territory and the northern parts of Western Australia - and he said many of the Station owners have now gone over to Black Angus cattle because when the ban hit and they couldn’t export their Brahman cattle, which are the preferred cattle for the Indonesian meat market, those Stations with Black Angus weren’t affected as they were still able to sell them to the southern and eastern Australian markets. And given that the numbers of live export cattle to Indonesia have been reduced significantly by an Indonesian Government quota cut, it makes even more sense to change over. Apparently the Angus is also lot easier to handle, tending to be more placid.  And they also appear to be a bit sniffy on the social side as well, not mixing with the other breeds - a sort of social elite if you will. So the next time you bite into that Angus beef hamburger, just remember that you're dining on the social elite of the bovine community.

The Olgas - from about 1 km

We then drove to Curtain Springs Station, which is a couple hundred km along the Lasseter Highway, which takes you to Uluru. Stopped overnight at another free camp there and then headed into Yulara, which is the main resort area outside the park area that contains both Uluru (aka Ayers Rock) and Kata-Tjuta (aka the Olgas). Decided to head for the Olgas because I’d forgotten the bike helmets - bugger. Walked along the Walpa Gorge which is only about a km in length - beautiful scenery with massive towering red coloured rock on either side. 

The Olgas - from Within

The “rock” is actually a conglomerate of various rock types including gravel, pebbles and boulders cemented together by sand and mud. Uluru on the other hand is a sedimentary rock of sandstone containing the mineral Feldspar. The red colour you get with Uluru is from weathering of the iron minerals in the sandstone by water and oxygen, which gives a similar appearance to rust. Also, there are no visible seams or fractures in Uluru making it one huge monolithic structure. 

For those who like numbers;

Kata Tjuta (Olgas) maximum peak is 546 metres above the surrounding plains, and 1066 metres above sea level.

Uluru (Ayers Rock) is 348 metres above the surrounding plains, and 863 metres above sea level. Uluru is 9.4 km around the immediate base.

Temperature extremes for the park are; Up to 47C during summer and down to -7C during winter at night and average annual rainfall is around 310 mm.

So for the statistically anal, there we have it.

It is difficult to take photographs of the Olgas that do them justice (ie I'm making excuses for my photography). There are 36 domes that make up the Olgas, and the best way to see them is to take the 7 km walk along the "Valley of the Winds"  (their description, not mine)  where you wind through several of these domes and see such magnificent scenery that it is awe inspiring. Nature has been kind to us and left both the Olgas and Uluru as a reminder of what this landscape once looked like. Both these edifices are the last remaining remnants of other such structures that existed millions of years ago and that have now been eroded and worn down by the prevailing weather and the inland sea that once inhabited the entire central parts of Australia. Scientists believe that other surrounding mountains must have had flaws or other features that made them prone to erosion and breakup, leaving both the Olgas and Uluru as the last remaining features.

The Curtain Springs Ablution Block - quaint

Stopped a couple more nights at Curtain Springs Station - and I must say, my impressions last time were not all that great. Having stayed there this time, I humbly beg forgiveness for any I may have offended in offering anything other than a good opinion of the place. Curtain Springs Station is an operating cattle station about 160 km direct west of the Stuart Highway. It offers free overnight camping with access to toilets and you can have a shower for $3 - and it’s based on the honour system. In the morning, a bloke (or blokess) on a quad bike goes round the camp area and collects the garbage from the garbage bins - and this is all for free - except for the shower of course. Now this is quite a remarkable thing in this day and age because in a lot of places your eyes are watering because of the increased cost of things up this way - or should I say, the increase in what is charged for things. So if anyone is heading up this way, thoroughly recommend a stay at Curtain Springs Station. 

Meet Mongrel - Curtain Springs Station Mascot

An added attraction is the tame Station Emu - goes by the name of Mongrel. He's anything but, just an inquisitive bloke that likes people, but I don't think I'd want to cross him. I believe Emu's have a blistering kick. And finally, speaking of all things feathered, you even have a rooster that wakes you up in the morning (or is that just Mongrel multi-tasking ?) - a wonderful sound, long lost to the cities where some grumpy people have had enacted local council laws banning the crowing of a rooster at dawn, because they take umbrage at any sound louder than an ant breaking wind at 4am. How sad we city people have become when we accept this kind of thing.

Uluru - Partial

During the days in between the nights at Curtain Springs, we walked through parts of the Olgas (Kata Tjuta) - refer above - and cycled around Uluru (Ayers Rock). I’m still amazed at the size of this thing and the fact it’s one huge amorphous rock, with most of it underground, like an iceberg. People still clamber up to the top, regardless of the signage at the beginning of the climb making it clear that the traditional owners  “don’t want you to climb”. But off they go, totally oblivious. To the point that while I was rummaging through a pile of beer stubby holders in the Aborigine Cultural Centre (looking for one holding a cold beer .....), this bloke was doing the same. And he was getting all sweaty because all he could find were holders that said “I didn’t climb Uluru” - he wanted one that said - “I climbed Uluru”. 

Uluru - taken from the base walk

Now, it was difficult but I held my tongue, not wishing to make him look like a complete tosser, and besides, he was bigger than me.  But to me this said it all. He obviously either couldn’t read the signs because the font was too small (and it’s not) or he’s a knuckle-dragger. And there are many like him. They were like ants climbing a giant pebble - a strung-out line of little dark and constantly shuffling figures, stretching from the base to the top. And watching it all through binoculars was an Aboriginal park ranger - and he couldn’t do a thing about it. He quite literally sighed, got back in his Hi-Lux and just drove off. I asked one of the ladies at the cultural centre why they haven’t legislated no climbing and she says they hope to have that completed by 2020 - why so long ?. Because, many people from overseas come to Uluru specifically to climb it and it’ll take that long to re-cast the rock as a sacred place and educate people that they just can’t do that anymore. There are, therefore,  not insignificant tourism considerations that need to be thought through. 

Now, this is where we need John Jarrett (Wolfe Creek) and his sniper expertise .....

Note:  When you next take a holiday overseas, start climbing (externally) some locally sacred icon, such as the Taj Mahal if in India or the Vatican if in Rome. When questioned, just simply grunt, point to your grazed knuckles (do that before you start the climb) and that should be defence enough. Certainly is here.

The next destination on our trip was Alice Springs, so off we went, heading toward Erldunda, which is the junction with the Stuart Highway and the Lasseter highway which got us to Uluru etc in the first place. Part way along, we came upon a car with the hood up. So we stopped and it turned out be an Aboriginal couple with the wife sitting in the shade while hubby seemingly just wandering around the vehicle looking busy - doing what, not sure.  After a bit of hand waving (on his part) and latent comprehension (on our’s), we finally managed to understand that they'd run out of petrol and had spent the night there. Now I’m not surprised because, he wasn’t doing anything to wave down traffic, other than raise the hood of his car - but then, anyone in these parts who has the hood of his/her car up isn’t doing it for the shade. Long short, we donated a few litres after it transpired that they lived in an Aboriginal community not 10 km down the road. Now Mrs Shade lady got behind the wheel straight off so we knew right away who ruled that particular humpy, and we figured hubby was gonna hear about it once we got out of ear shot - if he hadn't already. So we did our good deed for the day, felt like heroes for a short time - and then it all went away about 5 km down the road, lost to the interminable short term memory departure that afflicts people of our age.

Pulled in to Alice Springs (Friday April 26th) about mid afternoon and headed for the MacDonnell Range caravan park. Very clean park, off the main highway before you get anywhere near town. So we’re here for 8 nights and will start to explore the many delights that Alice Springs and surrounds have to offer.

Port Augusta to Coober Pedy

So we headed out from Port Augusta and stopped over at the Pimba free overnight camping area. This is adjacent to “Spud's Roadhouse” at the turnoff from the Stuart Highway where you head toward Woomera. 

German Travellers at Spud's Roadhouse - Pimba SA

The morning after the overnight, we were having a quiet coffee at Spuds when this Toyota Landcruiser pulled in. Nothing abnormal about that - except that this one had destinations visited that included North Africa, Asia, South America and now Australia. I get very interested in people who do such interesting things so I got talking to both of them - and these people were absolutely wonderful. 

They are from Germany - as you could have guessed given the German flag flying below the Australia flag in the photo - diplomatically correct  - and they have been traveling for 14 years - yes 14 ! They were (are) as brown as the land around them and the car has done over 400,000 km to date - and they’re not yet finished. They don’t stay in caravan parks but overnight wherever is suits them. If they’re near larger cities, they travel further into the surrounding scrub and set up camp just to make sure any unwanted visitors don’t appear. They were particularly careful in North Africa. The huge front “bumper” bar you see in the photo holds water for showers and the like, they have solar panels on the top of the vehicle for power, tracks on the side of car for getting out of sand bogs and on it goes. In short, they are totally self sufficient for camping offroad - anywhere - and they’ve done it all. They are heading for Melbourne where they have friends in Fawlkner and will then finish the Australian leg in Sydney, where they’ll fly back to germany and have the car sea-freighted back to their home, which is about 60 km north of Hamburg - 45 days to do this they tell me. Then, back in the car and off to see Europe for who knows how long. The spirit that inhabits these two people is awe-inspiring. I can’t begin to imagine what they’ve seen and experienced over this time. Going up the centre of Australia now seems very mundane indeed .....

Andamooka - the camera does not lie

Took another visit to Andamooka, which is about 115 km northeast of Spuds. This is my second visit and I’m still gobsmacked how anyone could spend years in the place. It’s like a junkyard on steroids surrounded by a bunch of giant anthills, the latter being the results of many years of backbreaking Opal mining for probably not much reward. The quality of the Opals from Andamooka are apparently better than those mined at Coober Pedy - a rare admission from a Coober Pedy miner I spoke to on the last trip - but not as good as those mined at Lightning Ridge in NSW, where they find the more sought after, and therefore more expensive, black Opal - that was his rider so he didn’t give it all away ... 

An old blower for extracting rock and dust

According to the blurb, 90% of the worlds opals come from Coober Pedy, Andamooka and Mintabie, which is west of Marla, the last main “town” in SA before you hit the Northern Territory Border. So South Australia has a strangle-hold on the supply of opals to the world. 

Ikara - Developed by GAF

Another visit to Woomera Historic Museum is in order for anyone who’s interested in the history of the rocket and guided weapons programs that existed in this country until the short-sightedness of our politicians and nitwit Military “leaders” brought it to a close (here’s whinge No 1 coming up) . To paraphrase Marlon Brando, .... "I (we) coulda been a contenda” in the international Aerospace industry if only we’d done what other countries do  when they have a niche technical expertise; ie provide an environment for it to grow.  Australia had world leading technical excellence in areas such as guided weapons, unmanned and remotely piloted vehicles and even small utility sized fixed wing commercial aeroplanes. We had much of that expertise back in the 1950’s through to the early-mid 1970’s, and then it came crashing down thanks in big part to our military - specifically the RAAF. This is whole story in itself ... suffice to say, I’ve been fortunate in having worked on some of the projects exhibited at this Museum - and I’ll leave it at that.

On the trip north to Coober Pedy - our next stop (Saturday April 20th) - we had a humungus head wind. On a normal trip with the caravan, I get around 14 litres/100 km, but on this, it was up to 18.5. So the hairs were standing on end about whether we’d get to Coober Pedy without having to use up the 20 litres of diesel I carry as a back up. Well, we got to our overnighting stop which was about 10 km shy of Coober Pedy after some raised level (read hysterical) discussions along the lines “OMG, we’re gonna run out of fuel and we’ll be all alone and John Jarrett (Wolfe Creek) will appear from nowhere and ..... “. A few slaps to the face (each slapping the other) and we calmed down as our destination came in to sight. The night was (quite literally) dark and stormy - try as black outside as 11.59pm (ie not quite black black) - with lightning off in the distance (perfect Wolfe Creek stuff). Anyway, if the blackness didn’t carry you away in your mind, the flies did physically. Couldn’t believe so many flies existed in one spot. Little things, just the right size to crawl in to any exposed cavity you might like to leave uncovered. Fortunately, we bought Mozzie/fly netting for our hats at Port Augusta so we both wandered around outside the caravan like a couple of bee-keepers. Not quite sure what the passing travelers must have thought - Bryan: “Look Joycie, a coupla Apiarists over there ...” ; Joycie: - “ WTF ? ...”.

Just as a footnote to this day of excitement, when we filled the fuel tank next day, it took 71.8 litres. The tank holds 75 litres. Do the math and you can see why the hysteria at the time. 

Next day (Sunday April 21) we headed into Coober Pedy, parked the van at the Information place (with their permission) and then headed in to see the local sites. From my last visit, all seemed very familiar indeed - even down to the bloke standing in the same location at the only roundabout in the main street - dead ringer for the guy who was there in 2011 - I’m sure of it. We went to the usual touristy places and then swung by the cemetery, just to check any recent arrivals since the last visit 2 years previous. Yep, about 10 more. And the beauty is that they’ve retained the same tradition of erecting just a simple white cross with the name of the deceased person, the year of their birth and the year of their expiry. The beauty is in the simplicity - sure there are some grave sites that are way more ornate, but they’re in the minority. I don’t normally like walking through cemeteries because they wreak of mortality - and that’s something I don’t believe in ...

Main Alter room - Serbian Church

A visit to the Serbian Church was a must. Although I visited last time, I couldn’t resist the urge to go again. TJ like me, was blown away with the ornate nature of the place. The church, like many places in Coober Pedy, is bored into the side of a plateau which is comprised of highly compressed sandstone. They use boring machines these days to make tunneling simple instead of the pick and shovel, and the interesting thing about sandstone is that it is quite safe to tunnel without the usual shoring type timbers used in mines dug in soils. Such is the constituency of highly compressed sandstone that it provides a naturally structural material capable of supporting itself even with quite large horizontal tunnels, although they do leave the occasional support pillar. The best example of this type of tunneling is the Serbian Church underground structure - refer attached photo. The sandstone carvings in this church are brilliant. They are carved into the naturally occurring sandstone and the level of detail is extraordinary. The Serbian congregation is obviously comprised of some very talented artisans. And unlike the other Christian churches which are located within the main township, the Serbian church is located outside town, close to some of the opal mine digs.

Old Timers Mine - Coober Pedy

If you go to Coober Pedy, you’ve got to go to the Old Timers Mine and Museum. Yes, it’s touristy, but the Museum is just an add-on to what was an existing mine started in 1918. And the sad irony of this is that the miners that started this mine in 1918 missed opal seems by literally inches. When they used machinery to open up the front of the mine for the entrance and museum area during the 1980’s, they struck opal seams only inches away from the original mine diggings that would have netted the early miners a fortune in their day - one seam was valued at between $20,000 and $40,000 in 1980 - and the original miners were a mere 10” away from it .... Fortunately, the original miners are long gone, otherwise they’d be crying in their sand infested beer.

Coober Pedy

So Coober Pedy started to die a few decades ago as did the opal mining business in general. The cost of mining started to go up and the price of opals started to go down. There was, however, a resurgence with the introduction of open cut mining where excavators were used to open up prospective mines, but the cost of diesel fuel started to rise, so down it went again. Then in 2005, about 65 km south of Coober Pedy, there was a huge opal strike again - one opal segment weighed over 5 kg - so the run started again, albeit slowly. Today, we saw maybe 10 or so mines north of Coober Pedy that are still being actively mined but you need to have one tough constitution to be in this game. It’s hot, dusty and frustrating work. You also need some fairly heavy machinery to make light work of it, so the odd $100 k is probably what you’d have to invest upfront - and then keep your fingers crossed.

The Breakaways

We also took a trip out along the road that takes you to the Breakout plateaus, about 30km out of Coober Pedy. Last time I did this on a paying mini-bus tour - but this time we took the car. A permit was required ($2.20 per person) and instead of roaring along at a hundred miles an hour and listening to a tour guide shouting out points of interest you could barely see because the windows were coated in red dust , the microphone was stuffed  “..only just happened this morning folks “ - yeah, right  - and the air-conditioner was “down on performance” ie it was useless -  this time we took a leisurely cruise through a very interesting weathered landscape rich in earthy colours and offering a cacophony of various shaped mounds, mini plateaus and what could pass for sand dunes, not because they were made of sand, but because of the way they blended into one another, just like a desert scene from some Hollywood movie. Half expected Lawrence to appear astride Harry the camel. 

Breakaways

Breakaways

Yep - it's a Fence - a Dog Fence

The road then took as parallel with the Dog Fence for a few kilometres. This particular fence was erected by the SA Government in order to protect the SE fertile crop areas from infestations of rabbits, Dingoes and other feral animals. and to keep the dingoes out of the southern Queensland sheep farming districts.  The fence actually comprises two quite separate fence systems that meet at Camerons Corner, the three-way junction of Qld, SA and NSW. The upper section that traverses east along part of the NSW/Qld border then extends up into southern Qld and helps protect the SE Qld farming districts from Dingoes. The souther section, which we saw, is solely within SA, extending from the cliffs of the Great Australian Bight, just west of the Eyre Peninsula in South Australia, up to Camerons Corner where it meets the Queensland “ Great Barrier Fence, and then down the border between NSW and SA. The fence has only been partially effective because sheep farmers still suffer losses of sheep from Dingo attacks.

Moama to Port Augusta

As with the last trip, the starting flag was waved at Moama in NSW, just across the border from Echuca on the Murray, and we set sail for Swanhill. We didn’t get away until quite late because TJ kept asking awkward questions about our traveling gear for which I didn’t have very good answers. So we messed about and sorted most of his problems (emphasis on his problems - not mine) , finally getting away around 4PM - a late start in anyones book.

We got to Swanhill and overnighted at Pental Island caravan park, which is off the main highway. Good quiet place to start the trip especially as we learned, on the day of our departure, that school holidays, although finished in Victoria - were just starting in Sth Australia. Gosh, how lucky are we ...? Sounding cynical I know, but then I’m getting old and that’s part of the job description they tell me ... the short of it was that there were no barking dogs and no kids being kids. Just us old people being - well, old and grumpy ....

The next day, we headed off to Port Augusta, stopping at Mildura for lunch. The drive through what was left of Victoria and then on into Sth Australia was uneventful. The car just chugs along without missing a beat - diesels don’t seem to struggle the same as ordinary combustion engines when pulling through the hills. The high torque at low revs is one of the reasons they are such a great tug.

Anyway, we made Port Augusta around 8.30pm after a very long day of driving. This will be, by far, the longest leg we do on the trip.

So if you’re traveling through South Australia you could be forgiven for ignoring those signs that say “Goyders Line” - sometimes with an arrow. I did on the first trip through these parts in 2011. But thanks to some friends of mine (thanks Ineke and Rod), I am now the wiser. In 1865, the South Australian Surveyor General George Woodroffe Goyder was asked to survey the northern areas of the state in order to define the southern most limit of the drought of 1864-65. In defining this limit, he established what is now called the “Goyder Line” which even to this day, defines the areas to the north of which there will be (in general) less than 300 mm of rain annually, which is considered insufficient to support farming. In the 1870’s, several years of good rains convinced some people to ignore Goyder’s advice and they commenced farming north of the line. In the 1880’s a series of dry years wiped them out. Who said old people are out of fashion !. I know these things because the older I got when my parents were alive, the more intelligent they (my parents) became (old joke rehashed) - funny ‘bout that ... One final point; the B64 in SA is the Goyder Highway.

Our stopover at Port Augusta is like a staging stop so that we can get ourselves organised for heading further north. You don’t have access to the same facilities as you do in a major city and you can expect to pay a premium - at times a considerable premium - for both food and fuel. For instance, my brother is currently ahead of us by some 10 days and he told me couple of days back that the cost of diesel at Kings Canyon is around $2.30 per litre. I can understand that because  throughout the wet season, these Roadhouse owners only get essential trucking through these areas and the cashflow must be something terrible during those times. So even though it hurts the wallet, what you’re really paying for is for some robust bloke/woman (and there are plenty robust women outback) to maintain a service all year round that would otherwise not allow rubbernecks like me and TJ to do what we’re doing. So we just suck it up and accept it - no point augueing otherwise that robust woman I referred to earlier will just give you a withering glare that'll send you slinking back to your car.

Back to Port Augusta: Port Augusta has a long and salubrious history. It was founded around 1852 by Alexander Elder. Because of its location at the head of Spencer Gulf, it became an important shipping port for wool in particular and was an active operational port up until the early 1970‘s. Wealthy pastoralist Sir Thomas Elder (after whom the current company Elders is named I suspect) was responsible for bringing the first camels and Cameleers to Australia in or around 1860 - although he was in fact pipped by John Horrocks who, in 1846 brought “Harry”, the first Camel, to Australia for the purpose of exploration. Sadly, whilst in the process of loading his gun to shoot a bird, John Horrocks was bumped by Harry who lurched sideways, causing Mr Horrocks to shoot himself instead. He died several days later, and it was his death wish that Harry be similarly removed from among the living, not out of revenge, but rather because of the potential for ill treatment from prejudices against camels existing at the time.  

The Cameleers who worked the camels were 
commonly referred to as Afghans, even though they came from both the northern parts of India (now known as Pakistan) and Afghanistan. Thomas Elders was aware of the efficiency of camels operating in arid areas through previous experience overseas and he established a camel stud at Beltana which provided camels for several of the great exploration undertakings in the state at the time. The efficiency with which the Cameleers and the camels worked gave them legendary status, to the point that the initial train service that ran between Port Augusta and Alice Springs in 1929 was referred to as the Ghan. During the building of the rail line throughout central Australia, the Afghan Cameleers and their camels were typically located at the rail head (furthest point of the rail line) to pick up the freight that came up from Adelaide and Port Augusta and take it to the final destination. The camel trains would also bring wool bales back to the rail head from the outlying sheep stations for transport back to Adelaide and Port Augusta. So, camels play an important part in opening up the interior of Australia to commerce and settlement. 

I’m sure Harry would have approved.

Today, the rail service now runs between Adelaide and Darwin with the northern most section only being completed in 2001. It still retains the Ghan branding but traverses a line that more closely tracks the Stuart Highway.  The old heritage line tracked via the Flinders Ranges to the east and then on up through Leigh Creek, Maree, Ooodnadatta and then Alice Springs.

Visited the Wadlata Outback Centre today (April 17). Anyone visiting Pt Augusta should pay a visit - it gives a good overview of what you can expect to see on your travels throughout South Australia and the outback regions. 

The adjacent photo shows one of the exhibitions in the centre - the seat you see in the foreground is part of the pedal radio designed and developed by Alfred Traeger in the late 1920’s. The radio is on the table and is powered by a generator which gets its power from the person pedalling. The microphone is in front of the radio and I can well imagine many a breathless conversation resulting more from  energetic pedalling than from exercise of another energetic kind ...... but at its origin, the pedal radio started out as a means of transmitting morse code. It was then developed into a radio system that culminated in the founding of the “School of the Air” for those in the outback that I remember reading about when I was a kid.... I just wasn't told about all that breathless exertion.

Traeger, in combination with the Rev John Flynn, was also instrumental in establishing the the predecessor to the current Royal Flying Doctor Service (RFDS), which operates throughout most of outback Australia. The RFDS has been responsible for saving many lives over many years and has achieved legendary status throughout the outback. It’s services are provided free of charge to whomever requires them - regardless of where the patient comes from - and survives only through limited Government financing, supplemented in the main by public fund raising. They are, in my humble opinion, an organisation worthy of support without reservation - this is not a paid advertisement, I just know a very worthy organisation when I see one. 

All along the major highways you will see designated aircraft landing areas on the road. This is preceded by a sign with the outline of an aeroplane in black. Some 100 metres on are the "piano keys" painted on the road, followed by a very straight stretch of road that culminates, after a couple of km, in another set of piano keys. At some point, there'll be a windsock and along the side of the road on both sides, the surrounding scrub is cleared. So if you're driving along any of these roads and you suddenly get a windscreen full of an aeroplane coming at you, that immediate urge to panic and swerve off the road is catered for by the absence of trees and other flora that may cause you to have a serious accident, which could have you too requiring the services of the RFDS. I think the whole thing is a well thought out strategy.