Having now finished our time at the Mungerannie Hotel and looking back at the three weeks that flew by, both of us have realised how much we have taken from that place and all of those quirky little moments that we will treasure for many years to come.
We were invited to join a tour group to journey out to a 1 million acre conservation area just 50kms down the road. The tour group had an average age of about 72 with the oldest person there being 97 years old so as you can imagine, we felt slightly out of the loop.
Warburton Creek, very full thanks to the Diamantina River...
The poo outside his burrow is apparently a means of impressing
the ladies during mating season (hmm)
the ladies during mating season (hmm)
During our short stay, we met and shared similar stories with so many of our fellow travellers. I recall one night, we had a large group of 35 cyclists staying (yes there are cyclists on the Birdsville track who cycle the 2130 kms from the Spencer Gulf to the Gulf of Carpentaria in 30days, crazy fools!!) Anyhow, on the final night of their stay, Tom came rushing into the kitchen and began ushering me away from the dirty dishes and nudged me out towards the bar with him.
There we were met by one crazy fool yielding a camera who told us both that after having met us and having heard about our journey around Australia, we had become part of his memory of the Mungerannie Pub and he wanted to capture the two of us together standing in front of ‘our’ bar. As I made some pathetic attempt to wipe away the red wine stain that ruined by singlet just minutes beforehand and then desperately tried to ruffle up my hair as if to make it look as those I spent 20 minutes infront of the mirror trying to get that messy look, I realised that to him, we belonged there. When he thinks of that funny little pub in the middle of bloody nowhere during the bike journey that nearly killed him, he’ll think of us. Tom and I were just so overwhelmed, as we stood there posing for our happy snap, when another 5 or 6 of them came along with their credit card sized compact cameras, snapping shots of us standing awkwardly by our bar.
For the first time in over six months, we belonged somewhere and it was so welcoming that it started to feel like home.
There we were met by one crazy fool yielding a camera who told us both that after having met us and having heard about our journey around Australia, we had become part of his memory of the Mungerannie Pub and he wanted to capture the two of us together standing in front of ‘our’ bar. As I made some pathetic attempt to wipe away the red wine stain that ruined by singlet just minutes beforehand and then desperately tried to ruffle up my hair as if to make it look as those I spent 20 minutes infront of the mirror trying to get that messy look, I realised that to him, we belonged there. When he thinks of that funny little pub in the middle of bloody nowhere during the bike journey that nearly killed him, he’ll think of us. Tom and I were just so overwhelmed, as we stood there posing for our happy snap, when another 5 or 6 of them came along with their credit card sized compact cameras, snapping shots of us standing awkwardly by our bar.
For the first time in over six months, we belonged somewhere and it was so welcoming that it started to feel like home.
Saying goodbye to Pam and Phil on that final day was as if we were being sent off to our first day at school and saying goodbye to Mum and Dad. To have found work in such a remote location, and to have been so incredibly well looked after by two of the awesomest (that is now a word) people has just put such a fantastic touch onto one of the greatest adventures of our lifetime.
Tommy was getting arty farty with the camera, this fence surrounds an empty yard that is apparently heritage listed as it used to be the Mungerannie Police Station.
Because it's heritage listed, Pam & Phil can't do any work on it, not even level the ground.
The Shed, where men become boys.
Our punctured tyre awaiting its repair...
It should be noted also, that the Mungerannie Hotel does in fact receive an outstanding number of compliments about their hospitality, service and food. (And I’m not just saying that because I’m bias). Even to a point where last month’s edition of a Caravan & Camping magazine did a write up on the track and mentioned the Mungerannie Hotel as serving “without a doubt the best sandwiches and burgers in the whole universe”. That’s exactly why we had to put our health regime on hold, how could we possibly pass up the opportunity to feast on the best burgers in the whole universe?!
Tom celebrated his 24th birthday while we were at Mungerannie. Somehow, he didn't click when I mysteriously just felt like baking a cake the day beforehand. And then, Pam and I had prearranged for her to come and steal me away from cleaning the toilets so we could rush back and decorate the dining room with balloons and streamers while I left the birthday boy there to continue scrubbing the porcelain bowls.Pam and Phil very generously gave Tom a Mungerannie work shirt which I'm sure he'll get alot of wear out of. As we had agreed not to buy any presents for each other on the road, I have given Tom and IOU for a Driza Bone when we finish the trip. Once the four of us had devoured the cake, it was back to cleaning toilets. Quite the birthday really.
After we said our goodbyes and drove back down the road travelled almost 3 weeks prior, we felt a very familiar feeling. The same feeling we had when we drove off from 20 of our friends waving us goodbye at Mt Coot-tha in Brisbane the very first day of our trip. The same feeling we had as we farewelled my two little nephews during our fly in fly out visit back to Brisbane. The same feeling we had as we drove away from spending a week with my Uncle in Canberra and my other Uncle in Adelaide. We felt lost. We knew what it was like to get back on the road, god knows we’ve done a lot of it already but we realised that no longer belonged anywhere.
We were on the road again.
90kms down the road heading towards Marree, just as I broke out the Camps 5 Australia book and began scheduling in our proposed campsites for the next few days, we heard a concerning sound that was far too familiar for my liking. This time, we had a flat on the rear right tyre and she was deflating at a much faster pace. So once again, I resumed my position as photographer as muscle man Tom set about changing over to the spare. The issue was – we were still 115kms from Marree and we only had one spare (which might I add was a spare that we really didn’t like the look of and had barely ever used before thanks to its dodgy home repair job and irregular shape). So, we journeyed on at a very slow and steady pace with all of our fingers and toes crossed very tight.Thankfully, we made it to Marree and set up camp for a night for free at the local pub. It literally was a patch of dirt but it was free and we were able to be safely tucked ourselves away in the Troopie that night, ready to get the tyre fixed first thing the next morning. Crisis averted, for now.
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