5 - Australia

     We moved on up to Bundaburg and found a nice little inexpensive motel. This was at the southern end of the Great Barrier Reef. We booked a snorkeling trip, but since the weekend was coming up, we had to wait there three days. We were determined to see this. We made the most of it, and took several shorter sightseeing trips. On one of these, we saw an animal in the distance that was as big as a cow, but was something else. When we finally found a way to drive up close to it, it was a giant red kangaroo. When it stood up and looked at us, it looked seven feet tall!

     When Monday finally rolled around, we drove to the town of Seventeen Seventy. It was named after the year Captain Cook explored that coast..

 We got in a very fast jet boat, and we tourists sat down in the middle area, unable to see out. It was a very rough ride, and the people sitting on both sides of us, and in front and back, and many others, threw up. We did not. I guess you could say we were lucky, somewhat. We didn't produce any of it, but we caught some of our neighbor's produce. It saturated the air. We felt like galley slaves of old.

      After two hours, we reached the reef. We stopped at the Lady Musgrave Island, several acres. There was absolutely no soil there. It was formed by a few trees growing up, with nodding terns visiting and nesting there. The trees, at times, secreted a sticky substance, trapping many birds. The Island had grown up from bird waste, rotting trees, and decaying bird bodies.

     We ran into a woman who was stranded there, and had been for days.  A boat had dropped her off, and just did not come back to pick her up. She begged for a ride. The last time I saw her, she was still begging the captain.

     We moved into the beautiful blue lagoon to snorkel. Barbara was a marginal swimmer, she was sucking in a lot of salt water, and I swam over to her and told her I was just barely holding my own, and not to count on me to be able to save her if she got into trouble. She finally went back to the boat and requested a life jacket. We had a fun day, and saw many kinds of colorful fish and coral.

     The ride back was long, but not quite as rough, and besides, we were all too tired to mess with throwing up by then.  On the way back to the motel, after dark, we learned that the kangaroo, unlike our deer, just felt it was their obligation to jump out in front of us if we came anywhere close. We slowed down.

     We headed inland the next morning for the Outback. When we arrived in the edge of it, people were very excited. No, not to see us, but because it rained the night before. Their first significant rain in three years.

     As we parked in a small village, we were amazed by the car next to us. It was a very long, very old station wagon. It had gas cans hanging all over it, filled with bedding and supplies, clotheslines stretching across it. The tag said, “Outback Australia.” We thought at first we were in a movie set. Anyway, we just had to wait until the owner got back, and get a look at him. When he arrived, he looked the part. Trips are just more interesting, with Barbara and her Dunnahoe nerve. We soon knew his life history. He was European, and he first came to the Outback years ago. He got on the dole, and lived on it, wandering about. He had come to this village, hoping to be able to get government money closer to civilization. He could not, so the last we saw of him, he had filled up his gas tank, all of his jugs, and was heading out toward Alice Springs, where there was almost no grass or trees, where the living was easy, on the dole. Australia has virtually no homeless. Anyone could get on the dole. And, we were told, if homeless people acted crazy, they were treated like they were, and put away.

     We headed on south, along the edge of the hard outback, to Charleyville. Along the way, we saw lots of Emus, goats, many birds and kangaroos, and bottle trees. Shaped like a bottle.

      The school district there, we found out, was the size of Texas. With thirty some-odd students. School was conducted by radio.

     We passed by a telephone booth, very rare in the outback. Then we went back and tried to call the kids. Luckily, Barbara caught both of them at the same place, and everyone was happy. My happiness faded as I felt a big something crawling on my face. It was a very big spider. I brushed it off. Now, I know our poisonous American spiders, but I don't know Australian spiders. I did know they had some that would kill you dead as a doornail. I noticed the phone booth we were in was full of spiderwebs. I told Barbara to hang up, we had to get out of there. Neither she nor the kids would hear of it, we had  never talked with both of our kids at the same time before. Finally I just dragged  her out. She was mad, but settled down when I told her about the spider.

     I counted 103 Kangaroo bodies in a ten kilometer stretch, lying along the road. As I said before, they just felt obligated to jump out in front of a car, and most people who lived there had bars on the front of their car to prevent damage. Also, Australia, where so many different animals live, had no buzzards or other carrion eaters. Plus, that part of Australia was extremely dry. The bodies just pile up and stay there forever, it seemed.