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Oct 29
Saturday

Adelaide-Broken Hill

Internet access may be all over the place these days, but you still have to be in the right place at the right time. Even Adelaide couldn't help when we arrived after 11pm and were away again by 8 the next morning.

It is raining again—hard. The first order of business today is a bus out to the airport to pick up the final hire car. Actually the first order of business is for Wayne to go birding, and for me to try once again to download the camera chips onto CD. I've been told that the place I used last time opens at 6am, and I'm there soon after that. Sure, they open at 6:00am, but the Internet/camera stuff can't open until the 9:00am guy shows up. I run back to the hotel, but miss Wayne by 10 minutes.

We finally reconnect and make a destination decision. Going north (directly into the outback) is much more likely to fix the rain. Wayne's seen most of the birds he was hoping to find in the parks south of here, and going north cuts down considerably on the driving, plus gains us a day on the cross-country thing. We've already had our eye on Menindee, south-east of Broken Hill which is reputed to be a spectacular park for wildlife, especially the water birds which gather on its substantial lakes. Broken Hill is more than 300 miles, and it is 10:00am before we finally extract the car from the airport rental folks, but with some open road and a little luck, this shouldn't be a problem. We drive for a couple of hours in unpromising conditions—suburbs, rain.

Finally the houses stop, and soon the agriculture does to. We're on the Barrier Highway. The Sturt Highway is a more direct connection between Adelaide and Sydney, but we're not looking for direct. This more northerly route will take us into the southern reaches of the great outback. It's a two-lane highway, and there's nothing on it for miles and miles. When we do meet other traffic, it's a huge road train.

We stop once for galahs, and again for emu, but otherwise we pretty much keep the peddle to the metal. Finally we stop at a little place about 30 miles out of Broken Hill because we're seriously low on gas.

There are two or three people sitting around on old kitchen chairs drinking beer. "No power." "No gas?" "No, no electricity. How much gas you got?" "About a quarter of a tank, a little less." No worries, go on to Broken Hill." Easy for you to say. We resolve never to pass another gas station with less than half a tank. But he's right of course, and we cruise into Broken Hill soon after the reserve lights up. We're now seriously into the outback but it's clearly been raining here too, and recently. I ask the guy in the gas station how often it rains here. "When she can, I reckon."

We cruise up and down the main drag, and Wayne picks out a hotel—he likes the balcony, and the bar is clearly open. Nothing else is. It's not late, but the sidewalk was rolled up hours ago (around lunch time it turns out). Worse, that's because it is Saturday, and tomorrow is Sunday, when nothing will be open at all.

The Internet Cafe is closed permanently. So my hopes for fixing my memory problem are dashed. Worse still, we're currently on target to be in the next (and last) major town on the route by Tuesday, which is October 1, Melbourne Cup day, which we've been warned is a holiday, so they'll be no chance there either. But this bad news is soon eclipsed by the hotel, which is just oozing with character. There are murals covering every wall, floor to ceiling, including a waterfall cascading down the open stairwell. The place feels like it hasn't been touched since the turn of the century. The 20th century that is. Except for the five 42inch plasma TVs which line the back of the bar. They have Tooheys' Black on draft, and we've got nothing to do for the evening.

I ask the hotel manager who seems barely out of college if he is local. "No, I'm from the east coast. Reckon I exchanged grass and water for dirt and more dirt." A brochure on his desk advertises the fact that this hotel featured in "Priscilla, Queen of the Desert." We resolve to rewatch the movie when we get back.

It is hard to think of this as an artistic colony, an arts center. But that's how they see themselves. Water is clearly scarce, in Australia in general, and the outback in particular. Rain water is what they were using on KI. Here the water trickles out of the showerhead in a decidedly reluctant fashion, despite the rain we have brought. Power seems almost as scarce, so even with every light on on the room, it still feels candle-lit. Once you concede that it is too dark to read, you might as well make it just light enough to navigate by, so we comply with the spirit and turn most of the lights off again.

Although the largest town in the outback, it's still a tiny community. Since everything else is shut, we finally have time to just sit in the bar and watch. But by about 8 we can't stay awake so retire to our room. At 9, the volume of the music suddenly cranks to bed-rattling volume. Just as suddenly it stopped again at 11.30, but the laughing and shouting went on for several more hours after that.

Emu
As part of the national emblem, the Emu is commonly recognized across the globe. These large, flightless birds do have short stubby feathered wings, a long neck and small head with a sharp pointy beak. Its long, powerful limbs and sharp clawed feet mean that the Emu can run incredibly fast. The Emu lives on the open plains and scrublands and is commonly found in Outback areas of Australia. Foraging for roots, fruits and herbs, this native bird is timid and peaceful unless provoked or under attack. Its sharp claws and beak can be very useful as a tool of protection against predators.

Broken Hill
Broken Hill is located on the Barrier Range in the far west of NSW, just 48km east of the South Australian border. 1,160km W of Sydney via the Great Western, Mitchell and Barrier Highways, and 304m above sea-level it has a population of over 20,000.

The largest town in the west, Broken Hill stands on the richest silver-lead-zinc deposit yet discovered and has so far yielded minerals worth over 1.5 billion dollars. Its famous "Line of Lode", one of the world's major lead-silver-zinc ore bodies and the city's raison d'être, still has a little life left in it after being mined continuously for over 110 years. The town, situated in one of the driest areas of Australia is surprisingly green and leafy thanks to water piped from the reservoir at Lake Menindee 110km away. Broken Hill was named in 1844 by explorer Sturt but the mineral riches were not discovered until 1883 by Charles Rasp after which a town grew almost instantly to a population 20,000 within eight years.

One of the most striking aspects of the town, apart from the number of pubs, is the remarkable aridity of the region. Drive out to the start of the Mundi Mundi Plain, NW of the town, and the desert around you doesn't fundamentally change until you reach the coast of Western Australia. Broken Hill is literally an oasis in the desert, a place of green parks and gardens. It can get very hot in summer but it is rare for the daily maximum to exceed 38C for more than 8 or 9 days a year.

Broken Hill celebrated its centenary in 1988. Inevitably, Broken Hill revolves around the mines, but in the last decade it has also evolved into a thriving arts center, thanks to the initiative of the Brushmen of the Bush, a painting school founded by local artists. Diverse talents have been attracted to Broken Hill, and their works are displayed in galleries scattered all over town.

Most of the notable buildings are in Argent St. At the corner with Chloride St is the red-brick Post Office (1890-92), designed by James Barnet, with its massive turret capped by a decorative mansard roof and enveloped by a footpath verandah and corner balcony. Next door is the town's architectural highlight, the extraordinarily ornate Town Hall (1890-91). Next to it is the modest Police station (1890). It replaced an earlier tin shed in which the prisoners were chained to the flooring joists, although if a female prisoner was present they were chained to the station fence outside!

There are also a number of historic hotels. The most impressive of these is the large, three-story Palace Hotel (1889) with its lengthy verandahs and elaborate cast-iron balustrades. It was used in the movie Priscilla, Queen of the Desert which was shot here in 1993.