Day 95 Sunday 29/8/21 Roma to Morven, hot 29

It’s a warm morning and already 22 degrees at 9:00am. It’s also time to lighten the bedding again and break out the lightweight tropical shorts.

We’re cooking fried rice for dinner tonight and we probably won’t have power so I cook the rice in the rice cooker and get it in the fridge before we leave Roma. We were to have a late start this morning but El Prado is a little edgy. The Doggies are playing in the finals this arvo and he wants to be set up and ready for the match. We take off with the TV aerial up and are quickly flagged down. We’d been trying to get TV again last night and forgotten to drop the aerial.

As we leave Roma a couple of emus race through the scrub. I really think they get a kick out of trying to outrun cars. Yellow paddocks turn to green grain crops then dry plains and prickly pear cactus. Gosh it must get hot out here in the summer. We’re having a bit of a giggle, when Woody when into town last night for some Chinese Roast Pork for tonight’s fried rice the lady couldn’t understand why he didn’t want sauce with it. ”Very strange order” she muttered as he left the shop.

We stop to stretch our legs at Mitchell where the sign says “Gateway to the Outback”. I’m glad they tell us these things because who knows where the outback starts and finishes, you only know when you are there. Mitchell is on the Maranoa River and it’s an old town with a lot of wooden buildings sadly many are closed their demise probably hastened by Covid. Yet, as we pass we see many happy heads in the artesian spa so there must be plenty of grey nomads around. The whimsical street art keeps us amused.

• 

• 

As we head west the soil is getting redder, the trees change and termite mounds appear. There’s mulga scrub and a lot of small roadkill. Long tails, fluffy ribs and bones, paws twisted skywards. Marsupial madness.

We sail past the Mungalalla Pub, that looks to be a good one for another time.

Now that we’re inland our skin is drying, lips are cracking. I woke up the other morning with eyes so dry that I thought they belonged to someone else but that may have been caused by the wine.

Cruising into the Morven Recreation Reserve we find that we’ve got a shady red dirt spot with power, beside the oval. Nearby is a pretty billabong called Sadleir’s Waterhole where gums dip in the water and ducks paddle. Behind the shower block I spot a Pale Headed Rosella on a fence.

Having quickly chucked the rice in the fridge this morning it’s looking a wee bit gluggy, I’d love to put it outside for a few minutes to dry out but with the red dust it would come back looking like it was dusted with cayenne pepper.

Apart from trying to improvise with the rice things are peaceful here, El Prado is fiddling with the TV, Woody has been out walking, when suddenly 5 vans roll in rudely squeezing in every which way to plug into the available power. There’s a van on our back bumper and a group sit themselves so close to our car that Woody has to ask them to move so that he can open the car door. Giving up on TV reception we’re watching the footy on Elle’s iPad when one gent comes over to give us Christian calendars, it turns out that they’re a church group heading to Uluru and obviously trying to spread the word, we’re just hoping they’ll learn some camping manners on the way.

The Doggies are well ahead before the wifi drops out, Woody steams dim sims and cooks the spring rolls in the air fryer, somehow the fried rice unglugs itself and we all eat dinner shoulder to shoulder in our van.

The stars are fabulous.

With no TV were relying on online newspapers and the ABC news app to keep us up to date of the Covid situation. In some ways this is a blessing as we’re not being bombarded with the depressing sensationalism of the commercial networks.

Accom: 10.00 (power, water, toilets, showers, dump point, short walk to the pub)

Towing Kms: 177Kms