THEZEPHYR/ DECEMBER-JANUARY 2010
didn't see any damn lizard," he mumbled as he climbed back in the ute. We drove on.
On
the fifth day, storm clouds gathered west of us and we could see
lightning bolts strike the distant spinifex plain. "I hope it pisses
down rain!' Reggie exclaimed. The next morning we began to encounter
puddles but could never catch the rain itself. The temperature hovered
above 100 degrees but the humidity was overwhelming us. As we rattled
along, I noticed something odd-my jeans had expanded at the waist; when
I stood up they practically slid off my hips. Later I realized I'd lost
15 pounds just sitting in the front passenger seat of Reggie's ute,
bouncing up and down, 16 hours a day in 100 degree heat. The Gunbarrel
Weight Loss Program-I don't recommend it.
tralia to truly menace me. I decided it might be a herd of wild camels.
About
an hour after dawn, I thought I detected the low grade rumble of a
truck pulling a low gear. Minutes later, the noise was more distinct.
Never did anything sound so good. A few minutes later, I met Ian Smith,
the manager of Carnegie Station, one of the largest cattle ranches in
this part of the state, and his foreman, Peter Buchanan. They'd seen
Reggie come out of the east, marching with all deliberate speed and
could not believe their eyes. Ian is reported to have turned to Peter
and remarked, "The things you see, mate, when you don't have a gun."
They were under the impression that Reggie had walked the entire
distance from Ayers Rock but he quickly explained our predicament. They
arrived in a souped up Land Rover, made all the more attractive to me
by the big electric winch secured to the front bumper.
"Hell," said Peter. "Where's the big puddle that you went around?" By now the water had all but evaporated.
We
secured the cable to the tow eye and hoped for the best. For the better
part of a minute, Peter rolled in the cable and it became so taut I
thought it would snap. The ute seemed determined to become a permanent
fixture in the Great Sandy Desert. But finally, the ute broke free. It
was as if the bog had just puked up her prisoner. We were free at last.
Ian
refused to take any money for saving our sorry asses and when we
reached Carnegie Station, he and his wife set us up in the bunkhouse.
Ian said, "Well mates, anybody dumb enough to drive the Gunbarrel
Highway in the middle of the summer without a winch and with saucepans
for shovels, at least deserves a beer or two." He gave us a wink. "Come
on over and we'll give you something to eat too."
We
stayed for two days. Faye and Ian treated us far better than we
deserved and when we left, Ian said, "Well you look better than you did
when you got here...remember to get a shovel." We promised.
WILUNA
We
still had 300 miles to go and we were stopped for a night by a swollen
river that looked for a while as if it might never go down. But it did.
We finally made Wiluna and Reggie sought out the police to let them
know we were ok.
The officer behind the desk smiled, slightly. "What are you saying? You're reporting to us that you're alright?"
"Well
yes," said Reggie. "I called last week to let you know we were coming
across the Gunbarrel...you know, just in case something happened."
The
cop thought that was pretty funny. "In case something happened?" he
chuckled. "Did you think we would send out the militia if you failed to
show? Hell mate, I don't think anyone here even remembers your phone
call."
"So if we'd been stranded..."
"We'd come gather your bones once the weather cooled."
We
reached Geraldton and the beautiful Indian Ocean two days later. The
enormity of our trip only began to sink in when I told other
Australians about the ordeal. To this day, many trips to Western
Australia later, I have yet to meet an Aussie who's made the journey.
But when I tell them my story, they always echo Ian Smith's sentiments.
They say, "Anybody stupid enough to drive the Gunbarrel Highway in
summer with saucepans for shovels deserves a beer."
That's why I love Australians.
THE BOG
Earlier
in this narrative I mentioned Reggie's penchant for a clean and tidy
car. Now, a thousand miles from anywhere, on one of the longest 4WD
roads in the world, Reg began to drive around the puddles in the road,
for fear of splashing mud on his beloved ute. Despite the rain, the
road surface was firm, the berm was not. Our luck ran out when Reggie
swerved left to avoid a particularly large puddle that must have been
an inch deep and hit a particularly viscous mud bog. The ute lurched
forward in the quagmire, trying to free itself, but finally gave up and
settled into the muck like a calf in quicksand—resigned to its fate.
It
could have gone either way, that next 30 seconds. Had either of us
allowed our impulses to play out, the authorities might have found us,
months later, two desicated skeletons, bony fingers wrapped tightly
around what remained of the other's neck, in that Grip of Death. It was
that close.
Eventually
we took out our frustrations on the mud. We had no shovel, so we used
Reggie's sauce pans, to scoop the goo, but with every potful, the hole
re-filled. It was hopeless.
If
there was a silver lining to this, it was that we'd buried the ute in
mud only 30 miles from Carnegie, our one and only chance for human
contact (and a tow truck) in almost 1000 miles. Reggie nobly offered to
make the hike and I graciously let him. Whatever else
one
might say about Reggie Gubbins, that little Welsh dude can walk. He
sets his stride, gets his arms pumping like a British soldier and moves
steadily forward at a even pace, mile after mile. I knew he could do
it. He left at sunset when the temperature became a bit more tolerable
and I watched him vanish over the lip of the horizon, a few minutes
later. I shoveled goo for another hour, for lack of anything else to
do, and finally crawled into the tent. The heat was so oppressive I
could not sleep. Throughout the night I could hear the strangest
sound...every 12 seconds I could hear an expulsion of air, as if
someone was turning the pressure release valve on a compresssor.
Pfffffffffffff! It scared me for a while until I remembered there were
no flesh-eating animals big enough in Western Aus-
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