This morning we depart Wagga Wagga and make our way along the Sturt Highway following the Murrumbidgee River to Hay, home to the Shearers Hall of Fame and the historic Murray Downs Woolshed. Here we learn about shearing history and look through the historic Woolshed. After some morning tea and some time to explore the museum we continue on to Balranald. We arrive in Mildura late in the afternoon and spend the night at the luxurious Quality Hotel Mildura Grand, Seventh Street, Mildura, phone 03 5023 0511.

I must have slept a little between 4 a.m. and 6 a.m., after awakening at 1 a.m. I took the large bags out to the bus around 6:45 a.m. I am not sure how John manages the jigsaw trick of making everything actually fit into such a small space. We had a hot buffet breakfast at the Country Comfort motel at Wagga Wagga, where I restricting myself to small quantities of food. I expect to be overfed on any trip like this.

We stopped for morning tea at 10 a.m. We reached Hay before noon, and had a drive around the town. We seemed to cross the Murrumbidgee River a dozen times during the course of the trip.

A few kilometre outside Hay is the Shear Outback. We set up lunch in the parking lot, although many of us did a bit of a wander through the Shear Outback museum before eating. The highlight was Billy showing us how shearing was done. He had just started using hand shears, the old fashioned variety from before mechanical shears. Despite not having done this often, Billy made it look easy. He was using a sheep not grown for wool. Back a century or so ago, a typical sheep yielded maybe three pound if wool. A modern sheep stands twice as tall, and can produce up to nine kilogram of wool. You can not use the old techniques or even tools these days.

Back in the bus, Maxine put on an iPod rendering of part of the 1988 TV version of D'Arcy Niland's classic Australian story, The Shiralee, as a bit of background video. A lot of actors looking exceedingly young.

We stopped at Balranald for a rest. The tourist information place stayed open for us to visit, despite normally closing by three. They sure have a lot of frogs being depicted at Balranald.

We crossed the river into Victoria, as we were staying at the Grand Hotel in Mildura. We were given a grand suite, two rooms, and a bathroom with a large spa tub. We had been unable to get both air conditioners working correctly. Luckily Justin brought us a fan heater to solve the problem of the unhelpful air conditioner.

I had a pile of porterhouse steak for dinner, in the very nice Anna Room. The 28 of us pushed the capacity of the single table to its limits. We also had free wine vouchers, which we made use of in the bar prior to dinner. Alas, I was replete after, and did very few notes of the day.

Today we explore Mungo National Park which was World Heritage Listed in 1981 in recognition of its rich Aboriginal heritage. Remains of the earliest humans to inhabit the Australian continent have been found in Mungo National Park and have recently been dated at more than 60,000 years old. Later today we visit Menindee, a town of 1,000 people on the banks of the Darling River and home to the 'Menindee Lakes'. The town has ties to several Australian Explorers, including Burke and Wills, Charles Sturt and Major Mitchell.

Later this afternoon we check-in to the Royal Exchange Hotel, 320 Argent Street, Broken Hill, phone 08 8087 2308, for our 2 night stay in Broken Hill. Dating back to 1889, the Royal Exchange is a charming boutique hotel which has been tastefully refurbished over the years.

It was raining in the morning at Mildura The weather radar was showing storms to the north. We were ignoring that, until I took our bags out to the bus a little before 7 a.m. And got sprinkled on. I did not like the drizzle that had started. After a fine buffet breakfast we all gathered in the lobby to check the news. Our driver John eventually reported that the road to Mungo and the national park was officially closed. The only way to Broken Hill was the boring Silver City Higway. So that is how we proceeded. John and Maxine organised a nice bunch of alternate events to fill the day, since we would arrive at Broken Hill very early.

Shortly before we reached Wentworth we found that there was an air conditioning water leak. Several folks got their bags in the overhead storage all soaked. Water was dripping on Sue from the air conditioning vent.

We stopped in Wentworth around 9 a.m. to view a status of Possum, David James Jones, who spent much of his life wandering the river, assisting animals in distress. John told us of his story, disenchanted by union control of of Broken Hill, and deciding to abandon society.

We stopped in Wentworth again to view the Murray and Darling River joining, where the two greatest rivers in Australia meet. As rivers go, it is not that impressive a junction, but that just shows how sparse the water flow is within Australia.

Next was a morning tea stop at Wentworth Jail. This was impressively massive stonework, although as jails go it was small. The were two cells for women. It appears the Salvation Army had scared the local god botherers, and the women band players tend to get seven day sentences for unauthorised music. The men tended to get 14 days. Mostly men were in jail for fighting in the pub.

We had morning tea beside the bus, as usual. There was a lot of bird life, including a few vivid green bird with red on the beak. We were driving away around 11 a.m. We also got to watch the second part of The Shiralee during the drive.

There were not many places on the road at which to stop. We pulled up at Coombah Roadhouse for lunch. John organised that we get use of their facilities. I could not resist the shop ice creams, and had one before lunch, and another after. However my lunch consist of a very small sandwich, about bite sized. Lack of food is not usually a problem in tours of country Australia, so I am trying not to overeat.

We arrived at Broken Hill (turn clocks back a half hour, as they are on South Australian time) around 2:30. We checked in to our rooms pretty quickly. Our room was warm, and had an enormous bed. It would have seemed a decent sized room had the bed not been so large. Bit of shuffling to find a place for the bags, but that was soon sorted.

Back at the bus at 3:15, as John or Maxine had organised a trip to Pro Hart's art gallery. That was a wonderful place, full of quirky paintings, and some other media. We also got to see a few of the neat Rolls Royce cars Pro Hart had collected. We are not art buyers. Jean was however taken by the various 1000 piece jigsaw puzzles available. She can get them via the internet. Maxine was shooing us out of the gallery at 4 p.m. which was a bit of a surprise, since dinner was not until after six.

However then John drove us to the Jack Absalom art gallery and opal collection. The Jack Absalom art gallery had a nice range of magnificent paintings of Australian scenery. I was most impressed by the views of country I had visited. Looking at the paintings up close revealed the colours were made of vast numbers of individual tones. Jack was at the gallery, and talked readily about his painting (since 1972), and his travels (the TV shows are available on DVD). He also talked about his life mining opals, in a hundred place around Australia. The opal collection is magnificent. I was very temped by the many prints of his paintings. But how would I get them home, and where would I put them?

We drove off at 6:15 p.m. for our three course dinner at the Legion club. A fine roasted vegetable cream soup. I had the battered fish, and avoided eating the batter. Dessert was chocolate cake and a small ice cream. Despite skipping much of the meal it was far too much for me. The serving staff said the chef used to work cooking for riggers on an oil platform, and did not know how to provide smaller quantities. It was very nice food. The four dollar wine seemed fine also.

We were at the end of one table, opposite Jill and Sue. They were excellent dining companions, and we had a fair overlap in travel experience and future plans. We did not get back from dinner until around nine.

This morning we visit Silverton which has starred in many films, including Mad Max and Mission Impossible 2. We head back into town for lunch. We then visit the Broken Hill Geocentre which gives us an insight into Broken Hill's unique geology.

Late this afternoon we visit the Sculpture Symposium before dining in Broken Hill's premier restaurant, Broken Earth. The centre is located on the highest point of the Line of Lode remnant mullock dumps which transverse the City of Broken Hill.

We have a glorious late day. No bags to pack early. Breakfast at eight, and a bus trip to Silverton at nine. I found the rather small servicing facilities at the very nice hotel a little frustrating, so I skipped breakfast (there is plenty of food at morning tea and lunch always). Instead I went to the reagent across the road and bought the Weekend Australian newspaper.

Our morning trip at nine was a relatively short drive to Silverton, a former mining town, now tourist precinct. This had a variety of old stone buildings, including the former court house. There was a nice information centre next to the old court house. There were even some new homes being built. We exited the bus on the high ground overlooking Silverton. This had several art galleries, as well as a new house being built. The old church was also now a home, and looked like it was having some construction activity. The main street through Silverton had several tourist activity shops, and several interesting structures.

We made sure we visited the coin man. He takes Australian an old Australian penny, the large old copper style. Then he saws out the voids around the kangaroo, and other features on the coin, leaving the rim and the scenery. He told us he takes about three hours to hand saw each coin. He send them of to be gold plated, and sells them for $175. He seemed to think that a good deal for him. He also had some nice seven pence (a sixpence embedded in the centre of a penny) which he sold for five dollars. These he makes with a die press.

We had morning tea at Silverton. While waiting near the pub where parts of Mad Max were filmed, we noticed a wedding party, consisting mostly of 4WD drivers. There seemed a lot of them.

We drove on to Mundi Mundi lookout for some views of the surrounding countryside. Then it was back to Broken Hill, where we had our usual picnic lunch in a park opposite the tourist information centre. This park also had a mine pit head looking very obvious.

The next trip was to the Broken Hill Geocentre. This was a museum of mineralogy and display about mining in the area. They had a nice range of sample minerals. One active display I enjoyed was the rotating aerial view of Broken Hill, with the (mineral) named streets being shown in turn. That was pretty neat.

My experience with the free household washing machines back at the hotel was a bit frustrating. The washing machine I used was slow. So slow it made an English washing machine seem quick. I could not even start using the dryer until after five. At six, I grabbed everything from the dryer, and spread it out on the bed in case it was not completely dry.

Dinner was at the Broken Earth, which appears to be the premier restaurant in Broken Hill. Premier to me usually means fancy names I do not understand, for food I am not really partial to, at outrageous prices. However it is nice to see a classy restaurant from time to time. We had a deBortoli Pinot Noir. The prawn entree was just fine, although none if the entrees were what I would have otherwise picked. There was about twice the meat I could eat in my chicken unkiev (seemed to have fennel and tarragon, and was very tasty). Jean had the steak, which looked great, although far too large for me to consider. The creme boule was outright weird, and none of the desserts were much to my taste in any case. It took from 6:30 until around 9 to complete the meal, which is a bit too lengthy for me.

This morning we head north along the Silver City Highway through the village of Packsaddle to Milparinka. The town's colonial buildings, including police barracks and cells have been lovingly restored as part of the Milparinka Heritage Precinct. They now provide an insight into life in Milparinka in its heyday during the gold rush of the late 1800's.

After lunch and a visit to some of the old buildings we head west to Depot Glen, named by Captain Charles Sturt on his 1845 expedition to find an inland sea. The stranded expedition team camped at this waterhole for months on end, waiting for the summer heat to abate.

This afternoon we continue on to the small outback village of Tibooburra. We overnight at the Family Hotel/Motel, Briscoe Street, Tibooburra, phone 08 8091 3314, which has a fantastic outback atmosphere.

Leave Broken Hill around eight, after breakfast at our hotel. The breakfast commenced at seven sharp. We were mostly hovering like vultures somewhat earlier than that. Usual country breakfast, with bacon and eggs from the buffet. Before we left I managed to get a copy of the weekend Financial Review from the news agent across from the hotel.

Our first stop was Packsaddler roadhouse 200 km from Broken Hill, where we had morning tea.

Malparinka, a former gold rush town, was our lunch stop.

No Roads Go By Mrs Myrtle White is a book that John recommends.

Grave and Green Lake with actual water 100 km south of Tipooburra

Depot Glen 13 km from Tipooburra, where Stuart waiting by good water until the rains arrived.

We were staying at the motel across from the Tipooburra Family Hotel. Although pleasant in most respects, the mattresses had issues.

Walk through the town, taking photographs. There was a park with a longboat su h as Stuart rolled across the continent. Had to replace my camera battery about then. Got as far as the fuel station where John and Maxine were shopping for supplies. There was a massive log of petrified wood in display, across from the screen of the former open air cinema. Beer o'clock at the hotel, followed by a roast lamb dinner at the hotel. That was very pleasant. Must have been, as I did not write these notes until several days later.

We depart Tibooburra this morning to venture into the vast Sturt National Park. We make our way west through the park to a place called Cameron Corner, where QLD, NSW and SA all meet. The area of Cameron Corner was first surveyed by James Cameron from the NSW Lands Department in 1800. The area is also home to the longest fence in the world, The Dog Fence, stretching from the Great Australian Bight to Jimbour near Brisbane (5600km).

After enjoying some lunch at the Corner Store we continue heading west towards the Strzelecki Track and then onto the village of Innamincka, set on the banks of the Cooper Creek. We spend two nights at the Innamincka Hotel, Main Street, phone 08 8675 9901, in comfortable motel units.

The bus was late arriving from the overflow hotel with extra luggage loading, as there was not enough room for us all at the motel. Breakfast at Tipooburra Family Hotel, featuring mince on toast (shit on a shingle).

About 130 kilometres of dirt road to Camerons Corner before us. It was cold, with clouds shading us.

We stopped near the entry of the Stuart desert for a short break. During the entire drive the landscape was greener than I ever expect. There were flooded areas and lakes all over the place.

We had morning tea at Cameron's Corner, the place where NSW, South Australia and Queensland all meet. Naturally the sun came out when we entered Queensland. Lots of photographs taken. There is now a small store there at Cameron's Corner. We had saved our newspapers and a few books for this isolated outpost. John and Maxine had also brought tomatoes to the store. There was a great accumulation of 4WD vehicles, mostly belonging to the wedding party we had seen in Silverton and again in Tipooburra.

We stopped atop a sand dune along the way. The idea was to see birds, but what we mostly saw was a variety of dessert plants. Our bird watchers Sue and Jill did much better.

About an hour or more further up the dusty road, we stopped at the Strzlecki Creek for lunch. The water had obviously been way outside its banks recently, with flood debris all over the place. There was still a reasonable amount of water in the creek. We continued on towards Innamincka around two.

We stopped to view the Moomba gas field that Santos run, and take photos of the large site. Luckily Jean recalled that gas field mining sites often have a cellular phone connection. As the bus pulled away, we hauled out phones and iPad, and downloaded as much material as we could manage.

Another long dusty and bumpy road. While typing on the bus, the Undo Typing signal appeared repeatedly as the iPad decided it was being shaken as an undo signal. We made a brief stop at Geodynamics, 14 km from Innamincka, to confirm our tour tomorrow. 422 kilometres covered.

After unpacking the bags at the Innamincka Hotel, we walked to Innamincka Homestay bed and breakfast, to say hello to Geoff Matthews. He tells us he is looking to retire and sell off the place. We last saw it in 2001, and the improvements are incredible. Larger, the kitchen is very fancy. It has 40 solar cells in a large array, which is a great idea in an area that would otherwise need diesel for all power.

Dinner at the hotel was pretty fancy. It started with herb damper. I had barramundi, Jean had steak. I can't recall exactly what the fancy ice cream had in it.

After Jean went to bed, I watched a 99 cent rental movie from iTunes. The movie Below was a WW II submarine ghost story. Interesting approach to a story.

Innamincka is a small village with a population of no more than 50 people. The township once played a major role in early explorations of Australia's unknown interior. With its reliable water source, it made an ideal base camp or resting place for expeditions and cattle drives from the east and the south. Not far from Innamincka is a place called the "Dig Tree" where explorers Burke and Wills tragically perished after returning from their expedition to the Gulf of Carpentaria in 1861. Today the town services the ever busy tourist industry and local pastoralists.

We visit the Burke and Wills Dig Tree, and have morning tea there. In the afternoon we visit the AIM building. We also take a tour of Geodynamics, a geothermal power project.

I finally got a good night of sleep, from around ten until five. We have a lazy day scheduled for our stay in Innamincka, starting with a buffet breakfast at eight. While I waited for Jean to arise, I watched the second half of the 99 cent rental movie Below.

At nine we headed out on the bus to the infamous Dig Tree. Burke and Wills missed their relief column had left only hours before. They had left supplies buried beside the Dig Tree. The expedition eventually perished, probably poisoned by some of the wild seeds they had seen the natives use. However they did not remove the poison by removing the husk the way the aborigines had done.

Once we hit Queensland, there was a fine bitumen road parallel to the old dirt track. Alas, for the first few kilometres, there was also a sign saying not to use it. Also alas, no sunbeam hit us when we passed through to Queensland. There were still the same stubborn steel grey and threatening overcast clouds.

At the Dig Tree we were greeted by the famous bush figure Bomber Johnson, who taught so many bush pilots to fly safely. He had some fascinating history to tell of the early days. He also had many historic photos and memorabilia. He has been working as ranger at the Dig Tree, employed by Santos owned Nappa Marrie station, which at 2800 square miles is one of the smaller stations. Another country figure who just can not manage to retire.

The Burke and Wills bridge was washed out last flood season. Well, the bridge survived just fine, but the approaches were washed away by the floods. We stopped to photograph the damage and Coopers Creek. Even at mid morning the weather remained cold, with high steel grey clouds.

We were a little late returning to the Innamincka sandwich lunch, which was plentiful. Jean and I bravely avoided eating a chocolate muffin.

Our afternoon trip was to the Geodynamics experimental one megawatt power plant. They were basically in maintenance mode, with a staff of three or four. They had two drill holes, over four kilometres down, one for injection, one for steam. Pressures of 10,000 psi. The site had been selected based on readings from sensors in other deep wells nearby that Santos had used. They use a closed loop system, with a heat exchanger to the turbine. They do their own reverse osmosis water filtering for the heat exchanger and turbine loop (you could see the compact reverse osmosis plant tucked away in a corner). The deep well brine is full of impurities, so that can not be allowed to contact the turbine.

Geodynamics encountered (I think) hydrogen sulphide, and hydrogen embrittlement of the casing, causing a failure in April 2009 of the Habanero 3 well. They had to change metals. They also ran through a gas pocket (and have to pay Santos for gas they flare). What I find myself wondering is how many suitable drill rigs are available, if the proof of concept drill holes all work. Their new drill Rig 200 is not scheduled to arrive until October 2010. The experimental plant was planed to operate in 2009, but is now scheduled for 2012.

The next target is a 25 MW plant, to power Innamincka. I gather this involves two injection wells, and three to gather steam. I thought the original plan was nine holes. However although you can drill maybe 30 metres a day through the insulating sedimentary rocks, the hot granite slows this to three metres a day. I need to check up more about Geodynamics. When I did check, I found their managing director of three years resigned three days later. Their chairman will be retiring at the next AGM at the end of 2010.

We visited the Coopers Creek crossing, and took photos of the weir. Amazing to think the water was four metres over the crossing last time the Outback Spirit bus was her. Plus the peak flood was 11.1 metres.

I wandered up to Innamincka Homestay with John and Maxine at 4:30 when they moved there. I was there for more photos, since our previous ones dated back to 2001. This is especially the case now Geoff if interested in selling the place, and retiring. Geoff had some amazing aerial and ground photos of the floods earlier in the year. A lot of the photos were floods caused by local rain, not floodwaters from Queensland.

Bar seemed a good idea when I returned, chilled from the walk in the cold wind.

Dinner at the Innamincka Hotel. I skipped the entree, and figured lamb cutlet would be fine for a main course. Some of the lamb was a bit raw, and I could not believe how fatty the lambs are this season. Jean had the kangaroo, which was as usual lean. Pavlova of course for dessert, but it lacked fruit salad. I think Wednesday is the fresh food resupply day. It is the day the mail gets sent out.

Our driver John reports we can get up late. The track to our next destination, Birdsville, is cut by unseasonable light rain. After a ling phone session, he reported to the hangers on at the dining room that the 740 km Boulia to Alice Springs track is also cut off by rain. At the moment our only way out is to take the Strzlecki track south, down to Maree, and then the Stuart Highway to Alice Springs. However will there be any accommodation on the way?

We head north up the Birdsville Track, through Arrabury and then Cordillo Downs, home to Australia's largest shearing shed, arriving at the Birdsville Hotel, 1 Adelaide Street, 07 4656 3244, late this afternoon. Enjoy modern, quality accommodation at the pub along with friendly outback hospitality. Except that the track is cut by water!

We were up at 6:30 after a restless night. Alas, the hotel were not expecting to provide a 7:30 breakfast, so a bunch of us hung around pressing our noses to the door. Breakfast actually started around eight, as usual at the Innamincka Hotel.

We were away somewhat after nine, with John receiving late phone calls about potential flights for some members of the tour. As anticipated, we were driving down the Strzlecki Track as far as Leigh Creek, where we now had accommodation at the Leigh Creek Tavern.

Our first stop was the Moomba gas fields. This was a new stop for John. For the first time he had been asked for a phone stop. The Moomba field has a Telstra 3G phone connection. We had our morning tea there also.

Lunch was at the Strzlecki Creek crossing, where blue skies made the area pleasant looking. We sure seemed to have a lot of 4WD vehicles around us.

I can not get over just how green the desert is at the moment. There are lakes everywhere, many from overflow of Coopers Creek. We even spotted fat cattle in the Strzlecki desert. I have never seen that before. Arid area cattle are typically lean, and often gaunt.

We stopped around 3:30 for afternoon tea at a dip in the road marking Koortanyanina Creek. Even that had water in part of the creek bed.

We reached Lyndhurst around 5:40, and pulled into the Leigh Creek Tavern just before our scheduled 6:30 dinner. Despite the short notice (that morning) they offered a printed menu, had the eighteen rooms we needed, and put on a roast beef or chicken schnitzel, and a very nice double chocolate pudding or a limited quantity of apple crumble and ice cream. We were collapsed in bed not long after nine (well, ten in my case).

Birdsville is a township of approximately 100 people and was originally named Diamantina Crossing in 1881 after the Diamantina River, which runs to the east of the town. The town however was renamed Birdsville in 1885 by the owner of Pandie Pandie Station who was amazed by the diversity of birdlife which inhabited the area. The town hosts a famous outback horse race on the first weekend of September which boosts the town's population from 100 to 7,000! Except we never reached Birdsville!

We need to make a very early start today, so breakfast is set for 6:30 a.m. We will load the bags after breakfast, as it will still be dark when we eat. The minus temperatures and frost are also a consideration.

We need to be on our way by 7:30 a.m. Seven of our fellow tourists need to be in Marree just after nine, to take a scenic flight over the rapidly filling Lake Ayre. Jean and I had dropped our plans to fly. Another person volunteered not to fly. That left about ten people competing for seven places. We will collect them at William Creek. For tonight, we have accommodation at Coober Pedy, at the Caves House Underground hotel.

As it turned out, the flights are all off. The only time to get ten seats on flights was at one o'clock, well after we needed to be past William Creek.

We departed Leigh Creek at 7:25 a.m. and headed north to Lyndhurst on time. We passed the Talc Alf sign, and John talked a little about this strange character, who Maxine had mentioned on the previous day. John also talked about the Goyder line.

When we reached Lyndhurst, we found an indicator that the road to Marree was closed. Luckily further enquiry revealed the sign had been set wrong, and was being corrected even as we encountered it. We passed the ruins of the ghost town of Farina around eight.

Marree was the next town we stopped at. This town of a hundred people was once a thriving rail head. Now it has rusting remnants of the old Ghan rail engines. The hotel has greatly expanded, with dongas all over, as more drivers pass through.

We made a stop at ten to photograph the strange sculptures along the road at one property along the Odnadatta Track.

Lake Ayre South had a viewing spot, so we stopped at eleven for photographs of the great salt lake, which is as much as twelve metres below sea level. There are no toilet facilities along most of the road.

Coward Springs shortly after for a rest break, where the owners were off leading a camel safari. They have rustic long drop toilets, which were in good repair nine years ago, and seem even better now.

William Creek was our lunch spot, a little after one. We were struggling to keep up our schedule by then. I love the various bits of rockets in the park museum they have opposite the William Creek Hotel.

After lunch, we left William Creek at two for the 160 kilometre drive to Coober Pedy. The road goes through relatively bare desert with little life.

We were a little later than four getting to Coober Pedy but not by much. Luckily there is a Telstra 3G connection here, so we could call ahead. Did a quick comfort stop, and then took a local guide on board the bus for a town tour.

The town tour was interesting to have items named and shown. I took a bunch of photos in haste, though the bus windows, so I have no idea if they will come out. The only stop was at the first church in Coober Pedy, which had some fine stained glass windows and was a mostly underground building, like much of the town. We also learnt that the sites for underground homes in the town were now exhausted. Only existing sites are now available.

Next we had a conducted tour of the museum. This included a demonstration of cutting and polishing opal. The highlight was the tour of the old mine that the museum occupies, whistle our guide explained how everything was done. The hand dug portions are much more cramped than the modern machine dug portions. The tour ended, as such tours must, in an opal shop at the museum.

We had surface rooms at the modern Desert Cave Hotel at Coober Pedy, across the car park from the main building. They were large and perfectly comfortable, but not as interesting as the underground rooms. This means we have a lot of stairs to climb to get to their fancy restaurant at the top of the hill. Wine was not cheap there, at ten dollars a glass. They put on a fine buffet dinner for us, preceded by a prawn entree, and followed by a chocolate and cream dessert. Despite not having done the driving, we were tired, and soon retired.

This morning we bid farewell to Birdsville and continue our travels north through Queensland's Channel Country to the small township of Bedourie. Bedourie is the main administrative centre for the Diamantina Shire, the second largest shire in Queensland after the Cooktown Shire. After some lunch we continue on to Boulia, known as the capital of the Channel Country. Except no-one was getting to Boulia, after the rain.

Accommodation, or lack of it, is our problem. The only town with sufficient hotel space is Alice Springs, so we are heading there today, a day early. This is close to a 700 kilometre drive, so we want to be on the road by eight. We have a breakfast arranged at seven at the Crystal Cave, which luckily is at the same surface level as our room. I took the bags out to the Outback Spririt bus a few minutes before we headed to breakfast.

We were headed off at eight, on the long drive. We passed the usual gleaming rocks of the outback glimmer fields. To the sunward side of the bus, the rocks appear dark. On the other side, they appear the usual red of the outback. Our driver John and tour guide Maxine played an hilarious speech that Len Beadle had given about building so many of the outback roads when he was setting up access for the British atomic bomb tests at Emu and Marilinga. Later they were to play the first chapter of one of his books.

By 9:30 a.m. we had passed by Cadney Roadhouse. Our first break was at the greatly enlarged Marla Roadhouse junction with the Lassiter Highway. Inadequate toilets for the now thriving store. I saw a Golden North triple chocolate ice cream, chocolate ice cream, chocolate sauce, and a choc coating. This is a brand I have never seen previously. Alas, the queue was moving so slow I could not buy one.

We stopped a few tens of kilometres up the road at Iwantja Junction, which leads to a indigenous community. Gwenddl's daughter was working there, so she took the Nganampa ambulance and met us at the road junction for a brief and unexpected reunion.

The long absent clouds were back at midday. Not unexpected as Alice Springs had a forecast of rain for the next several days. We had lunch at the border, which now has some very impressive signage, and a heap of parking spaces. Maxine and John had organised pre-made sandwiches, so this was a quicker lunch than is often the case. We passed Kulgera police station and hamlet, where we had originally planned lunch, around two.

Passed the Fink River at 3:30 p.m. A short while later we pulled into Stuart Wells for a rest break. Jim has a wonderful roadhouse there, with some popular accommodation. A heap of us had ice creams this time. Jim very kindly had Dinky, the singing dingo, play the piano for us. He put on a splendid and spirited performance. Call of the Wild, I think.

We reached Alice Springs around 5:15, earlier than I expected. We stay at the very comfortable Chifley Alice Springs Resort. I was even able to get our laundry done before heading for our seven o'clock dinner at the Barra on Todd restaurant at the Chifley Alice Springs resort. Anne did not manage to get to dinner until well after the rest of our group, and alas seemed very much out of sorts.

We depart Boulia this morning to make our way west towards the Northern Territory Border. We stop for morning tea at the Tobermorey Store before continuing along the Plenty Highway through Harts Range and Gemtree to arrive into Alice Springs late this afternoon. We spend the next two nights at the 4.5 star Chifley Alice Springs Resort, 34 Stott Terrace, Alice Springs, phone 08 8951 4545. Except none of that happened.

After breakfast we boarded the bus for an 8:30 departure. We were a little late leaving, but had a relatively easy day of sites close to Alice Springs, covering less than 300 kilometres during the day. We also found our travel companion Anne had needed to go to hospital.

The first stop was the Reverend John Flynn memorial and gravesite near Alice Springs. The original rock marker (from the Devil's Marbles) has been replaced with a local stone, and the original returned, after consultation with indigenous people. The Royal Flying Doctor Service made a tremendous difference to life in rural Australia, and Flynn was the person who came up with the remote medical service idea and made it work.

It was overcast during the entire day, with fitful sunshine breaking through the threatening cloud only a few times. Photography was not easy, and several sites simply could not be seen through the clouds. We also found water crossing the road at creek areas several times during the drive. Luckily this trip was picked to be in bitumen all weather roads (as long as the creeks did not rise too much).

Simpsons Gap chasm walk from the extensive car park was very short, less than 15 minutes return. We managed that around 9:30. Many of these chasms are very narrow indeed, and this is one of the most narrow.

Standley Chasm walk. We had morning tea at this private site. The walk takes you along a creek bed with a lot of rough stones. It is hard on shoes and on ankles. The signs are a little misleading, as you would need to be moving pretty fast to do the walk in the suggested time. I kept complaining the car park was now a lot further away than it used to be. I reached the chasm fairly early, and thus was probably first to return. Luckily there seemed to be a biscuit still available from morning tea.

Standley Chasm was named for Ida Standley, a school teacher who taught not only the white children she was employed to instruct, but in her own time, also taught indigenous children. Back then, education for Aborigines was not considered essential.

Rain and water in creeks as we drove further away from Alice Springs. We splashed through several in the bus as we drove the additional hundred kilometres out of town, still keeping to the good bitumen road. It look us until about one o'clock to reach Ormiston Gorge, where we had lunch.

I like the Ormiston Gorge waterhole, as it is a very easy short walk along a well made concrete path. Alas, with water in the river very high, there was no chance to scramble along the creek bed into the gorge itself, like I did on a previous visit. I soon returned to the bus for lunch in one of the extensive shelter sheds than now grace this site.

I followed lunch by walking to the Ormiston Gorge lookout, despite the top of the gorge walls being shrouded in low cloud. This lookout gives a wonderful view of the canyon, and the walls. It also lets you look down at the path to the waterhole. The lookout track involves a pretty fair number of steps, which I will doubtless regret tomorrow. It is worth it for the views, and the photographic opportunities even without full sunlight.

We left for nearby Glen Helen Gorge sometime after two. This is also a tourist resort area, on a former station. The property looks a little run down from the outside, but is magnificently situated in the shadow of the gorge walls. I have stayed there in the past, and would return any time. They have a few wonderful paintings of the area on the walls of the dining room. It always seemed a very friendly place.

Most of us walked to the nearby gorge, over the rounded pebbles of the creek bed path. On the trees around the creek bed you could see debris showing just how high the water can sometimes rise. Droughts and flooding rains indeed, and our trip was certainly divert by the rains.

We left around three, and were back at the Chifley Alice Springs resort before five. At the dinner this evening, there was a little presentation to John and Maxine, as an expression of thanks to them for their fine service during this Outback Spirit trip.

Today we take a leisurely tour around Alice Springs which includes a visit to the Alice Springs Desert Park, The Old Telegraph Station and the Royal Flying Doctor Base Museum. This afternoon can be spent at your leisure. Tonight we celebrate our trip through central Australia and enjoy our final dinner together.

I am up at five. I can hear the rain pelting down on the roof of the hotel, despite being on the ground floor. It was still raining at 6:30 when Jean arose. I have a bad feeling about activities today.

We went to breakfast a little after seven, and are due to depart on the bus a little after eight. Our destination is the Desert Park, on Larapinta Drive, not far outside Alice Springs. Jean sensibly declined to go out in the rain.

The weather was fairly miserable. A desert park is ill suited to tourists walking through the rain. The dense packed sand and gravel retains puddles of water, and there is little shelter from the showers. Even the brush shelters do not actually stop rain to any extent. In short, it is a far better fine weather experience, and fine weather is what you mostly experience in such arid regions.

The Nature House provided a shortened but informative show on birds if prey. I thought the cluster of prairie pigeons wandering around the ground were involuntary food. The staff member said they would likely be, if they had certain falcons on hand. The prairie pigeons look remarkably like a crested or topnotch pigeon. They keep low on the ground all the time, and can walk at a remarkable pace. They can fly, but mostly do not. They also do not really use trees as roosts or protection (not many trees in a desert anyhow).

Next was a brown falcon, which demonstrated swooping on objects (well, food) on the ground, and grabbing it with it's talons It carried the snack to a branch to eat it, or ate it in the ground.

The black kite (which is not actually black) was the star performer. It catches food in the air with its talons, and eats it while flying. I am not sure any other bird manages this talon to beak transfer in flight. It is an opportunistic robber of other birds in flight. It also made several attempts to grab contents from the food pouch the trainer wore.

I should mention that during the entire performance, a tawny frogmouth sheltered in the fork of the brush shelter, less than a metre from the audience. I suspect many people did not see it until the staff pointed it out. It is not unusual for these birds to be so close at this type of bird show.

We left on the bus just before midday for the Royal Flying Doctor base. The auxiliary provided a very nice lunch, including home baked cakes. These volunteers throughout Australia attempt to raise a million dollars a year. The Alice Springs folks apparently raised around $29,000. I had seen the museum and done the tour on previous visits, so I walked back to the Chifley Alice Springs Resort, to have a lazy afternoon. By then my umbrella was wrecked. It had worked fine previously, when I never used it.

We had our last dinner together as a group this evening. Some had already left to make better connecting return flights to their homes. Anne returned from hospital to rejoin the group, and looked much better. Her husband had flown in to assist her in returning home, so it was great to see she was being looked after.

This morning we all enjoy breakfast together before being transferred to the airport.

We needed to take QF797 from Alice Springs to Melbourne from 11:50 a.m. to 2:55 p.m. We made the mistake of making our own way to the airport via the airport shuttle. This shuttle was slow, uncomfortable, and cost money. The airport shuttle stopped at the casino for an interminable time while someone attempting boarding tried to pay a bill. Next time we are with Outback Spirit, we will accept their kind offer of transport to the airport. Despite leaving the hotel 35 minutes after us, their bus reached the airport first. Having to fly to Melbourne to get to Townsville is a pain in the arse. The Qantas seats were also a pain in the arse. Especially when booking through Qantas does not mean your luggage gets transferred to their JetStar subsidiary in Melbourne.

We had a booking on JQ918 Melbourne to Townsville from 5:15 PM to 8:10 PM on an Airbus A320. But first we had to collect our luggage from baggage collection (it was just about last off), and take it to the JetStar counter, past the Qantas counter. Not impressed by this system at all. Not that we were short of time. We finally got back to Townsville around nine. Which is about when I went out to collect mail, since we actually have a working postal delivery here.

Unpacking, starting one load of laundry under a threatening sky. This is the dry season up north. I am not sure why clouds fail to understand this. Shopping at Coles at Willows, in which Jean got a trolley full of fruit and vegetables. She is very much the person who gets sensible food. We had nothing much for breakfast in the place. Put the laundry under shelter due to the threat of rain.

Deleting Apple applications on your iPad and iPhone can be a pain. If you do not delete them on all devices (iPad, iPhone, computer), they are apt to return.

I deleted Egyptian Mythology Lite, from Brighthouse Labs. This bunch seem to data mine sources to make the equivalent of quick and dirty ebooks books. They must have thousands of them in the Apple store. Personally I think most of these book applications should be dumped. I think most Brighthouse apps should be dumped.

DC Comics and Marvel Comics are both custom labelled versions of an existing comics viewer. As comics viewers go, they seem fine. However they are just a way to let you buy easily from an overpriced comics publisher. Then your comics are locked to that application. Wait until DRM free versions arrive.

Same comments essentially apply to a wide variety of magazines. The same problem with most magazine applications, despite many of them having full contents. Locked content, inconsistent navigation, overpriced relative to subscription, poor handling of type sizes. Try the web site via RSS feeds, and buy the paper version if an issue looks interesting. The Monthly. APC Magazine (not that you can view video on an iPad, as long as web sites persist in using proprietary Flash crap). Time Magazine. NPR (USA content only really).

Sydney Traffic Camera works fine, but I do not live in Sydney. Also, Quota can pick up cameras, as well as doing its primary job of checking download limits. I also deleted AIM instant messaging, as I did not know anyone who used it.

Epicurious is a very nice looking recipe application, in which all measurements are in Imperial. I can not believe it. Only three countries in the world do not have metric measurements as standard, and this application seems totally unaware of the metric system. Utterly useless, as you would need to convert all their quantities when shopping and measuring.

Jean took her car in for a service, scheduled for 8:30 a.m. She managed to get a lift back home, arriving only a little after nine. That was pretty good! Meanwhile, I hung out the laundry, and started a second load. With a sunny blue sky today, I did not intend to waste drying time. On Tuesday threatened rain meant we had to bring the load of laundry into the porch. In the background, my computer was downloading as many videos as I could manage. We have one day left on our monthly download allocation, and may as well use up as much as we can manage.

Microsoft is a giant corporation, with wonderful cash flows, and a 14 P/E ratio. However Microsoft is vulnerable. It has two cash cows. Microsoft Windows operating system, and Microsoft Office business suite. Web and internet applications do not need Windows. They need internet access (a communications company and an ISP get the money). Perhaps customers need a free web browser, such as Apple Safari, Google Chrome, Microsoft Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox, or Opera. Meanwhile, Google are also giving away their Android operating system for smart phones and PDAs. You can also get the Linux operating system (the basis for Android) for free. While Microsoft has essentially the entire personal computer market, the phone market is now five billion units. And, Microsoft are somewhat in denial, at the moment. Plus, there is competition from Apple, limited for now, but still there.

Meanwhile, Google (who make all their money from advertising) have a free web based Google Apps office suite, which is inferior to Office. So does Microsoft, but you do not make money on free!

Against this, cloud computing is imperfectly available, and at best unreliable. I do not run business or office applications, but I still can not rely on internet availability. The question is when that will change.

There are some nice HTML5 demonstrations available. These typically work best in WebKit based web browsers such as Google's Chrome, and Apple Safari, but also typically work in Firefox (especially version 4) and Opera 10.6. Internet Explorer 9, still in pre-release, is also often able to use them.

Google gives instructions on using HTML5 and more examples in HTML5Rocks. For example, Modernizr provides a Javascript library that helps older browsers render modern HTML and CSS better. Check to see which web browsers are HTML5 and CSS3 ready.

I was awake before five, so I had a hasty shower, and set off in Jean's Subaru a little after five. About half an hour late I thought to switch on the car radio and listen to the ABC news radio. I was passing through Ayr an hour later. At sunrise I was at the Inkerman pub and general store, getting a chocolate milk as a substitute for breakfast. The toilet block outside Bowen was closed for cleaning. Grump.

Finally pulled into the Centro Shopping Centre a little after eight. After the chocolate milk, one of my first stops had to be the toilet there. BigW budget videos had a bunch of DVDs. I found an original Howard Hanks black and white version of The Thing, based on John W Campbell's Who Goes There. Another science fiction item was the relatively recent District 9. I also bought the twelve episode Watchmen comic on DVD, mostly out of curiosity. Having visited Jack Absalom' art gallery in Broken Hill recently, and met the man himself, I got a $4 version of his old DVD In the Steps of Charles Sturt. We had visited the site of Sturt's Depot Camp recently. I suspect I need to seek others of the Absalom DVD series.

The Dollars and Sense store did not seem to have the clips to hold coat hangers that we have been after for ages. I did however get a cheap battery operated standing reading lamp, and a clip board I had needed. I found a cheap pack of alkaline AA batteries at Harvey Norman. I also saw and talked to the Harvey Norman employee who had so often sold us computer gear. He had been off sick for some time, but was at least partly on the mend now, which was good to hear.

Steve at Leading Edge Music had a chat with me. It seems the old Australian movie Jedda is not available through the regular distributors. I saw that in a newsagent in Katherine. On the other hand, Steve had the revised and remastered Star Trek original series with the new special effects. The price is outrageous, but at least that formerly USA only version is available. I will have to think about that one.

VideoEzy had some former rental DVDs, so I got the disaster movie 2012, and another science fiction movie called Moon.

I did some food shopping in Woolworths, and then drove home. Luckily there was space in our usual spot in our regular parking lot under the shelter shed/

There was a note under the door from Whitsunday Terraces reception, signed by resort managers Tim and Wendy. They complain about the volume of packages and general mail being received and not collected. I suspect this has increased now there is no Airlie Beach post office. Reception would not accept packages larger than an A4 envelope. Not sure how they intend to stop delivery drivers from being lazy. We always use the correct address, and some delivery drivers always ignore it. Residents have to register with reception (we were trying to reach Birdsville at the time this notice came out, but neighbour Michael kindly put our names down). Mail will only be held one week before being returned to sender. No wonder Jim sent me email asking which concentration camp the managers previously ran. Not that either of us encourage mail sent here.

The Boathouse apartments at Port of Airlie are still being constructed, something about which I had once had doubts. There were a whole heap of cars parked down there, so construction must have gone back to being full on. Either there is more parking planned, or they are making more shopping space. A lot more earth has been spread over the former muddy areas. I am beginning to hope that landscaping may commence this year. There is a barge with a pile driving crane, and some new pilings have been driven in the soft mud of the marina. Michael said he had not heard pile driving, but he also said he was away in Brisbane for the past few weeks.

Down the twelve flights of stairs to the main street. I was able to collect my prescription tablets from the chemist. It is too early to get a haircut, and next time I am home will be too late. Got some bubbles and white wine in case I had party visitors on Saturday. The number of closed shops has increased. The newsagent site is now empty, with all the fittings removed. Hogs Breath, with new owners, have their bar right near the front of the entry now. Only saw one customer there however. Several other shops nearby remain empty. Internet cafe numbers seem to be on the increase again, for the benefit of backpackers. Not a sign of upmarket visitors, to my mind.

During the afternoon I caught up with some cleaning, and read the remains of the March Analog. I also watched Howard Hanks black and white version of The Thing, based on John W Campbell's classic SF short story Who Goes There.

There was little on TV during the evening. TV stations are becoming increasingly irrelevant. Michael pointed out that his TV was receiving digital channels. I thought the resort transmission system could only handle old analogue TV, so I have been picking that up via a VCR tuner and DVD combination (I do not own a TV). Instead of TV, I watched the DVD of the disaster movie 2012. Nice special effects, but not all that sensible as far as I could tell.

I packed up the old ADSL modem router, since we no longer have landline phones connected. I do need to tell people to use my mobile phone number. I was able to connect to the Internet just fine via my Telstra 3G connected Apple iPad, and via my iPhone.

With no news agent or Post Office in Airlie Beach these days, I drove to the Whitsunday Shopping Centre around 7:40 a.m. It seems the news agent there opens at the traditional early hour, and I was able to get the weekend newspapers I so enjoy. I did a bit of an inspection of the shopping centre. An astonishing number of shopfronts are empty, just as had been suggested to me by local business owners. This included some that had been pushed out over a year ago. I do not understand the motives of the management here.

My parking space back home was still intact when I returned. I parked Jean's car, and walked the twelve flights back to the main street. The open air markets were in full swing, with parking in short supply (which is why I walk there). My favourite breakfast folks were there again, so I had my egg and bacon treat as I wandered the narrow paths of the market area.

Had a nice chat with Rex, who complained about parking near his stall. For some reason I did not have his email address in my phone, although phoning him works better than email. When I saw him later, he managed to see me a raffle ticket for a fund raiser for the Proserpine Citizen's Band. Despite a cutting breeze, it was warm in the winter sunshine, so I rather enjoyed walking around. In contrast, Rex was this time all rugged up in winter jacket, and looked cold.

Michael had managed a very neat looking stall for his return to the markets after a long absence. The display boards he had been working on last night were looking very effective. I was particularly attracted to the magnet display boards he had made using bright sheet steel. He later reported sales were good.

I had a chat with Glenn and Alison. Glenn had a skate boarding visitor, a young soldier from Townsville, and they planned to watch skate board movies all evening. So no party tonight. Jim was also away in Adelaide this time.

I came across Rocky Hannan, a new stall holder, who had two pocket Rum Reggae cotton tropical shirts from Indonesia. It is rare to find tropical shirts in cotton and similar breathable fabrics. Although they did not have the fierce brightness I desire in shirts, I bought eight shirts, partly to encourage this style.

I got through The Courier Mail during the afternoon, and started on The Weekend Australian. I also managed to read the April Analog, plus some other magazines that were in my ToDo pile. Alas, the back list of Science News still defy my efforts.

TV during the evening was the usual disaster, once the election campaign material was out of the way. I watched the science fiction movie Moon, since I had the newly purchased DVD.

Midday new Labor Prime Minister Julia Gillard announced the Australian election, to be held Saturday 21 August. So, it seems fear of being exposed as a money wasting spendthrift or being dumped by her backstabbing factional union mates in Labor is greater than the need for establishing incumbency by being Prime Minister longer than three weeks. Thank goodness we will be away during most of the tedious spin of the election campaign.

It seems the Labor campaign slogan will be Moving Forward. This meaningless phrase got repeated about 36 times by Julia Gillard during her speech announcing the election (and starting the campaigning). Moving forward aimlessly seems more like it to me. For once the ABC actually did some coverage of breaking news.

In theory I should like Julia Ginger Ninja Gillard. A avowed atheist, who sees little need to mouth platitudes to the remaining truly religious people in the community. While Australia is nominally Christian, the vast majority never attend church. Julia Gillard also sees no need to be married, and has for a fair few years lived with her partner without benefit of wedlock. I like both attitudes. However I am disappointed this free thinking does not extend to support for the concept of (civil) marriage outside heterosexual couples. Labor has lesbian cabinet ministers. Surely the issue has been raised?

In contrast, the Liberals are led by Captain Catholic, the Mad Monk Tony Abbott. He is very much a god botherer, a true believer. I fear religious intolerance. Religions have a long history of hate crimes against pretty much everyone. As well as the god delusion, they also appear to think anyone outside them cares about their doctrines. Like Gillard, Abbott seems to have little interest in careful economic management, which is about the only thing I really want a government to get right. As well as a qualified treasurer, I would like to see a finance minister capable of saying no on both sides.

The Australian Electoral Commission keeps the electoral rolls and organises elections. The Federal election was announced today, Saturday 17 July, to be held on Saturday 21 August. That means the writ will be issued on Monday 19 July, which means you must be enrolled to vote by 8 p.m. on Monday. You must update electoral details by 8 p.m. Thursday 22 July. You must nominate as a candidate by noon the following Thursday, 29 July, and candidates will be declared 24 hours later.

First, I checked my electoral enrolment information, since the idea government departments have of my address does not correspond really closely with reality (minor database issues). I will be overseas during the election. However this is a very temporary state. I completed an Overseas notification form, to cover myself if I could not manage to vote. Since I don't have a printer or scanner connected, completing the PDF form provided some interesting issues … especially signing it. The other issue is not having a postal address (not my fault - talk to the management of the twice closed Airlie Beach post office).

You can apply for a postal vote, and even do it online, with some difficulty. Unfortunately, timing issues make it unlikely that a postal vote would reach us before we leave Australia. After that, we are travelling by train until we reach Moscow, just prior to the election. No way to return the postal vote within the voting deadline, even if we can get our hands on one. This may be the first Australian election since I was of voting age in which I did not vote.

I finally awoke sometime after six, after a good night of sleep that I needed badly. My Sunday morning are usually occupied by watching the various public affairs programs on TV, while reading whatever remains of the weekend papers. Naturally enough, everyone was talking about plans for the election.

However politicians deal in announcements, and only rarely do they deliver on what they announce. I am really tired of bullshit promises from politicians, about things they are inherently unable to deliver. Entrepreneurs, importers and manufacturers tend to deliver, as do tradesmen and artists, and even freight carriers. I value all these folks far higher than politicians and their promises.

Having finished with the last of the weekend newspapers, I continued with the September Analog magazine, which arrived unexpectedly soon after the very late March and April issues. However these days I get most of my reading matter via the Internet. Today, I mostly read it via my iPad.

I was on the road again around 5:30 a.m. This turned out to be a bad idea. On the Bruce Highway, still in the pre-dawn darkness, a wallaby hopped across the road straight under my right hand tyre. It was too dark to tell how much damage the dead wallaby did, but the right hand front of Jean's car was making noises as I drove off. When it was lighter, I managed to pull some of the ABS plastic shell around the wheel a bit further out of the way. However without cutting tools I could not cut it away completely.

I could not connect to my iPhone via the USB hub on my Dell computer monitor. So I tried my USB connected Time Machine backup drive. No sign of that working either. I think the USB ports on my Mac mini have failed to come up when I came out of sleep last time. Very strange.

Putting the Mac mini to sleep and waking it does not work. I woke it via the Dell USB hub, which sort of proves it is detecting USB events. However there is no power going to devices I plug into the Dell hub. Nor is the backup drive waking.