May 1987: Camel Cup

THE U.S. AMBASSADOR AND THE CAMEL CUP

This is a narrative of the Alice Springs visit by the U.S. Ambassador to Australia, the week of the Camel Cup. However, before I start let me set the scene.

CAST OF CHARACTERS

The Grimms - I think you will admit they are definitely "characters"

Mr. William Lane - U.S. Ambassador to Australia

Harry Arnold - Sergeant in the N.T. Police Force. President of the local chapter of the Australian-American Association, and local "character"

The Nevada Delegation - The wife of the Governor of Nevada, the Wife of President of the Virginia City Chamber of Commerce and five camel jockeys.

The American-Australian Association - an organization formed 50 years ago to foster good relations between the two countries. The local division is the newest of 13 divisions here in Australia and is just completing its first year.

LOCATIONS

Araluen - The Alice Springs Community Arts Center which includes a theatre, a bistro, art galleries and other assorted rooms.

The "Old Telegraph Station" - the original site of Alice Springs. A telegraph repeater station was built there alongside a waterhole in the dry Todd River bed. The buildings have been restored and the area is now a historic reserve and a favorite picnic area.

Virginia City, Nevada - a town of about 750 people about 25 miles from Reno. The town has been holding Camel Races since 1960 with crowds up to 80,000 on hand.



THE ALICE SPRINGS CAMEL CUP
A yearly event that is similar to a carnival/fair centered around a day of camel races culminating in the Camel Cup. In addition, there is the "Honeymoon Handicap" in which the jockeys have to race half way around the track and pick up their lady and race back to the finish line -sounds easy but the camels are not very cooperative. This year there was also a match race between Australians and Americans (more later) and a game of Camel polo that I did not see.

I would also like to set the scene by relating two events that led up to the weekend. Harry Arnold attended the Federal conference of our association (Australian-American Assoc.) in Adelaide last year and at that time Mr. Lane who is the patron of the Association and who spoke at the conference told Harry he would like to come to Alice Springs as our guest. Consequently we invited him to come up for the Camel Cup. In addition to being our guest, he was also an official the Camel Cup (which is run by the Lions Club).

Dwight has really become involved in photography and has won a prize in a local contest, and in another show, sold a large print to a couple from Sydney - thus becoming a professional. Just last week he received a letter from Time/Life and thinking it was junk mail I threw it at him, joking that they were probably offering him a job. It wasn't a job offer, but it did invite him to enter a contest for young photographers, with a. deadline of 1 June. The contest is not for the best photo, but the best photographers, so requires a minimum of six photos, either as separate items or with a story line. The subject(s) have to be about American Society. I don't know if it'll be seen that way by Time/Life, but Dwight is going to enter a series of shots about a day in the life of a U.S. Ambassador. And now on with the story ...

The Ambassador and his party were due to arrive on Friday, 15 May. The two weeks prior to his arrival the number in his party changed daily, from two to four to eight and finally back to two. Then, his plane developed mechanical difficulties at the last moment and there was some question whether he was going to use commercial air or not. Apparently at that late date there was little chance of getting on a commercial flight, so he came in his plane, but the plane could only fly at 12,000 feet which meant it had to refuel along the way. I was to meet Harry Arnold at the airport to greet the Ambassador when he arrived, so the whole day was spent guessing when he was actually going to arrive. I finally heard that he was arriving at 2:30, so I left work about 2 and headed for the airport. Since Dwight was going to try and get some photos, he and his mother were also there. It turned out that the chiefs of two American installations here in town also felt they needed to be there, and in fact made a point of being the first ones to greet the Ambassador when he got off the plane. I realize there is a matter of protocol, but this was supposed to be a personal visit by the Ambassador as a guest of the Australian-American Association, of which Harry is the president and I am the vice-president. For some naive reason, I figured we should have greeted him on his arrival.

As an aside, the an official of the Canberra chapter of the AAA (Australian-American Assoc.) rang Harry last week and asked if he could send some lottery tickets up to us on the plane oh Monday for us to sell. Harry told him sure, but why not drop them off at the U.S. Embassy and get the Ambassador to bring them along. I guess he must have thought Harry had gone around the bend, but apparently he bought the idea, because as soon as the Ambassador arrived he made a thing out of officially handing over the lottery tickets to Harry and even asked to have some pictures taken in front of him presenting them to Harry.

Dwight was rather obvious, as the only youngster there and the only one there who looked like a photographer. The Ambassador struck up a conversation with Dwight, who explained about the contest and told him his idea about "a day in the life of an Ambassador." The Ambassador apparently was struck by the idea and he and Dwight became quick friends - he specifically looked around for Dwight on certain occasions to make sure he was present to get some shots. But that was only the start of it - more later.

Harry took the Ambassador and his aid to the Sheraton and dropped them off. He was to visit another installation outside of town during the afternoon. Our next commitment was that evening when we had scheduled a dinner for him at Araluen. Guests at the dinner included ranking people from the two American installations here in Alice Springs, and the Australian installation that the Ambassador had visited during the afternoon, the mayor of Alice Springs, Commodore Johnson who is the administrator of the Northern Territory, and the Nevada delegation.

There is a segment of the population in Alice Springs, and elsewhere in Australia, who are opposed to the presence of the American base where I work here in town. It is alleged to make Alice Springs a nuclear target. Consequently, we have periodic protests calling for its closure. Also, the lease for the base is due to be renewed in October and thus the next several months will be especially sensitive. The peace group in town found out about the dinner at Araluen and had a group there to protest. The police were aware of the protest and had a large contingent (more than the peace group) there for security. The protesters were fairly well behaved, only making a few comments when the Ambassador walked in. Someone in the group sent in a letter later on and the Ambassador took the time to read it and then went outside to respond to it. The discussion apparently was fairly rational, but I am sure it didn't solve any problems.

The dinner went well. The food was good. Harry, who can drone on gave a nice, brief talk and the Ambassador gave a somewhat longer but well received speech. An ABC newsman/cameraman man with the Nevada group filmed some of the proceedings. (When he arrived in town his camera was. not working, but fortunately someone in town was able to fix it.) The film from the entire visit, including the Camel Cup was to be shown in Nevada, and supposedly some of it on Good Morning America. Before the dinner ended, I invited everyone to a barbeque the following night out bush in a river bed.

The following morning the AAA had a small champagne breakfast (chicken sandwiches, champagne and orange juice) for the entire U.S. contingent at the Old Telegraph Station. It was a delightful breakfast - the sandwiches were good, the weather a bit nippy, but beautiful and a large flock of galahs (a common variety of grey cockatoo with a pink stomach) joined us. Following breakfast, the coach (bus) took the U.S. delegation back to the Sheraton and then on to the Camel Cup. I might mention the bus - it is owned by a local touring service. The inside is decorated with curtains and hanging plants. It has a bathroom, a kitchen and a bookcase full of field guides and a scrabble game!

During the breakfast, Dwight, who had stopped by before going to work in the camera shop, mentioned to local protocol man that he hoped to get some good pictures of the Ambassador at the Camel Cup. The guy said, "No worries. I'll get you a press pass." Some people just fall into it.
The Ambassador had said he wanted to ride a camel, so one was made available for him and he rode in the grand parade around the race track which opened the festivities. Dwight followed him around the track and took umpteen pictures. The Nevada jockeys did not fare well in the races. They are used to racing in a straight line, not around a track, and someone said they sit differently on a camel -which is an interesting question - just how many ways are there to sit on a camel. They came in last in every race including the International Race, Consequently, the Australians won the 4-foot high trophy that the Nevada delegation brought with them. It will probably prove to be a costly win, since it almost obligates the Australians to send a delegation to the camel races in Virginia City this coming September to defend the trophy. The Ambassador took 'part in the presentation of awards, then he and the Nevada delegation were taken back to the Sheraton.

That evening, as planned, we had a barbeque about 15 km outside of town alongside a dry river bed. I had wanted it to be set up in the river bed, but the bank is a little steep there and at night it was difficult to see to step down, though later a lantern was set up to light the way down. In addition, the Tourist Commission paid to have a local showman some out to demonstrate bush food, and it may have been difficult for him to pull into the river bed. By the time I got there, a fire had been burning several-hours, with a huge iron plate lying concrete blocks over the fire. The Lions Club donated a bunch of steaks, and between those and the food the local people brought, I don't think anyone went hungry.



The bush tucker (food) show seemed to be a hit. The guy showed how to cook the small frogs you can find around in the ground - a species which lives in very dry climates by burrowing in the ground, sometimes for years. He also cooked some witchety grubs - a white grub, several inches long which lives in the ground under specific bushes in the outback. Aboriginals and some white people can eat them raw, but they are also cooked. Let it be recorded that Jack was the only Grimm who tried a small (approximately 1/2-3/4") piece of one. It is difficult to separate in your mind the idea that you are eating a grub and trying to objectively identify the taste, but the impression was that there was little taste. The guy putting on the the show also prepared damper (bread) and spotted dog (a type of cake) which are both prepared in covered pots covered by hot coals in the ground. While the show was very entertaining and the Nevada group seemed to enjoy it, the whole evening up to that point seemed to revolve around them rather that the original idea of the Ambassador being our guest at a barbeque.

This aspect became even clearer when the ABC cameraman broke out a guitar and started singing American western cowboy songs. I didn't mind except I had asked some of the members of the local folk group to come-out and sing Australian songs, I finally asked the guy from the Lions Club who was taking care of the Nevada group if he could tactfully give the folk singers a chance before they left. He said it was too late, he was taking the group back to the Sheraton then, and he did. He did not score any points with our group.

After the Nevada group and the Ambassador left, some of the rest of us went down into the river bed beside a fire we had had going all evening and the three people from the folk group sang for well over an hour. One of the guys even brought along copies of the words to
most of the songs they were singing and a lot of us sang along. Toby thought that was great since he is learning to play the guitar and listening to the people play the guitar raised his interest again. Sitting there under the stars beside a fire and a big gum tree, listening to Australian folk songs was the highlight of the weekend for me - it's too bad the other Americans weren't there to enjoy it as well. The cold finally started to catch up with us, so around midnight we called it a night.

The next morning, one of the American installations in town had arranged for the Nevada group and the Ambassador to have tea and scones at the train museum outside of town, on the way to the airport. Unfortunately, the breakfast at the Sheraton ran long, so the people from Nevada and the Ambassador, who had some business to conduct that morning all arrived very late. So there was very little time to sit down and relax. While he was there, the Ambassador donated $1000 to help restore one of the old trains and he specifically asked Dwight to take the photo of the presentation, and also asked that the picture be used in the newspaper article. It was, with Dwight's name as the photographer.

Finally, it was on to the airport and farewell to most of the group (some of the Nevada people stayed an extra day to attend the beerfest in town that evening). The Ambassador flew back to Canberra via commercial plane because of the problems with his own plane, which had been taken on to Perth for repairs. The Ambassador made sure that Dwight got some last picture carrying his bags and heading for the plane.

As for the professional photographer, stay tuned. The local protocol man came over to the house last night to select photos, approximately 50 in all, to send to the Chief Minister, Commodore Johnson the administrator of the Northern Territory, the Ambassador, etc., and his office will pick up the tab. He also said that since his office does not have a big budget, he may ask permission for Dwight to cover other visits by dignitaries to Alice Springs.

April 1987: Alice Springs

We are moving into winter here in the Southern Hemisphere, and although we don't expect any snow, we have had some chilly nights already - when I say chilly I mean high 40's-low 50's F. Yesterday and today we even had some rain - the first in a long time. It is actually a pleasant change to see a bit of rain and gray skies -it breaks up the monotony of those beautiful sunny days with an incredibly blue sky that we take for granted in Alice Springs.

With the cool weather, some activities fall off (I believe the town pool closes this weekend) and other activities pick up. For instance the world-renown Camel Cup is coming up the weekend of May 16-17. The Australian-American Association is getting its act together to host the U.S. Ambassador, William Lane, here in town that weekend. We have scheduled a dinner for him Friday night, a champagne breakfast at the Old Telegraph Station (a historical reserve which is also a favorite place for picnics and barbeques for Alice Springs residents) on Saturday morning and a barbeque outside of town in a dry creek bed Saturday evening. In the interim he will be an official guest at the Camel Cup on Saturday afternoon. In case you are wondering about the barbeque in the dry creek bed, it is a great place to have a barbeque. You can just dig a hole in the sand, pull some dry wood from under one of the trees nearby over for the fire and throw a metal plate over the pit to cook on. Since you are in the creek bed there is no worry about starting a bush fire. There are a number of places you can do this not far from town, but far enough from the lights of the city that if you just walk a short ways from the fire you have an excellent view of the southern night sky, and if you have never seen it there is no way to describe it. One night out of town to see the unpolluted night sky with the Milky Way stretched out across the entire sky makes the entire trip here worthwhile. But I am digressing ...

A number of significant events have occurred in Dwight's life. His mother finally gave in and allowed him to drive her car by himself. He took his girlfriend to dinner and a movie (in the same building, the Community Arts Center, which has a Bistro), which is located a whole 7 blocks from our house. I kidded Dwight that he had to call when he arrived, but his mother wasn't kidding when she told him to. He called and I said, "Grimm's Wreckers" Dwight did not think that was funny. Anyway, I had to ask him if he had locked the car and turned off the lights. I am glad Dorothy was not my mother.

Dwight has also won second prize for one of his photographs in a Territory-wide contest and in another contest which just ended, we haven't heard who the winners were, but Dwight sold one of his photos to a couple from Sydney. So, now he qualifies as a professional photographer.
Toby has quite a few activities still going on - guitar lessons one day a week at school, bowling on Sunday evenings, French lessons and computer classes (after school) as part of the extension, or advanced classes he attends part time, and Sunday school. He is also the Captain of the "B" chess team of his school and they just had their first match against another school and did very well. He is justifiably proud that he is not only the only sixth grader on the team, but captain of the B team.

There are times when we don't see Dorothy for long periods of time. The weekend before last, the Australian National Folk Festival was held here in Alice Springs and Dorothy almost lived down on the grounds where it was held. The activities ran almost full time from 9 a.m. until well into the night Friday-Sunday. Then, she put in a lot of hours at the office typing up the articles about the Festival. I keep wondering if she is so busy now writing articles for a paper that is only published twice a week, how she is going to manage if and when they start publishing five days a week, as planned.

It appears that we are finally going to get out of Alice Springs. We are tentatively planning to fly on the Air Force plane (which flies into and out of Alice every Monday) to the RAAF base outside of Sydney in July. There we will rent a car and drive up into the northern part of New South Wells and perhaps all the way to Brisbane and back to Sydney to return here on the Air Force plane again. (I had thought about flying commercially out of Brisbane until I found out it would cost almost $1000). Anyway, I have put in for leave and if it approved I will start to plan the trip in detail. I am looking forward to it - we have been here in Alice for almost a year without leaving.

Well, I can't think of anything else fit to print so I will end my part of this letter and turn it over to Dorothy.

March 1987: Alice Springs

I'll try and bring you up to date on the Grimm adventures in the outback. Following the summer school holidays, which ended at the end of January, Dwight entered the llth grade and Toby started the sixth. Dwight actually is putting in some work and-according to him is learning something. He has two math courses that he says are not easy, economics that is his favorite (he sees himself as Alex P. Keaton in Family Ties), chemistry and technical drawing, which he appears to like. At this point, he has changed his mind about school and says that he does not really want to come home to finish at St. Stephens, but would prefer to stay here at least an extra six months to finish high school here. Discussions on that subject continue in the Grimm household and further episodes will no doubt be forthcoming - stayed tuned.

He is also working part time in the Alice Springs Camera Shop on Saturday mornings, if for no other reason to finance his passion for photography. He used the money he made during the summer to purchase a really good camera and is known all over town for his enthusiasm. Several of his pictures have been used in the newspaper. Dwight turned 16 in February and got his learners permit to drive. His mother started to teach him to drive, but for a number of reasons (nerves or lack thereof, as well the fact that the Datsun 210 is left hand drive) caused her to seek the aid of a professional driving instruction school - driver's ed is available in school, but you have to sacrifice a regular subject and Dwight wasn't willing. He finally passed his test to get a "provisional" license (the same as a regular license with some restrictions.) He got it last Friday afternoon and by the time I got home from work he and his mother were already at each other about him taking over the car. I love to start the weekend off with a good argument!

Anyway, things have calmed down for now and we will make an effort to see that he is allowed to get some experience before venturing out by himself. Dwight is still dating the same girl (Katherine O’Donoghue) he has been seeing for about the last six months and at one point in the scene last week Dorothy was encouraging him to get married and leave. Fortunately, I think, Dwight has more sense - though if I had a cute sexy girlfriend like Katherine when I was his age, I may have been tempted.

Toby appears to like school and is doing well. He was upset at the start of the term that many of his friends were in another class but has gotten over it. He is still taking guitar lessons, though with somewhat less enthusiasm. We are having one minor problem in that the teacher; he has doesn't like guitars with steel strings (versus nylon or whatever) and for a while wouldn't let him use his own guitar. We ignored her and last week he was able to use his own guitar. I am waiting to see what she says today. Toby was the only sixth grader to be selected for the school chess team (all the rest are 7th graders). Toby turned 11 about two weeks ago and asked if he could have some kids sleep over last weekend. I told him it was okay, but didn't realize the full extent of his plans. The party ran from 2 p.m. Saturday until almost 2 p.m. Sunday and involved seven 10 and 11-year old boys! We had hot dogs and sloppy joes (which are unknown to Australians) for supper and chocolate doughnuts and "junk" American cereal for breakfast. We rented a number of videos to keep them from tearing the house apart, and I took them bowling for a while, an experience I have vowed I will not repeat. I must admit I lost my patience Sunday morning when they woke me up at 6:30 a.m. (all yelling at once). I threatened to call all of their parents right then to come get them! That worked for about 10 minutes.

Dorothy keeps busy at work. She is always rushing out of the house, more times than not with camera in hand to take her own photos, to cover some event. She is well known in town and people, more and more, are requesting her by name to cover some event. The newspaper, which only publishes twice a week, currently, is making plans to go to a five-day schedule in the not too distant future. I believe they have already contracted to have a new building, all their own, built-for this expansion. It will be interesting to see how things will change.

I have also been busy. The Australian-American Association has become involved in more things. We hosted a group of Smithsonian Associates who were on a tour of Australia and who spent 24 hours here in Alice Springs. A group of about 10 of us met them at the airport and really impressed them. No one had met them anywhere else. We rode with them on their bus to a nice little restaurant outside of town and had lunch there. Then, we rode back to town with them and the bus dropped them off at the Casino, where they were staying, and I went home. That evening we had a barbeque for them at the Old Telegraph Station and it was really a nice evening. The weather was just right and we had a lady who is a member of our association and runs a couple of restaurants in town cater the food and it was very good. We also had a park ranger give them about an hour tour of the Telegraph Station and surrounding park area. Finally, and for me the highlight of the evening, was the participation of several members of the local astronomical society. A couple of members brought their large telescopes out and set them up and the first thing they showed us was the super nova (exploding star) that became visible here in the southern hemisphere not long ago. I may have missed Halley's Comet, but the last super nova observed was almost 400 years ago. Anyway, the people with the telescopes were really very patient and showed us a lot of sights in the sky - I could have stayed there for a long time, but we finally had to leave since the park closes at 9.

The Australian-American Association has also officially invited the U.S. Ambassador to Australia to be our guest here the weekend of the annual Alice Springs Camel Cup (a day of camel races), May 15-17. We are now getting ready for that. I made the mistake of attending a meeting for parents of kids who are in the talented and gifted program here (Toby is involved). A friend nominated me for secretary of the organization and I couldn’t think of an excuse. One of the first assignments I had was to write a letter to the Minister of Education of the Northern Territory asking, once again for an additional teacher for this program - there is one teacher now who works a couple of hours a week with these kids in grades 4-7. There are no provisions for younger kids and they are dropped after grade 7. I can see 'that this organization may keep me busy. Otherwise all of our regular activities continue (camera club, writing group, etc). We, at least the kids and I, watch quite a few videos, but haven't seen anything really memorable lately. The Community Arts Center is also running movies most weekends now and we have seen a number of films there, as well as some plays. Dorothy got quite involved with the cast from the last play that was quite controversial - about Aboriginal land rights. She even gave them a ride in her "left-hand drive" Datsun. Many Australians are intrigued by that feature.

We still have not been anywhere outside the immediate Alice Springs area, nor have any plans. I asked Dorothy about going over the short school break in April, but she explained that that was the week of the National Folk Festival here in Alice Springs. My God, we wouldn't want to miss that and, of course, no one but her could cover it for the newspaper - it's tough to be indispensible.

Well, I think that is about all I have. I am sure Dorothy will have something to add to this, so I will leave room for her comments.

September 1986: Bush Trip

(* Editor's Note: I consider this the first true Grimm Report. While notes were taken and written records filed previous to this account, the spirit of the Grimm Trip Report starts here)

I had promised Dwight that if we returned to Australia we would buy a 4-wheel drive and go out bush so that he could, look for rocks (a pastime called "fossicking" here. I have to admit that I was not actually looking forward to, the time that I would actually undertake the first venture, since I am not and never have been an outdoors type, nor am I mechanically inclined in case of trouble. So I was more than a little apprehensive about our first trip, and as it turned out -rightfully so - it turned into a disaster, though it could have been worse.

Dwight has been planning trips every since we arrived and eventually talked our friend, Ronnie, into going with him, taking our van, while I kept her Old English Sheep dogs. Dorothy said she would keep the dogs and I could go along. I still hadn't, decided, when Ronnie got sick and the doctor told her she could not go that weekend. I didn't want to disappoint Dwight so I said I would take him, I prepared the van, and in doing so found the spare tire was no-good, so bought a new tire and figured I was in good shape. I also put some gas in the extra tank that is in the van and that is when the trouble started. I wasn't even sure the tank was working properly and I thought the valve was in the off position. It wasn't, so about an hour after I brought it home from the service station, I tried to restart it and it wouldn't start. After trying for several minutes, I found gas leaking onto the ground. So I guess that the gas from the extra tank was pushing more gas than necessary into the engine, flooding it. I turned the valve off and figured that after the extra gas evaporated it would start again. More on that later. Dwight did a pretty good job of rounding up the necessary supplies, with the help of Ronnie. Our base here has camping supplies and she had reserved a lantern, sleeping bag, an iron cooking plate and some gas cans, which we ended up not using. Dwight planned, the remaining supplies, including the food. I guess by now it is clear that Dorothy and Toby were not going to make this trip. Dorothy doesn't trust my driving out bush, and Toby is not that interested.

We planned to leave as soon as I got home from work on Friday, so by the time I got here, Dwight had the van pretty well packed. I went to start the van and it still wouldn’t start, which gave me an uneasy feeling, but I figured if I got it started, it would sort itself out. I did eventually get it started and we left. We drove north for about 70km, then turned east, still on a sealed road (not really macadam, more oil and gravel and basically one lane wide) for another 70km. At that point we turned back a dirt road (past Mud Tank Bore – bores or water holes are key landmarks here) for about 10 km to the zircon fields. There were about six other groups camped there so I didn't feel too isolated, figuring if something went wrong I could get help.

It was dark by the time we arrived, so the first test was to pitch the tent by the light of the lantern and cook a meal. I got the tent up by myself while Dwight scouted for some firewood, which wasn't that easy. Since a lot of people camp there, there was not a lot of wood close by, but we eventually found some and got a fire started. You have to realize that I was never a scout and never camped in the "wilds" in my life. The only camping I have ever done was in organized camping sites in Europe, which have everything from stores to indoor facilities, so this was a challenge for me. We survived that evening and went to bed. Dwight slept in a sleeping bag on top of the van. I tried sleeping in the tent, but shortly after going to bed, the wind began to blow and even though I made the tent as tight as I could, it still "rattled" so I finally gave up and moved into the van for the remainder of the night.

The next morning, Dwight got up and started the fire and cooked breakfast. He made "jaffles" which are a sort of toasted sandwich made using a jaffle iron (a hinged long-handled implement you stick in the fire). They weren't all that bad. We spent several hours after breakfast, digging for zircons. We found some, but none that are of any real value. The temperature wasn't too bad, but the flies were terrible. There were always a half dozen or more buzzing around your head. We left the zircon fields and drove back to the "main" road - the sealed one on which you do see an occasional car - and drove another 24 km to the east, and shortly before our destination, some garnet fields just off the highway, the road turned to dirt. The other thing to mention is that this is considered a major road in this area and is called the "Plenty Highway." We spent about an hour and a half looking for garnets. Dwight found some very small ones; I found none. We ate lunch and then headed to the place that Dwight was most anxious to get to. This was the area I was a bit nervous about. It was some distance off the main road and not visited as much as the first place we had gone to. We turned off the main road and headed back dirt road. It wasn't a rough road - I never had to go into 4-wheel drive.

The only tricky part was a dry river bed. Dry river beds are a usual hazard here in the outback, because the bottom is loose sand and so it is easy to get bogged in them. One interesting feature we had to negotiate was a mob of cattle that we literally had to plow our way through - they wouldn't move. We continued on back that road for 23 km until Dwight spotted the area where he wanted to stop, I had to drive about 200 meters cross country through a fairly open area to the base of a hill topped by a beautiful column of quartz. It was a remarkable chunk of quartz and pieces of it lay scattered all over the hillside. We parked the van and walked across to it and up onto the hill. Dwight really wanted to go on to the next hill which was the location of a different type of quartz known as smoky quartz - it is a dark brown opaque rock which I believe is only worth something for specimen value I unlike zircon and garnet which can be faceted for jewelry.

After Dwight wandered off, I started to look around and noticed all of the many types of wildflowers on the hill, and. then gazed off into the distance and realized we were in a really beautiful area, surrounded by mountains in the distance, with wide open I fields close by, also full of wildflowers. I also noticed that I could pull the van closer to the hill so I would be able to be close to a supply of rocks to build an enclosure for a campfire later, so I walked back to the van to move it and also to get the camera. Dwight joined me about that time to get some more gear out of the van. That was when the fun started. The car wouldn't start. I readily admit that I was in a state of panic. I am not a mechanic, and I knew we were in an isolated area - we had not seen another car on that road. I told Dwight he could go back to the hill to look for rocks and I would stay and try and start the car I told him that I was sorry, but I was too nervous about this situation and if I got the car started I thought we should leave. About 25 minutes later, the car finally started after I played with the carburetor and kept trying to start it. We started back to the main road, and although I did not relax, I did breathe a sigh of relief.

However, it was relatively short lived. About 7-8 km up the road I had a sinking feeling that I had a flat tire. I stopped and asked Dwight to check. He jumped out and looked at me and said, "You have two flat tires." Although I didn't doubt him, I couldn't believe this was happening, so I jumped out and checked. Well, I had several choices - we could walk the estimated 15 km back to the main road, I could put the one spare I had on for one of the tires, but I didn't want to turn off the engine to do it and didn't think it was a good idea to change it with the engine running. Instead I ran on the tires, knowing I would ruin them, but figuring I could get us closer to the main road, before they fell apart. I got to within about 2-3 km before I knew I couldn't go any further. You can imagine what the tires looked like.

Dwight said he would go out to the road and try and flag someone down. I couldn't think of any better idea so after he left, I figured I would go ahead and take the wheels off so I could give them to whoever came, to take back to Alice Springs. This was one of those times when you wonder what else can go wrong. The lugs were rusty and two of the 6 snapped off while I was trying to get them off. I got the spare on the back and had no trouble getting the front tire off and left the van on the jack. I was almost finished when a carload of people pulled up with Dwight, They were going on in to Alice Springs and offered to take Dwight and the wheels with them, I have to admit by this time I was in a mild state of shock and didn't even get their names.I told Dwight that I knew it was too late to ask Dorothy to come back out that night and besides she may have trouble finding tires, so I would stay with the van overnight and she could come out the next day.

The car, with Dwight and tires, left me at 4 p.m Saturday afternoon. After they left, I just sat in my lawn chair and fought off the flies. I was really too depressed to read the book I had brought with me. It was like I had taken a course and when it got to exam time, I flunked. My first bush trip and I had screwed it up royally. I figured I would never hear the end of it, including the money it would cost to buy two new tires. As it got darker, I had to make a couple of decisions. Should I set up the tent? I decided I wasn't up to sleeping out there by myself in a tent, I would feel safer (I don't know from what) inside the car. I did start a campfire, but decided it was too much trouble to cook the steaks that we had brought for supper that evening ,and besides, by that time I had started to worry about Dwight, and I didn't feel up to eating. I worried that the two couples were trustworthy - reason said that since there were two couples and they had brought Dwight back to me to pick up the tires that they were OK. The other thought was that the Northern Territory roads are not the safest and I had no idea how good driver the guy was, except that they had traveled all the way up here from Melbourne, through some very desolate country, so guess they were OK in that respect, as well. Dwight told me later that they drove about 140km/hour (over 80 mph) on the way back. Leaving me for a moment, Dwight arrived back in town about 5:30 and as expected there was some question about getting tires on the weekend. They (he and his mother) were unable to find any that night, but located some the next morning at a Shell service station.

I guess the attendants got -a good laugh at the condition of the tires. Meanwhile, that evening, Dorothy was covering a big social event in town - a 4-hour fashion show and she and the photographer from the paper talked to a lot of people about finding tires. At the same time, Ronnie was calling all over town trying to find some help. I was sure the big news in town that night. I was, however, unaware of what was happening, and after the daylight faded, and I was even more alone with myself, my worse fears began to surface - not about myself, but whether Dwight was OK. I got some sleep throughout the night, but I was a nervous wreck by the following day.

Although Dorothy had located tires, she was afraid to drive her Datsun the 200 km to deliver them. To be honest, the car does not ride well. I think both front tires need to be replaced, Dwight called up a good friend of mine who volunteered to bring he and the tires out to me and brought his family with him to make it an outing. (After dropping the tires off he and his family had a barbecue at a place just off of the main road.) They arrived about noon. Although I had reasoned with myself that it probably would be noon or thereabouts before someone got out, I was starting to get a bit frantic, again not about my situation, but because I still didn't know if Dwight was safe. I had not seen another soul since the people had left me Saturday afternoon. No one came back that road from the time we drove onto it, so I'm glad we didn't wait for help to come in that manner.

Needless to say, I was very glad to see Dwight when the car arrived, We put one of the new tires on the front, and I started the car. Ironically, it started immediately. At that point, my friend Jeff, thought one of the other tires looked low also. It turned out it was only a couple of pounds low, so it must have been the way the car was sitting. However, I now had to worry about the wheel with two missing lugs, whether another tire was low, whether the car would restart if I had to stop it for some reason, and. whether the gas would indeed flow out of the extra tank because there was not enough gas in the main tank to get us back to town. Especially because of the missing lugs, I did not drive very fast back to town only about 60—70 km/hr so it took almost 3 hours. But we arrived, back in-town safely. Dorothy was glad to see us, and didn't even give me a hard time about my ruining two tires. I have to admit that I am not anxious to go back out bush, but if someone with-another vehicle, asks us to go with them I will consider it - but no more--trips with just one car.