Last Night in Longreach

My last night here in Longreach. Its bitterly cold and the wind, in Julies eloquent words, is described as smelling of penguin shit…. or polar bear arseholes…. humm classy - thanks Jules!!

 The rain has made it over from Bedourie, where one of Dougals crushing plants is currently…. Which means that things will halt and hunker down till it stops raining… again... 

I’d love to go and see the channel country now and compare it with the thick dusty roads we drove through for thousands of miles last year.  I caught up briefly with my brother Geordie who’d flown in from Birdsville on the weekend.  He reckons the countryside is incredible, transformed into huge lakes, vegetation and flowers. seems almost impossible to me - having see those long read expanses.  It was like driving on the moon. Not a stick, not a blade of grass for thousands of Miles. Poor old Bourke and Wills.

Having been here a number of times theres only so many times you can do the touristy stuff.  I’ve really come out here to see Jules and the kids - so that my kids can continue to get know their cousins and to experience some real Australian bush life.  Julie and her gang drive to mum and dads for Christmas every year and we generally spend two weeks with each other a year.  Its really not enough.  Every time we part I cry. I know I’ll cry tomorrow.  Distance kind of makes you forget how nice it is to have  a sister.  Someone who knows you so well that you don’t really have to talk. Boy and I am lucky,,, or unlucky.  I have three sisters all thousands of miles away from me in far flung dusty country towns. And its times like this I really really miss them. 

Poor Lilly has been crying alot tonight. She has had such a wonderful time with her cousins. 

and I totally understand. When I was growing up, we had cousins who lived in Mackay who we only saw once a year.  We adored those times and were so close to them as we grew up.  you know its crazy too. We didnt’ grow up in a luvy huggy kissy family.  But you knew where  you stood and that your family was always going to be there; you just have to say the word and you know they will travel thousands of miles to be there.

We’ve already begun planning our next trip out here. Julie and Dougal both turn 40 next year - so its got to be a big shin ding!  Morgan has committed to mastering riding his push bike so that at Easter next year, he can learn to ride a motorcycle. We will all get a bit better at our fishing skills ( like the tying of knots) so we can go fishing in the boat next time as well.

I’ve been posting photos up of our trip onto facebook - so go over there and check them out.. with my new Iphone - I’ve gotten very lazy with all of this - its so easy to upload to facebook I just don't do my blog much.. 

I've done this as an Audio Boo here   and there was a quick one done when I was in Roma on the way home here. 

My Audio Boos get posted directly onto my Facebook  - all you need to do is click on them while you are scrolling down and checking out what other people are doing and it will play in the background... otherwise just go to my AudioBoo site and follow me from there.  Every Sunday I will be reading one of my short stories - first drafts of them at least.

cheers!!