Longreach - 13th September 2008

Longreach Car Kilometers: 177,693

Distance Travelled: 659km

Total Distance Travelled: 9442km

Mount Isa to Longreach was a long drive of around 650kms, and if anyone is following the route on the map it may seem a little off route as by this time we were heading over towards the east coast. It did in fact add around 200kms onto the trip east but I feel under the circumstances this was well worth it. The circumstances I am referring to are the fact that Longreach is the home of the Qantas Founders Outback Museum. This may seem like a small thing to deserve a 200km detour but as anyone who knows me will understand, anything with planes involved is a strong draw. This had the added draw of having a jumbo jet.

The journey was through the Queensland outback bush and was made up of grasslands, termite mounds and thin trees that have no shadow. The drive was only broken up by changing drivers and we were both tired by the time we arrived. Longreach only has a population of just over 6000 and because of this doesn't feature as a prominent destination. The result of this is that there are no sleeping options in the bible and we rely on the popular bill board advertising that many of these small towns use and follow the signs to a small caravan park just on the edge of town. We manage to squeeze into the last area on the site which was full with a combination of Grey Nomads, us and long termers living on the site.

The first thing we realise is that this was probably the friendliest site that we have stayed on. Before we had even got the tent out we had said hello to at least 10 people and invited to the twice daily morning and afternoon tea or 'smoko' as it is known. Just as we had finished setting up we had a visit by 8 year old 'Blade' who told us his, his mothers and his grandmothers life history over the next 45 minutes or so before we told him that we were going to have some dinner. Although it was a bit disconcerting being on a site this friendly did have its positives. Halfway through blowing up the air bed, the (already a bit sporadic) pump decided it was time to expire and gave up completely. Luckily a couple of 'hello's' later we had located another friendly camper with a compressor who blew it up for us.

The next time the friendly site was really useful was about 7am the next morning. We both woke up about the same time and after a quick look outside realised that anyone leaving that day was packing up rapidly as a very big black cloud approached. We had not had any rain since our last day at work in Perth but were both confident the tent would be watertight but we hadn't thought too much about why this was the last site to be taken. As it turns out this was the last site because any rain congregates right in the area of what was now our porch! We realised this over the next 15 minutes or so and by this time the front corner of the tent was about two inches underwater. Luckily for us, not only did most people on the site know who we were they also knew that we were quickly sinking and within a few minutes, and the help of around 5 other people, we had unpacked the tent, dragged it back to higher ground and re-pegged in what was hopefully a safer area. We were even made a cup of tea in the middle of this.After all this the last we could do is go to morning tea and have a chat. We also decided to stay another night as much because of the people as the fact it was a Sunday we couldn't buy a new pump until tomorrow. If we moved now we would have to blow up the air bed without the hand pump, and neither of us fancied that idea.

By now it was time to visit the reason we were there and we headed off to the Qantas museum about 5kms away. We didn't really need a map as, in a town of 6000 people all living in bungalows; you can see something as large as a Jumbo Jet from quite a distance away.We went in the museum booking the Jumbo tour for a couple of hours later and spent a happy two hours learning all about the founding and development of the Queensland and Northern Territory's Airway Service (Remember that for pub quizzes). The jumbo tour was guided by a girl of around 20 who, surprisingly, seemed really genuinely interested in aeroplanes. We got to see into the hold are and under the plastic interior into the fuselage of the plane. We even got to see the upstairs bit and the cockpit, although in this one the upstairs bar had been removed and economy seating had been installed! She also told the story of landing the plane in Longreach on a runway less than half the normal length for Jumbo's and with only about 2m clearance in width, during this one you could almost see a tear in her eye.

Apparently the plane (it was a Boeing 747-200b for anyone who is interested), was donated to the museum by Qantas on the 100th anniversary of the airline and is the only fully working jumbo jet in any museum. It was worth $5 million as scrap but Qantas decided the museum was the place for it. The museum is not part of Qantas but I think the fact that it is called the Qantas museum, is in the place where Qantas first started and is run by a man who was a senior pilot for about 20 years, may have had something to do with it.

There were other planes there, a DC10 and a model of an older plane and a Boeing 707 that was currently being restored. This was the first 707 that Qantas had owned and was found practically abandoned at an airport in Southport about 5 years ago. The only other Qantas 707 is owned by John Travolta and there were pictures of him and the 2 planes on its way back to Australia.

We just about managed to get through everything in the museum and I made a mental note to go back in about 10 years as if the expansion plans are anything to go buy it should be an impressive museum by this point. I am not so sure if Jemma will be up for that trip but I have 10 years to work on it!

A last walk round Longreach in the morning and we briefly crossed the tropic of Capricorn again before heading back to the campsite. We also invested in a new pump and a few desperately needed tent pegs. After a nice Aussie pie we walked back to the car and the pavement we had walked along about half an hour before there was now a car embedded into the wall of the pub! The police and ambulance were there but the old lady driver was sitting on a chair and she seemed ok luckily. We think she had put the car in drive and not reverse. What was stranger was the fact that we sat outside for our pie and heard or saw nothing.

It was a nice town and very friendly but we both agreed that it is probably not a place we could live despite the jumbo jet and 20 year old female aeroplane fanatics!!