"Build it and they will come" was the theme of the movie Field of Dreams.

 It didn't quite work that way for the inaugural West Oz Blues Festival held at Bolgart 9th,10th & 11th October. Unfortunate for the organisers. We, on the otherhand, were unfazed and enjoyed the opportunity to get close to the stars and not join the usual festival queues at the bar.

 We heard an interview on ABC radio about this festival when we were back of beyond, roughly 1,000 kilometres away, and decided on a whim to go. Not enough others did the same. Our generous estimate only raised a 200 head count at best and catering seemed to be for around 1,200 with four stages, lots of food vans and enough toilets and showers for the campers to use a clean one each day if we desired.  

Sitting around with a "Howling Wolf" Margaret River Red in hand, swatting flies, and enjoying first class blues, we had a chance to reflect on our recent outback travel. From fishing on an isolated beach at Shark Bay, to the fillies, both equestrian and human at the Landor Races, then on to Bolgart for the Blues festival. Three nice F words. We could also add that lovely F word friends to the mix as we enjoyed sharing our adventures with good company.

There are not many places left in the world where you can camp right on the beach, undisturbed by others. Our special beach was by permission only behind a locked gate. Once through the gate, a challenging four wheel drive track had to be negotiated. With our friends Ashley and Esther, it took us close to 3 hours through closed in bush, rocky tracks and soft sand to reach our camp spot. With both ours and Ashley's boats launched the next day, it was on with the fishing and relaxing. On day five we were joined by another couple of our friends Rob and Sharon and their son James. Enough fish were caught to cover lunch and dinner every day and the variety included Snapper, Spangled Emperor, Blue Bone Groper, Mackerel, Chinaman Cod and Shark. Campfires each night, snorkelling, walking, reading, gourmet food, and, of course, socialising with a drink (or five), filled in our non-fishing time. 

All too quickly our last day arrived. Avan and I went out for a last fish in our little porta-bote and out of the blue caught a largish shark. This shark threatened to jump right into the boat and then more or less towed us back into shore!  

After waving goodbye our friends we replenished our water, groceries and fuel and set off on the almost 800 kilometres of dirt back roads to take us to the Landor Races.

There is something special about outback races. Landor has been on our bucket list for a few years and the timing worked for us this year. The Landor Races are, unbelievably, in their 94th year. There is no town, and the actual race track is 28 kilometres from the station itself. Attendees and competitors all camp for the races (and also the Sunday Gymkhana). With flushing toilets, wood fired showers, a fuel truck for fuel sales, and an extremely well stocked bar it was luxury compared to where we had come from. No beach though to cool off and no sea breeze. Our friends Glenn and Jean were already set up when we arrived late on the Thursday night. Pulsing away as the background theme tune for the whole weekend was the noisiest generator I'd ever heard - a necessary evil to keep food, alcohol and ice ready for racegoers.

 With temperatures in the 40's everyday, swirling dust, friendly flies, and enormous double g's (prickles) everywhere we were certainly getting the outback races experience and some!   

Fashions of the field were a wonderful distraction between races. Outback fillies of the human kind donned stilettos and platforms then struggled through the dust in them. They looked ill at ease in lavish race day outfits, but relaxed slightly once a familiar stubby was in hand. The men wore gigantic new 10 gallon cowboy hats, neat checked shirts and riding boots. 

Back at our camp we enjoyed campfire cooking, sunsets and I learnt (thanks Jean!) that a gin and tonic with plenty of ice is a refreshing relaxer.

Saturday morning proved eventful. Avan lined up to buy fuel from the tanker only to run out completely whilst in line. Then of course it wouldn't start. After many people helping and offering suggestions it finally fired again.    

Did we win? Well we came out about even I think. It was a lot of fun making small wagers and cheering the horses on. The bar loosened some money from our pockets of course.

Tuesday after the races we headed off to spend one more night together camping with Glenn and Jean at Bylung Pool on the Murchison Track before going our separate ways. Our plan was to head over to the coast for some more fishing but as we set out, we heard about the West Oz Blues Festival. "that sounds like us", I said. Camping twice more on the way down, first at an old abandoned lead mining town of Geraldine and then a rest area inland where we met a lovely French couple and shared a bottle of wine, we arrived right as gates opened at Bolgart.

The blues performers line up was outstanding, with "Dreamboogie" being our favourite and especially more so when we found out the lead singer had our surname, Davey. Relaxing, albeit with an active fly shooing hand, and listening to as many performers as we could over three days was a dream - maybe even a dreamboogie??

So the fishing, fillies and festival are done and dusted and now to plan some more adventures.