As I stepped off the plane is Brisbane yesterday, I was filled with
excitement for the adventure that lay ahead of me. This was my first
time in Australia, and I didn’t quite know what it had in store for me,
but I knew that I would soon find out! Katrina Greeves of World
Nomads, who would be my chauffeur and guide for my short stay in
Brisbane, greeted me at the Airport. Once everything was dropped off at
the hotel, we headed out for an excellent seafood lunch by the river,
which was a breath of fresh air after my last five “meals” of typical
airplane fare. The rest of my afternoon was spent walking around
downtown “Brissy” checking out the shops and Chinatown. I kept seeing
signs for “Pokies” everywhere, which as I found out later, is
Australian for slot machine. Later on, back at the hotel, dinner
consisted of more seafood, though I was a little let down when I was
told that if I wanted to have a beer with my prawns I would have to
bring over a pint myself. On my way home, I’ll stop by again and try
and bring my own food as well!
This morning was early. Very early.
I got up at five to catch a 6:55 flight to Longreach from Brisbane. A
lovely Katrina once again picked me up, and a couple hours later I was
sitting in a 30-person propeller plane about the size of a school bus,
but with smaller windows! Once on the ground in Longreach I caught a
cab to the cattle sale yard to meet up with Jason Edwards of National
Geographic. Jason was to carry me under his wing for the next week and
provide me with mentorship on everything photographic. Wasting no time,
we got to shooting immediately, taking pictures of the cattle auction
as the sun started to drop towards the horizon. The cattle were kicking
up dust, which was catching that late afternoon glow and made for some
pretty spectacular shots. Our hotel for the night was booked in
Hughenden, a 5-hour drive from Longreach. This wasn’t a problem,
however we were faced with the dilemma of either staying and shooting
in this great light, but at the cost of driving to Hughenden in the
dark. Jason warned me that driving in the dark would mean dodging a
couple Kangaroos along the way, but I figured that the light was too
good to pass up and that the night drive would be worth it. So we
stayed.
We hit the first Kangaroo about 3 hours into the drive,
which I must say, seemed to be pretty good considering the hundred we
“creatively” dodged previous to that. It was a small young red that
leapt out at the last second, leaving a nice dent in the front corner
of our rental SUV’s bumper. A couple kilometers later we managed to
brake and swerve, just clipping the tail of a larger ‘roo. From that
point on, the remaining 150k into Hughenden consisted of me yelling to
a very tired Jason “LEFT!”, “RIGHT!”, “LEFT AND RIGHT AND RIGHT
AGAIN!”, “BRAKE!!!”. At times It seemed like they were just doing it to
mess with us. We would see a group of them sitting still by the road
and we would slow down, only to have them leap in front of our
headlights at the very last possible second! Bastards. As we drove into
Hughenden at around eleven to see the glowing lights of the Motel, I’m
not sure if I was more relieved that I wasn’t running over ‘roos, or to
finally wash off the cattle infused dust that covered me from head to
toe. Needless to say, I slept well, and got to sleep in that night.
Which is good because it was the only night of this whole trip that I’d
get to do so.
