After returning from life on the road, I spent some time thinking about ‘what’ as opposed to ‘where’ I would like to explore.
Imagining in Melbourne
The final stretch
Being in the right part, of the right country, at the right time has opened the door for so much exploration.
Down the East Coast
Drawn to the water, I sat myself on one of the sandstones that formed over thousands of years. Gazing over the beach, I was swept away with the enormity of the coastline. With the view framed by Tin Pan Bay and Double Island Point, all the senses came to life.
A gentle desert
When the rains came, they told me I was ‘stuck’. Unless I wanted to retrace my steps back along the bitumen, travelling the Oodnadatta Track would require an extreme patience and a real slowing down.
Time for a shower
An evening in the wind tunnel was a stark reminder of how being in the wild pushes your senses to the edge.
Clinging to the Great Dividing Range
It’s often said that Australians hug the coast. What I’ve learnt travelling across New South Wales is that we cling to the Great Dividing Range.
No time for agendas
Trying to attach a person’s political views to their position on COVID-19 is a fairly fruitless activity. Take away the extremes, and there is a world of convergence.
Life over the border
I had to adjust to two realities. The first was that if I didn’t want to be in ‘lockdown’ then I would have to stay on the road. The second was that to be on the road I would need to get over the sense of guilt that goes with having that freedom.
Imagination’s edge
Bourke has drilled home how comfortable I’ve become in my own Australian bubble. It’s been a painful reminder of how little time I spend thinking about and even more importantly feeling the legacy of dispossession and subjugation that the bubble is based on.
As the cloud lifts (…in Australia)
In a few days, much of Australia will move to further ease restrictions that have stopped our worst health fears in their tracks. The changes are already palpable in Melbourne.
