my first visit to the land ..a story by montyp1

A story from montyp1 31.0708

..it starts with me musing on being born into a laconic society, full of
hope and promise, and sadly seeing a lot of that society disappear ...and
as I sit and write down these thoughts after a bubbly meeting that spilled
our members into the mists half way up a steep driveway in Olinda, a 'mopoke
owl' intrudes into them with its repeated calls that echo through the cold
mists of the early morning, 04.37.
In my warm caravan the radio, on 774 of course, rumbles softly with its
topics, callers and their jokes, and personalities.
I pause, and I wonder .....
Should we advertise this opportunity, to grow old on land we've built and
love, or just wait to let it grow in its own way.
Sometimes I feel I'm pushing a direction on you all;

In May when I agreed to visit I didn't realize I'd arrive first (before the 'convoy' ...that had
left earlier on a rainy, cold Sunday morning from Melb., Vic.) and I remember my frustration
at not being able to follow the map directions I'd been given by George.
I felt close and pushed on through Guyra at 12:25am (having left Sydney at 10.17am the previous day),
found the road that was the right name and the right
direction as those squiggles on the map, down the dirt road with farm
houses looming in from the night into my Cibie driving lights, and then I
struck an invisible barrier.
I found myself walking through farmers’ paddocks at 2:00 am for what seemed
like hours, trying to put gates and distances, land marks and road bends in
place ...cold and frustrated I tossed the options through the ‘salad bowl’ that was my mind by then,
...drive back into town and risk missing them (if I'm ahead of them), or sleep on the
road side and make them 'not miss me'.
I pulled the Ford well off the road and rolled my swag out in the soft
earth of the ditch, full of grass and mulch, lit a fire with broken dried
sticks from the council grader's travels and felt its heat warm my face.
Drawing the heavy canvas over my 'beanied' head to ward off the night dew I
aimed for sleep ...it came slowly, "should I have driven through that gate
at the end of the road I asked myself (yes, I later found out) and as I
pushed sticks into the embers and watched the fire crackle yellow and toss
red sparks up through twisting columns of eucalypt flavoured air, I ground
through the questions that jumped into my mind ...
"would this venture work ?, what were the plusses for this location and on
the negative side ...?, and lots more until sleep finally swept me away.

................The pre-dawn light filled the eastern sky with pale pink tendrils,
growing and stretching through far flung grey silhouettes of clouds.
I stoked the fire and rolled over the big log I'd used to cover the night’s coals,
a sheet of semi-wet newspaper was dragged out from under my swag
and I watched it smoke and splutter into a cold flame.
I plunged my hands into the smoke as it blew into my face
and breathed the scent of the moist leaves and twigs I'd stacked high.
Suddenly they popped and shot sparks everywhere, into my swag. I jumped out
and stood straddling the flames in my sandals and soft track-suit pants, and
my navy singlet and enjoyed the heat up my back,
...suddenly I wasn't alone.

Twenty or so black faced Angus cows were slowly strolling across the
paddock to visit me. I rushed to the car and grabbed my camera with its
tripod pre-attached for this reason ..
Luckily I'd picked a spot where the eastern light was behind me and their
faces were shadowed gently as I framed them in my view-finder and happily
clicked away.
A bold white face appeared, half blocked behind a black one,
...great tones ...what, …I pulled back from the camera in shock ...no cows
face was this but an Alpaca, curious with intense eyes. Where had he/she
come from? Why was an Alpaca wondering through a paddock full of beef cows
as they slowly fattened to fill the 'bellies' of fat city folk?
I looked into the cows’ eyes and felt their sadness.
I later discovered that Alpacas guard sheep herds and will fight off foxes,
what a battle of energies that
would be ...in the silent cold night air with the swirling rivers of ground
level cloud covering the foxes’ approach ....
A car’s engine crashed its noise into my ears, the contrast with the calls of the birds
in the early morning was, …big.
I walked over and stood beside my ute and watched as a white 4x4 came from the direction of town, ‘good, …going my way’, I commented to myself.
I raised a finger gently, and held it; the ‘standard’ traveller’s sign meaning ‘…I need to talk, will you slow …’,
As it did a couple in their late sixties looked at me, and my camp, and my car; their un-asked questions bounced out of their eyes.
‘Car looks OK / not broke down / no flat tyre / not local …?’
I asked for directions to Essington, the property name that the locals would know, ‘..follow us, we’ll show you,
Are you moving up here? …’

Eager to talk to a possible new neighbour they were happy to tell me about their (small) 1200 acre hobby farm where they ‘ …ran a few sheep, call in to see us, sure we can provide contacts for things you might need,
... no our kids aren’t interested in this part of the country, ... they’ve moved to Sydney …’
I kicked the fire apart, doused the coals with water from the jerry can that is ‘ ..always full, and in the ute at all times …’, tossed my swag into the tub where it squeezed in with builders tools (and a kitchen sink I didn’t remember packing) and started the engine.
It started first turn, and as I swung across the road, up over the verge, I took one last look at the cows, now with their mate the bull standing at their back ever watchful and protective; ‘ …poor buggers ‘ I muttered and then followed Don and his ‘missus’. I was eager again.
As we swung round a bend in the road the sun jumped above the horizon and splashed gold on my bonnet.
I should have gone through the gate at the road end, said Don, and sure enough 200 m in over the cattle grid
there it was, the turn off on my map with the signpost ‘ ..Essington Rd. …’
I was close, and pushed the pedal down a bit too far ….I didn’t know this road, had never driven along it in my life (at least not this life anyway), and so I couldn’t have known about the 100 degree bend that then dipped 22 degrees into a concreted causeway over Essington Creek.
‘ …Be nice to your new 4x4 Paul, don’t bottom out the springs again, please ..’, I swore at my rashness and ‘boyish’ driving skills. I reminded myself that Guyra, a town I had cruised through tired, at 90 kph, was 50 kms behind me and I really didn’t want to walk back there.
Now the signs on my map made sense, the fork in the road (devoid of its silver plating now!), the two gates ….
I was about to enter the property that had eluded me …. I felt my adrenalin rise, my gaze swung from left to right, through the bush, macro details, micro details of bush flowers and tree shapes, rock colours, all logged into my ‘old’ scientific brain.
My ‘geology studies’ seemed a long way back in my past now … ‘partially metamorphosed sand-stone, no, mudstone, but look, that’s an igneous outcrop, intrusion, good strength?, …the memories rumbled up slowly like a softening magma plug, I was in a place in my brain rarely visited now.
My body ached, my legs were stiff from too much driving, I longed for a hot drink. My ‘dilly-bag’ on the seat beside me offered me a banana, it tasted good and the skin went out to feed a native bush creature.
I opened and rolled through the entry gate, stopped and re-latched it …and then I stood still, and facing the road that led away to my right, toward the centre of the block, toward a house I knew was there but couldn’t see, I slowly opened my arms wide and said to the ‘land’, ‘…I am here..’

The sun’s early rays glistened from the dew on the trees’ leaves; they filtered its light as it shone over my shoulder.
I turned to face the East realizing that I’d been stopped from arriving until ‘my brother, the Sun’ could be with me for this my ‘first visit’. I thanked my ‘guides’ for getting me here and, as usual, knowing more than me, and rolled back in the seat, gunning the engine up a steep grass covered section of the track. The map made more sense, George’s squiggly line was quite accurate, I laughed out loud, I was tired, concentrate I told myself.
Then through the trees, across a big paddock, I glimpsed a roof ……
A new chapter, a new adventure had started for me ………..






‘ ….and you’ll only be able to find out about my campsite, and the ladder, the sunsets and the valleys we discovered and named, and the emotive tones in our voices as we discussed, and planned into the night, bellies full of the most amazing food …’ if you log in again, soon I hope,
‘…tootls-for-now, and sleep well’ ……montyp1 31.0708
..sorry if there's mistakes, I'll learn ....