A Break Along the Yellow Brick Road, Mate!

Alice Springs, NT, Australia

As a reminder, I have been back from Australia for a little while now and am simply catching up from where I left off before Christmas on Facebook.

Uluru and Kata Tjuta were only the beginning.  Jennifer, Dany and I still had another four days of Outback experiences ahead, but for now, a little down time was needed from the insane early morning wake-ups. 

Alice Springs, middle-of-nowhere Australia, had its humble origins as a telegraph post in the latter half of the 19^th century in hopes of connecting Adelaide and other settlements in the southern part of the continent with Darwin in the north, and thus to the mother land of Great Britain.  If it wasn’t for gold, Alice Springs may have simply stayed a minor, yet important, outpost of communication.

But as became a major part of Australia’s transition from penal colonies to a challenging land of opportunity, gold would ensure the town to rise in population but subsequently arouse conflict with local Aboriginal peoples who have claimed the land for thousands upon thousands of years.  In the modern era, Alice Springs harbors a relatively large Aboriginal population in comparison to other Aussie cities, seemingly keeping to themselves with little indication of interaction with other people.

Not to show any disrespect or imply anything, but I was curious as to why the Aboriginal population seemed highly segregated from the rest of the people, and our next guide for the second portion of this Northern Territory journey would shed a little insight as to why this could be the case.  You’ll just have to stay tuned to the next episode of Dragonball Z for the answer, because Son Goku might actually scratch his ass and Freezer might pick his nose after staring at each other for the previous ten episodes.

In the modern era, Alice serves as a base for Outback exploration and expeditions out to Uluru and Kata Tjuta.  It’s also good for watching tumbleweeds, filling in a dot on a map of an otherwise empty center of Australia and having annoying drunks interrupt conversations with girls.  But even if the telegraph is caveman technology and gold has been all but used in the grills of annoying rappers, the town still harbors over 20,000 inhabitants with a few interesting sights to keep the traveler happy for a day or two. 

Anzac Hill, named after the famed World War I army corps consisting of Australian and New Zealand soldiers that formed in Egypt in 1915 and would go on to serve with distinction in the Battle of Gallipoli the following year, features lovely views of the surrounding landscape, showcasing a vibrant landscape with a taste of hills not always associated with the Outback.

Doesn't it seem like a charming place to live?  It would be if it weren’t for the oppressive heat that can easily rival, if nor surpass, the heat experienced throughout the American Southwest during the middle of summer.  That and the fact, even today, it’s still heavily isolated even though several arteries connect the town with the rest of the nation.

With the soft breeze of a searing spring day and hilarious cultural observations and questions, we walked through the artisan Todd Mall into the heart of Alice before heading north to the Royal Flying Doctors Service Museum.  At first, I wasn’t too keen on the idea of the visit, but once inside and learning the history, it suddenly became a dynamic curiosity.  Beginning as a vision of Presbyterian minister The Reverend John Flynn, the Flying Doctors Service began service in 1928 and expanded throughout the following decades to encompass 61 aircraft and 21 bases around the country.  Their mission is to provide both preventative and emergency medical care for people living in the scattered isolation of Outback reality.  In a punishing land of minimal resource and vast distance (but immense cultural and spiritual value), even “casual” cases such as a leg break can quickly descend into a medical emergency of medieval proportions.  When the call is put on, an aircraft loaded with medical and navigational goodies flies to the rescue, and people can breathe a sigh of relief as the plane flies away and they don’t hear the brooding voice of Dr. Claw growling “Next time, Gadget, next time.”

Why an animated villain of a cartoon character portrayed by Matthew Broderick in a mistake-of-a-live-action-film would be in an Aussie medical Cessna is beyond me, but hey, my subconscious has jumbled together plot ideas far weirder than that.

And they also can emit a ray of hope as their loved one will be flown to a hospital for the best care possible.  I wonder if they give out free lollipops and other goodies as cathartic distractions?  What if they had the latest movies and television entertainment to choose from?  I mean, think about it, watching Matt Damon kick ass in Elysium while you have a bone sticking protruding three inches from your leg…. I just hope they don’t show that scene from the NBC show, Revolution, where the Google geek bandages up a compound fracture….yikes.

Enough of leg breaks (tell Anderson Silva that one!).  The point is the Royal Flying Doctor Service is a vital institution for the health and safety of the hardy Aussies who call the unforgiving beauty of the Outback their home.

And to round off a pleasant, non-gruesome injury-of-a-day in Alice Springs, Jennifer and I indulged in a sunset camel ride, where our 17-year-old guide from the  Australian East Coast led our caravan while explaining the importance of these creatures to settling of the outback.  For the first half century of their arrival in Australia from India and other places, camels became instrumental in the settling of the lands in the Outback and Western Australia.  With the arrival of motorized transportation in the early 20^th century, camels were no longer needed as pack animals and were given their freedom to eat, drink and sleep with other camels at their own leisure.

Some estimates have the feral camel population at over 1 million with the capacity to double in population every nine years.  Other estimates, however, claim the 1 million number is an exaggeration and that the actual population is only approximately half that.  Regardless of who’s right and what sort of drinking game could possibly be created from this argument, we got to ride a camel and it was cool.  Unlike my first camel ride on the Canary Island of Lanzarote in 2011, I did not lose my cell phone this time and have a miraculous reunion with it several weeks later (that Blackberry would go on to die just a month later).

And so it was, a quiet night descended upon the heart of Oz as the mental preparation for the northbound journey began.  No yellow brick road here, just the paved path to the unknown.

So stick around, because the story gets a little crazier.  You might even get to meet a kangaroo with a special name.