Imported To Birdsville with bull dust

I was not the first of my family to order a beer at the Birdsville pub. Not by a long shot. In fact, before the first stone was ever laid to build either the pub or the town, my great great uncle, E A P Burt was out riding the red dunes in the area, scouting for a location to set up his store. Ebenezer Alma Percival Burt, nicknamed Percy, was my great grandfather's brother. He was one of the founding settlers of the place that was to become Birdsville. Percy owned and operated a large corrugated iron general store, called Burt & Co, opposite the Birdsville pub. The street fronting the pub and Percy's store still bears his name: Burt Street. For a while, in no-name land, the crossing where he set up his shop was informally called 'Burtsville', possibly an easy address for the Afghan camel drivers to recall as they began regularly delivering goods there, ordered for the run holders and workers of the Mulligan, the Georgina and the Diamantina.  ...

Cattle, the lifeblood of the outback Just a few decades ago, Innamincka was virtually a ghost town, its pastoral history its only real story. Back then, after the Burke and Wills exploration, early pastoralists moved their cattle up from the more populated southern states and Innamincka and Coongie became vast cattle fattening and horse breeding populations, all bought, at the turn of the new century, by Sidney Kidman, nearly 14,000 square miles of gibber and grass with access to the occasional water that flows south into the shallow inland creek beds.  The cattle station traffic encouraged the development of the small township of Innamincka, with a hotel, a store, a saddler's shop, a Chinese eatery and a police station. Nurses set up an Inland Mission to look after the medical needs of the widespread community, but, over time, that all came to a standstill, and it was only began to be revived after oil and gas were discovered in the surrounding Cooper basin after the ...

Crossing into South Australia from Queensland The flatter it gets, the drier it looks, the less it seems likely that life can be sustained out here. Yet beneath the wheels of our vehicles lies one of the largest water basins on the planet: the Great Artesian Basin. Which behaves much like a giant sponge, soaking up water over the millennia, collecting it in impermeable underground holes and tunnels, caves and niches. Two hundred million years ago this great flat dry land was covered in water. In parts of this basin you can still dig up sea fossils from that time. Back then the northern part of Australia tipped towards the sea. Not just once, but three times. Sea water flooded in, filling up these giant inland water bowls. Rain water funnelled underground from natural 'drain pipes' high in the eastern and northern mountain ranges.  The 'piped' water behaved the way water typically behaves, gradually being pulled down and down by gravity until it fi...

Turn left at the Bowra postbox to our camp We stop at Bowra where daytime bird watching and evening bird counts are on the agenda, but this time our grey falcon has flown elsewhere. Bowra is now owned by the Australian Wildlife Conservancy who, with the help of volunteers, keep this unique and protected property open for birdwatchers. It is a patchwork of ecosystems encouraging great diversity in bird habitats, and one of these was our water viewing spot under the red gums beside Gumhole's Creek.  We camped near the old shearing shed still kitted out in its original shearing gear with wooden floors rich with wool oil that most home owners would die for.  Some thoughtful volunteer has built a temporary shower amidst the industrial relics using wood studs tacked with tarpaulins for walls and gallons of hot steamy water on tap at the end of a dusty day.   The road is narrow, the land flat, the sky huge, as we head west in the morning. We call in for s...