For a long time Jorge and I have been talking about travelling to the outback and hunt the big game of Australia: pigs, goats, wild cattle, etc.
One day Jorge’s friend Harry, owner of the Gooyea Out Station invited him to go there and shoot some feral animals before he hands over the farm to the new owners (Harry sold the farm and leaves in February). We got all excited and decided to accept the invitation and head to the outback.
The problem we had was that both Jorge and I are men of few words and to endure a long trip we needed someone that could keep us alive.
We decided to invite Cagi and the three of us travelled to Gooyea (13 hours and 1,050 km on the road). The trip took us through Toowoomba, Dalby, Miles, Roma, Mitchell, Charleville and Adavale and Cagi never stopped talking even though he had arrived the day before from a 15 days tour of New Zealand. Good on you Cagi… you made the trip feel shorter.
We left Brisbane at 4:30 am and for the next 13 hours we had only brief stops for fuel, a cold beer and visit the loo. As we travelled towards the center of Australia the mercury in the thermometer expanded and reached 42 degrees by the time we arrived at Charleville.
From Toowoomba onwards we had phone contact only at the villages and from Charleville we said goodbye to our mobile phones. From Charleville to Gooyea ( 240 km) we had no way of contacting the outside world and we met no one on the road. The Navman GPS showed the way until Adavale, but after that the screen was blank.
The second GPS (Jorge’s EBay bargain) only indicated the Longitude and Latitude of Gooyea but gave us the warm feeling that we were going in the right direction. From Charleville we said goodbye to the sealed road and from Adavale we only had Harry’s brief tips to guide us through the maze of tracks heading to the several stations in the area.
However everything went well and we arrived at Gooyea Out Station at approximately 5:00 pm with only one wrong turn on the way out of Adavale. The next pages try to give and idea of the 4 wonderful days we spent with Harry at Gooyea Out Station. Enjoy it…