The hot breath of a fire-breathing dragon

Day: 154 Stage three / total expedition days 545

Sunrise:
05:55

Sunset:
18:36

As the crow flies:
24,8

Daily kilometers:
30

Temperature - Day (maximum):
41.5° degrees, in the sun approx. 62°

Temperature - Night:
11.5° degrees

Latitude:
23°38'01.6"

Longitude:
142°19'43.5"

Winton Jundah Camp – 10/17/2002

Due to the increasing heat and the sun rising earlier and earlier, we decide to get up half an hour earlier today. In this way, we want to avoid having used up our energy by loading before we set off. Over the years, I’ve gotten used to the eternal morning effort, but as the season progresses, it gets hot with the first rays of sunshine. We have been using the tactic of getting up earlier as the season progresses since the start of the Australian expedition and it has worked well.

At 05:55, the first virginal rays of sunshine flash across the land. I interrupt my work for a brief moment to enjoy this beautiful moment when the surface of the earth begins to glow. At this time of day, everything looks peaceful. The gidyea trees glow green as if they had just sprung from a paint box. A few birds chirp their bright, clear song. The strong blue of the sky appears in a wide variety of delicate tones and nuances. Even the dry grass gives the impression of belonging to an idyllic picture. Our camels sit there peacefully and regurgitate their stomach contents to chew them up again. The sun’s rays now hit her brown fur. It really catches fire and I have to look twice to make sure that they are not suddenly hiding under a red robe. The subtle but intense colors flow into one another. Ochre yellow, reddish brown, pale green, pale blue, blue-grey, light blue and other shades that are hard to describe blend together to create a painting that only Mother Earth can produce. The warm, inviting light gives the impression of sitting in the center of a paradise. Nothing in this minute gives away the fact that things will really start to boil here in a few hours. At this time of day, nothing betrays the wave that is inevitably coming. A wave that will plunge the country into inhuman heat. A heat whose hot breath is like that of a fire-breathing dragon and will claim even more lives than yesterday or the days before.

LIKE A FEATHER THAT NEEDS THE WIND TO FLY

I’m loading Istan as the sun casts more and more of its lovely light. It becomes brighter, more glaring and the beautiful colors that just a moment ago painted the picture of a dream gradually disappear. The first drops of sweat run down my forehead as I put the water bags in Edgar’s saddlebags. After Jasper is also equipped for the day, the thermometer shows 28° degrees. “You’re ready to get up,” I say to Tanja, tightening a few straps on some saddlebags. While I clean my sunglasses, wrap the white scarf around my head and put on my hat, Tanja opens all the camels’ leg ropes and lets them stand up one by one. Our activities flow seamlessly into one another. Neither of us has one second less to do than the other. The hand movements merge into one another like shadow boxing. Slow but still fast and effective. Harmoniously, without having to speak a word, two people work together on the same thing, work in the same rhythm. We have become a unit that moves like a round ball. Like a feather that needs the wind to fly. A wave that piles up to glide into the valley. If we manage to reach the east coast. If we manage to take ourselves and our partners 7000 kilometers through this wild country, it will only be because we work together. Because our common will is behind it. Because we have a common goal and a common friend, teacher and ally… The desert and Mother Earth.

THE CIRCUIT OF DEATH CLOSES FASTER FASTER THAN BEFORE

At 06:50 I give the command to set off. We are 30 minutes earlier than usual and are delighted with this success. As soon as we leave the riverbed, the stench of decay hits us. Our mood is instantly shaken. Here he is again. The death of thousands of animals brought to Australia by the white man. Animals that have never existed here and are not made for such extreme conditions of resistance. “There’s a whole group of dead cattle up ahead. I’ll take a closer look,” I say to Tanja and grab the cameras. Five dead cattle ferment in the sun. Flies buzz around wildly and feast on the feast. The stench takes my breath away. I take a few photos so that I can later tell people about the consequences of this drought in a slide show. Then I discover wire loops wrapped around the cattle’s necks. I wonder what that means? A large drag mark on the coarse earth shows me that something dragged the animals here. Strange? What is capable of dragging a full-grown cow across the ground? I slowly follow the trail. Suddenly I notice tire tracks. A hundred meters further on, they end at a natural waterhole in a branch of the Mayne River. Two more cattle are lying in the waterhole. Their decaying carcasses contaminate the precious water, making it undrinkable for other cattle in the vicinity. The waterhole is becoming increasingly silted up due to the drought. As a result, the cattle have to trudge further and further through the swamp-like mire to quench their thirst. They get stuck and die. This now occurs at all waterholes, so that some station managers, who in some cases live out here alone, can no longer manage to pull all the animals out of the dams and waterholes. The consequences are of course fatal and the cycle of death closes even faster than before.

“Why do the dead cattle have the wire around their heads?” Tanja asks as I return from my short discovery trip. “I think Tiger pulls them out of the waterholes in his jeep that way,” I reply.

At around 13:00, the thermometer climbs to 41.5 degrees in the shade. In the sun it is well over 60° degrees. My shirt is soaking wet with sweat. Despite the heat, a light breeze makes it feel cold against the skin due to evaporation. An unhealthy constant thirst forces us to stop every 20 minutes at the latest to take a sip from our drinking bags. The water in the bag is soon as hot as the outside air. Rufus begins to refuse. We are worried about him. Although he rides Hardie and is therefore not exposed to the reflective ground temperatures, his black coat attracts the sun’s rays like a magnet. From 11:00 a.m. we get him off the saddle at regular intervals to give him the opportunity to drink something. To keep the water in our drinking bags below 60° degrees, we have already hung them on the right, i.e. on the south side of Sebastian. There they are not exposed to direct sunlight.

Exhausted, we reach Winton Jundah Road. From here we follow it southwards and thus take another long detour. About 50 kilometers east of our position begins the area where the infamous Desert Poison Bush is said to be at home. Especially in this heat, we are not happy about having to walk a 150-kilometer loop, but as Tiger said, “What’s a detour compared to dead camels?”

Just a few hundred meters after turning south, we look for a camp for the night on the Mayne River. We have reached our destination for the day at 30 kilometers and are longing more than ever for shade and to drown our terrible thirst in water.