I took a bit of a drive further west of Charleville, and tried to set down and do a few typecasts, and perhaps write a couple of letters. The bonnet of my car can make an interesting desk.
All photos can be clicked to enlarge them.
Seriously, they ain’t kiddin’.
The Exxy gets a Typewriter supercharger. Typing here on here was quite fun. Except for the wind.
Just a quick pose before I move on.
This road has been torn apart by mining activity and flood. There’s actually a hint of the original sealed road here.
This shot is quite spectacular at full resolution. I think I might make a poster out of it.
Take my back to town, oh Ruby!
Man…. I really need to refine my ‘Its & It”s’. I swear, I do know better!
The Filthy Platen 
Outback Typecast = Outcast? Typeback?
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Ha ha ha… It almost sounds live a very rejected typecast.
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Ooh, love that shot of the lone typewriter on the dirt road.
Yeah, make a poster out of it.
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Wonderful. I agree, the Remington on the red road makes for a great image.
Is that a roo bar on the front of your car? A relative who knows more about Australia than I do mentioned these when I was describing your adventure.
I am looking forward to seeing the Morse typewriter. I believe I know what you're talking about thanks to Robert Messenger's research.
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Scott, this is a great trip, thanks for sharing it with us. My mother was able to fufill a lifetime wish of a trip Down Under some years back, sticking mostly to cities and universities, but with some touristy trips including a jaunt out to Uluru. To say that I'm jealous isn't strong enough. This photo journey is perhaps the next best thing.
The Remington on the road photo is stunning.
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Those are what some of your roads look like? First off, beautiful (although I can imagine a pain)…and man, I thought I had some back-ass roads around here!
Great post. That picture would definitely look amazing as a poster.
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Thanks…. It is one of my favorites!
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Unfortunately no, that's only a 'Nudge Bar'. A full Roo bar is much bigger, and typically uglier.
And yes, Rob has blogged about the Morse typewriter before. It was great to see (and get my hands on one) in person. That's not the special typewriter I wrote about the other day though, as I'm keeping that as a surprise.
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Well, this was only a short trip. But I'm certain there will be more in the future.
The universities would have been interesting! And Uluru is an amazing place. As well as the areas surrounding it.
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Charleville sits at the edge of the domesticated part of Australia. We have a term here 'Out the back of Bourke', which basically means that anything west of Bourke is mostly wild and undomesticated. Charleville sits just north of Bourke, and is the last major town before you go deep into outback Queensland. While the government tries to keep most of our roads sealed with bitumen, once you get past places like Charleville, only a handful of highways are maintained. As such, the majority of the roads are like the red one above – Where they have just bulldozed a path out of the dirt, and packed it in by wetting it and running a heavyweight roller over it. Sometimes they don't even wet it. But whenever there's a lot of rain, you'll see them getting out there with the rollers.
The trucks that run these roads generally pack it down tighter afterwards. That red dirt road was smoother than most of the highway I had driven on. You just don't want to have to hit the brakes suddenly on such roads.
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Wonderful pictures!
I kept wondering if the Remington got dirty and dusty sitting out there in the road.
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Thanks Cameron.
Well, the reason I took the Remington was because it was a lot more robust. Having said that, I kept the typewriter away from the big trucks when they came along, but the dirt is packed really tight on these roads, so it was actually a very solid piece of earth I placed the Remington on.
On the earlier road, I parked my car upwind of the dusty road, so anything that came by wouldn't affect me. It wasn't there long, as it turned out to be too windy.
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Beautiful views of a very foreign landscape. The soil on the road is so red. It looks a lot like what passes for dirt here in Phoenix.
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You know, I'd love to see Phoenix some day. I'm sure it would be a very different world though.
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