16/7/12 - 19/7/12

This week just involved a lot of driving and ending up in Darwin.
After saying goodbye to the crew at Daly Waters the next stop was at Katherine where I needed to fuel up old Freda.
I was pretty impressed that she made it from Threeways to Katherine on less than a tank.

680kms on less than a tank..Go! Freda! Go!

I then kept driving and spent the night at Noonama, about 50km out of Darwin.
I was hoping for a relaxing swim in the pool there until it was overrun by about 10 kids. One kid in particular was a real bad seed and I've taken note of his name as I guarantee he will be on "Australia's Most Wanted" list in about 10 years time.
The next day I made it to Darwin.
It seems like a pretty nice place - I thought it would be bigger but first impressions are kinda like Cairns.

Driving into Darwin

I went for a bit of a drive around the place then went for a walk once I had my bearings.
The waterfront area is pretty nice and very reminiscent of Cairns, especially with the wave pool.

Wave Pool......yeah!

After dinner I parked Freda at the Esplanade and sat outside taking in the balmy evening and wonderful warm breezes.
Again, it's hard to imagine it's the middle of July.

Darwin Esplanade..check out those colours

The next day I caught up with Eva whom I last saw at Cape Trib.
She's had an eventful last couple of months which included blowing out a tyre and rolling her van (poor Sam!).
It was good to see her again and we spent the day hanging out at the Waterfront then in the evening we went to the Mindl Beach Markets.

Mindl Beach Markets

There were heaps of people everywhere, lost of food stalls and live music - a really good atmosphere.

Eva's probably gonna kill me for posting this pic but....pffft!

After dinner we walked down to the beach and had a couple of drinks and waited for the famous Mindl Beach sunset but unfortunately it was thwarted at the last moment by clouds - bummer!

Damn you! Clouds!

After that we sat and listened to a band called "The Lucky Wonders" a group of girls from Byron who were pretty cool - reminded me a bit of Frente.

The Lucky Wonders doin' their thang..

The next day was just spent hanging out and getting ready to board the Ghan (destination Alice Springs, Adelaide, Melbourne then back to Darwin again) and see what the next chapter of this journey will bring.

15/7/12

Another highlight day "on tour' today.
The destination today was the famous Daly Waters Pub.

Daly Waters Pub

I got there and met the lovely Robyn who gave me a camping spot and said I will get a free feed and beers tonight.

Prime spot near the stage.....and toilets

I also met Chilli who is the main act every night and a nice bloke. He showed me where I'd be playing and the PA I'd be using.
It was then time for me to take a few pics around the place and do a bit of yoga as I pulled up a bit sore after my jog yesterday.

Note the brazierres hanging to the left

Aussie-as

Thong Tree!

Before I knew it, it was showtime and I got up on stage and did my thing.
I didn't know what to expect from the crowd, whether they'd be rough and demanding, subdued, respectful, or whether I'd just be background music while they ate.
It turns out they were really into it and it will go down as one of my most memorable gigs yet.

Daly Waters crowd - goodonya!

Chilli took this pic of me in between songs

I was asked to play a little ditty which I wrote earlier this year called "Somewhere where I'm not" twice and actually finished with it and surprisingly it brought the house down! WTF??
It was a fantastic atmosphere with the crowd clapping along and singing and it's been a long while since I've been so keyed up after a gig.
Afterwards I was selling cds, signing autographs, having pictures taken, it was all very amusing.

Me and old mate

So that's what it feels like to have your 15 seconds of fame I guess.
I caught up with Noel and crew from a few days ago as well as Mini and crew who I have now creepily run into three days in a row now.
The night was topped off with a nice feed of barra all washed down with a few beers.
Another top night.

14/7/12

Today I woke up and couldn't be f'd doing anything but drive so I literally jumped from the back to the front and hit the road.
I eventually stopped at Threeways (where I ran into Mini and crew from last night) and fueled up Freda (and myself) and continued on.

Threeways

I drove on for another hour and stopped at Banka Banka station.
I met Bob the manager and he waived my camping fee and gave me a few beers in exchange for doing a gig around the campfire tonight - sweet!
I went for a jog around the property and had a glorious shower and chilled out reading and generally dicking about until campfire time.

Banka Banka Station

Was this before or after my glorious shower? Hard to tell when you're a hippy!

It was good playing around the campfire again and the crowd seemed to enjoy it.

Campfire jams

It was an unexpected financial success too as I sold eight cds and got $73 when Bob passed the hat around (WTF?) There was a $50 note in there which can't be right..I reckon it was meant to be a $5 but whoever put it in, couldn't see too well in the dark, oh well!! :)
A bloke from SA said I have to make sure I pop into Port Lincoln on the way back, so I'll keep that in mind.
Top night.

13/7/12

Friday the 13th today (boogidy, boogidy).
I hit the road and tuned into a radio station which freakishly stopped on the AM frequency "666" and the dulcet tones of Alan Jones (make of that what you will).
Today was just another driving day but that's ok.
After having a gutful of Alan Jones after 10 seconds, I plugged my Ipod into the stereo and the hours melted away.
I stopped at Camoweel to fuel up and at the Qld/NT border for the obligatory photo.

Down on the border...

Two things I don't get sick of out here is the cool cloud formations and the brilliant sunsets.

Check out those colours

When I got to my campspot I met Roy, Peta, Mini and Warren who kindly invited me to have dinner with them - the grey nomads have been so nice to me on my travels - bloody champions!

Peta and Mini to the right

Tonight I spent half an hour before bed just gazing up at the stars. After a warm day in the car, there is a nice breeze tonight and when it got completely dark it was like God switch the lights on and a whole host of stars instantly appeared. Magnificent.

12/7/12

After some brekky and yoga it was time to hit the road again.
After spending more than 9 hours driving yesterday, I was keen to take it a bit easier today.

I think I'm becoming obsessed with clouds...

After a couple of hours I hit Mt Isa. It was strange to be in a city again after three weeks of being cut off from most things at Undara (and loving it!).
It was 31 degrees today, hard to believe, considering it's the middle of July. I'm not complaining though, I'd take the heat over the cold ANY day.

Spotted a truck made at Nixon's in Wagga

I spent the afternoon in the air conditioned comfort of the tourist info centre, uploading blogs and checking my email then it was off to the camp spot for the night, 50km the other side of Mt Isa.

Freda at WWII camp spot

I rolled in to the spot and immediately picked up on the distinct tones of two banjos being played.
So I went for a walk to see who was playing and met Andy, Leon and Noel. Andy was giving Leon a banjo lesson and Noel was just being Noel.
I introduced myself and they were all really nice blokes. I said I was on my way to Darwin for a gig on The Ghan and they invited me around later that night to have a jam.
I made some dinner (ie heated up some soup) and a dude who I met at Undara about 5 days earlier, Vincent from France, rolled in.

I remembered at the last second that these shorts have a hole in the crutch so had to adjust my pose accordingly

I still find it funny how you meet these people on the road then end up running into them again days, or even months, down the track.
So that night we had a great old time, singing and laughing.

Andy, Leon, Steve and Noel

Leon: "You eat snails? Vincent: "Snails?"

Andy was an old fashioned gentleman, he reminded me a bit of my Pop actually. He lost his wife 10 months and you could tell he was still in a lot of pain, poor bugger.
And Noel, well.....

11/7/12

It rained again for a little while last night so it was with trepidation that I set off again this morning in my bid to get to Darwin.
Thankfully the road was open and after a deep breath, Freda and I took the plunge.

Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

I drove for a couple of hours then stopped at Hughenden for fuel and spotted a dinosaur.

The Megasorearse

Now the next photo you may find a little disturbing but I think I need to document it in an attempt to "keep it real".
There is no doubt that my travels this year have been great fun and I wouldn't take back any of my experiences (good and bad).
But it's not all beer and skittles, sometimes it's just freakin' hard but it's been good for me because I now know that no matter how low I get for whatever reason, I can suck it up and bounce back, no worries, mate!
So I was driving along, thinking, and a whole host of things combined in my head and I just started crying!
I think it was a combination of a lot of things: being on the road alone again, staying at a scummy roadhouse two nights in a row, leaving the lovely people at Undara, and listening to a segment on ABC radio with Richard Fidler that hit pretty close to home. I then hit a butterfly of all things (yeah, I know!) and I just totally lost my shit.
I had to pull over as unfortunately they have not yet developed windscreen wipers for eyes and I sobbed my little sensitive singer-songwriter heart out for a couple of minutes then I was right as rain!

Boo hoo.....

If I had ovaries (and a calendar) there may have been a reasonable explanation for such an outburst but alas no.
By the time I hit Richmond for lunch, took a few deep breaths and went for a walk around the lake, I was all good again.

Check out those clouds..and the reflection on the water

No more tears boy, you're livin' the dream!

The rest of the day was spent driving. I pulled up at about 4pm at a rest stop 66km of Cloncurry and met Greg and Margaret from the Gold Coast who were really nice and on their way back home after visiting Lawn Hill.
All that was left to do then was to cook up some dinner and enjoy another beautiful outback Qld sunset.

Sunset

That thing to the right isn't a UFO, it's a plane...looks pretty cool though huh?

10/7/12

To say today was uneventful would be a drastic understatement.
It rained all night and I awoke, bleary eyed, to this lovely view from Freda's bed:

Rain, rain go away...

The plan today was to just drive towards Mt Isa until I got sick of driving, then stop.
However, I got 60km out of Charters Towers and was met with this:

Egh...

So I gathered amongst the crowd and watched as some idiots decided to run the "water gauntlet".

Challenger! Ready!!

I asked a pretty rough looking dude if he'd mind taking a picture of me and he said yes as long as I did the "W" Westside sign....egh....great.
So I ended up doing a double "W" which I told him was for "Wagga Wagga" and he laughed, fortunately.

Michelle, please don't comment on my hands...it's the angle/lighting!

After that we all just went back to our vehciles and waited for the water to drop.
I did some reading, listened to music and had a few random chats with people walking by to check out the latest situation.

I ended up piffing that blue towel later that night..it stunk

I waited until 4pm and a portly bloke advised me it looked as though the water wasn't going to drop until at least 7pm so I decided to cut my losses and head back to Charters for the night.
Fingers crossed (not in a W!) that the road will be clear tomorrow.

9/7/12

Well today it was time to leave the warm and comforting bosom that was Undara and move back into "Solo Steve" mode again. Before I hit the road, I gave young Freda a bit of a wash down which I think she enjoyed.

Freda to the left, Spud to the right

I said my goodbyes to the staff at Undara and then it was time to hit the road.

The road is loooong....and not very wiiinding..

It was a pretty shitty day in all, given I spent the whole time driving, I had a leaky valve in one of my tyres so I wasn't sure if I was gonna make it or not, the weather was shitty and windy, I was leaving some good people behind and I was all by myself again.
But I took a teaspoon of concrete and fortunately made it to Charters Towers without the tyre blowing out, got it fixed and made my way to the Roadhouse parking bay to spend the night.
This was the wonderful view from Freda at night.

mmmmmm Roadhouse Blues

Undara & The Music

My three week stint at Undara also did wonders for my confidence as a musician, songwriter and performer.
After years of slogging it out doing gigs where people don't show up or when they do they have absolutely no interest in listening, the audiences at Undara inspired me to continue with this music thing.
The setting was perfect for my solo acoustic performances. I played through my PA at low volumes, from 8pm around a campfire to people who were there to listen.
With people listening, it allowed me to actually talk to them between songs and I got a lot of good feedback as to how good I was with the audience between songs as well as with the kids.

"I'll have two cds, thanks"

It helped me develop my skills as performer and I learned a lot about set lists and how to manipulate an audience to meet your needs.
For example, a winner for me was to play "You are my sunshine" then follow that up immediately with one of my own songs while the whole audience was still focused. Sneaky, very sneaky.
Another bonus for me was the audience was a different set of people every night. It was good for once to have the audience come to me rather than me having to plead, beg and bribe people to come!
I'd be lieing if I said I didn't enjoy people coming up to me after each gig saying positive things about my voice, songs, banter or just being generally appreciative of my efforts. It probably sounds very corny but it was very fulfilling for me to entertain people with what talent I have.
It also felt good to effectively be a working musician for three weeks straight - what a wonderful feeling!
Undara was also a very creative time for me too. I wrote and recorded three new songs: "Campfire song", "Man in the sand" and "The Tree" which may or may not make it on to the new cd.
Sample of "Man in the sand" here (think being in the country is rubbing off on me??)

Making musical magic in my room

I also managed to shift a reasonable number of cds in three weeks. I won't say how many but I did have to get James to send me up more stock as I did run out at one point.

The pedestal from which I sold my cds (looking strangely like a Legend of Zelda trophy)

I've always known that for each good gig there's about 6 shitty ones so after my Undara run I'm probably due for a good 6 to 12 months of "Forsayth-like" gigs but so be it - I'd never take back my Undara gigs for quids.

Last camp fire gig with Lulu, Dutchy, Trev and Ronja....

Undara Memories From My Diary

So rather than individual day blogs I'm just flicking through my diary and will note a few things that were memorable to me. They may not be of interest to you but will be to me when I go back through my entries down the track.
My time at Undara was up there with my Wintermoon experience a couple of months ago in terms of the people I met as well as the development I made with my music.
Some memorable moments:
* Campfire music at night time has been great and is the perfect setting for the songs and style of music that I'm doing solo. Audiences have been really good, receptive and appreciative. Every night was memorable for one reason or another and I managed to shift a lot of cds.
* A grey nomad couple wants to adopt my song "Somewhere where I'm not" as their theme song as they travel around Australia.
* New song "Older Wiser" is getting a good response every night so I think it will definitely get a spot on the new cd whenever that happens.
* Coco pops and ice cream with Lulu and Ronja.
* Getting asked to play encores of only my originals - cool!
* Lulu is a hit with the audiences with her version of "TNT" - very entertaining.
* Bloke at the pool seeing me surrounded by bikini clad women and asking me how I do it. I just said "I play guitar" and everyone laughed. Lolz
* Getting kids up to sing "Waltzing Matilda" with me.
* Having to sing "Happy Birthday" to Cherry the dog.
* Meeting Bev and Silvio from Fremantle.
* Doing "To her door" and singing the line "Really hit the skids" just as the fire sparked and scared the crap out of Ronja who was closeby taking photos.
* Chatting to Lee for a couple of hours after a gig.
* Sitting around the campfire til 4am with Sarah, Ollie and Angus from Townsville drinking Broo beer and marvelling at the staying power of the now legendary "Ollie Log" (you had to be there).
* Selling a cd to a ridiculously hot girl from Austria.
* Taking photos of the audience on the nights I remembered to bring my camera.
* Meeting John from NZ and his family. John gave me a shirt that says "Living the dream" which is kinda what I'm doing.
* Being given a block of chocolate from a Cadbury rep as appreciation for my night of music.
* Meeting Norman Lindsay, not THE Norman Lindsay, who said my vocal tones remind him of a cross between James Taylor and Cat Stevens.
* People coming up to me after gigs and saying they prefer my version of "Old Man" to Neil's (I kid you not!)
* Talking pop culture crap with two very cute school teachers from Cairns round the campfire and having them leave me a couple of apples at reception the next day (naaaaaaaw).
* Watching the Origin finale with the staff then having a campfire jam afterwards.
* Getting a handmade cd selling sign from Lulu and Ronja (naaaaaaaaw).
* Getting little Abigail up to help me sing "Waltzing Matilda" then later in the night heard her singing my song "Older Wiser" word for word - amazing.
* Mum to my left blaming a "squeaky chair" during a break between songs, yeah right Mum...

John (left) and his crew - thanks for the shirt mate!

Camp fire crowd! (PS That's a mic stand in the foreground, I swear!)

Lulu and Steve (check out the grin!) LOL!

Chocolate ans shirt......living the dream!