October 14, 2007
Roo Country
We had been warned not to drive through the outback past sunset. Initially I had thought “surely driving here can’t be much worse than driving between Brisbane and Cairns” (which I had done overnight on many an occasion), but I was proven wrong.
Shortly after sunset, all seemed fine. But that was soon to change. We had one more hour to drive to reach our destination, Colbar. It was not a pleasant hour. Roos starting appearing everywhere. At first just a few, than many. And they seemed to get bigger. It was the most tiresome hour of driving I have ever had to endure.
We managed to stay clear of any live roos, eventhough they did hop on the road in front of us. We did however hit a carcass at 90km/hr. straight down the middle of the car. It made a lot of noise, but there was not much that could be done about that. By the time you see it, you are too late, and sit right on top of it. An unfortunate rabbit also went underneath the car. It decided to hop the wrong way, and did not make it. Since rabbits are a pest in Australia (severely affecting the natural landscape), we did not feel all that bad about its demise.
We were very glad to reach Colbar at last, found a hotel and tried to get a bite to eat. That proved quite hard; the only establishment still serving was the roadhouse where truckies hung out. I decided to skip a meal: being a vegetarian, my appetite was soon diminished after reading the *meat only* menu.