Almost two hours into the trip, the plane began to pitch and the engine coughed. George fumbled with dials and levers cursing under his breath. He barked at Chuck, “Secure your seat belt and brace yourself!”
Terrified, Chuck pulled his seatbelt tighter and looked out his side window. The silence created by the stalled engine filled his ears as the ground rushed to greet them.
George suddenly became eerily calm, his tone professional. “Look for any smooth place. Any smooth place without shrubs, boulders, or craters where we can land.”
Chuck looked to his right. In the distance, he noticed a clear piece of terrain that looked like a dirt road set on a strip of elevated ground, above a dry landscape with a scattering of brush and stones here and there. A landing strip? I don’t believe it! He punched George on the shoulder and pointed. “Do you mean something like that?”
When George saw the landing strip, the tense lines in his face disappeared. His mouth curved into a smile. “That’s exactly what I mean, mate.”
The plane banked right, lining up with the newfound airstrip. The smooth landing surprised Chuck. Even so, he gratefully anticipated the feeling of his feet touching ground safely. The Cessna 170 rolled down the airstrip kicking up dust behind it, finally coming to a stop.
George sighed deeply and leaned back in his seat. “That engine timing mechanism goes out sometimes. Really, mate, it’s not a serious problem. I can fix it in a jiffy. Let me get back there behind the back seats. I have a bag of tools.”
Chuck opened his door to step down upon the dusty land. His weakened knees gained strength once his feet touched the ground. He seriously considered getting down on his shakey knees and kissing terra firma, dirt and all. Meanwhile, George began whistling as he rummaged through the tool bag and inspected the engine.
A few moments later, George came around where Chuck leaned on the shady side of the aircraft. “It’s all good. Just as I thought—it’s the timing belt, and I readjusted it. We’ll be fine. It happened a couple of weeks ago, so I was pretty sure that was the problem.
“Let’s look around. I should let the owners know why we landed and give them my information.” George nodded toward the other end of the landing strip. “This place looks desolate. Let’s go see who we can find.”
The thin trail of red dust following their footsteps reminded Chuck of his childhood in Oklahoma. They reached the dilapidated building perched at the other end of the airstrip. There they ventured through the empty hangar and out the other side, passing over a small rise. Below them spread a huge house that, in its prime, would have impressed a Texan. A wooden door flanked by eight columns dominated a large porch that reminded Chuck of the movie Giant. On the second floor, sagging gables stared at them. The large windows near the door were dark and caked with years of dirt. The place had been magnificent decades ago.
About a football field south of the big house stood a large building that had probably once housed ranchhands. Fifty yards across the way stood another smaller building that might have served as a guest house. Remnants of a road wound for half a mile to outbuildings and corrals. The chicken coop and pump house barely stood, their roofs sagging. A hay barn leaned to one side, and faded wooden fences with broken boards cried out for restoration.
No apparent signs of occupation confirmed George’s first observation. It certainly looked barren. Furthermore, it was creepy, out in the middle of nowhere with no one around. Now only the wind blew through this ghost ranch.
George pointed to the barn and corral behind the house. “Looks like a cattle station—cattle ranch, to you Americans. From all the housing and barns, this place looks like it rocked with activity at one time. People moved out here with lofty dreams. Sadly, it only takes one or two years of dry weather to clean them out. I’ll bet that’s what happened here.”
Chuck looked around for a source of water. “It’s huge. I wonder how much the total acreage is. With all this homestead, there had to be one heck of a lot of livestock grazing.”
George put his hands on his hips. “Well, there’s no one here now. I’m guessing that we’re around a hundred miles from the edge of the Sturt Stony Desert. There had to be more vegetation when this was a working ranch.”
Chuck looked at the landscape of red dirt, with a smattering of brush here and there. Large and small rocks jutted from the ground. “There’s not enough food here for cattle, that’s for sure.”
“Look over there.” George pointed to some tall rock formations far in the distance. “This is new territory for me. It’s not what I planned, but as long as we’re here, let’s do some exploring. Let’s hike over to those rocks and see what we can find.”
They strode back to the aircraft and retrieved their gear. George strapped a canister of water on his back in addition to his pack. He pulled another one out of the back seat. “Each of us should have five liters of water per day to hike in the outback. Here, let me strap it on.”
Chuck felt the weight on his back increase. “How much is this? I guess I can’t complain. It looks like your pack is twice the size I’m carrying.”
“You’ve got about ten liters there. Can ya handle it, mate?”
Chuck swallowed. “I’m good.”
Turning toward the rock formations in the distance, they stepped off the airstrip into the outback desert. Carefully picking their way, they made slow progress, drinking often.
After an hour, George stopped and dug through his backpack, then offered Chuck a piece of beef jerky. The midday sun bore down on them. “We need to eat something on the go if we’re going to get over there before dark.”
They hiked and chewed on beef jerky, taking drinks often while making slow progress. Because of uneven ground and rocks, they watched each step, lest one of them twist an ankle or worse. In addition to the different rock formations, the sparse plants, and sandy stretches, the land itself proved interesting.
Chuck struggled to keep up with George, but he wasn’t about to ask him to slow down. The rock formation loomed far ahead for what seemed forever. He sorely misjudged the distance from the airstrip, but he guessed that George knew exactly how far they needed to hike. Finally, they stopped under the shade of a bluff near the formations.
The sun was beginning to set. A small herd of camels sauntered past.
Chuck leaned with his back against the rock face. “When I first came to Australia, I was shocked when people told me there were camels. I can’t believe I’m finally seeing them.”
George loosened his pack. “Oh, yeah, the government started importing them to use for pack animals back in the eighteen forties. They had a big part in the development of the railroads. I think they stopped bringing the animals in somewhere around the turn of the century.”
Chuck took a deep drink from his water pack. “Camels are beautiful animals with ugly knees and stubborn personalities. I always say I love to see them outside spitting distance.”
George let his pack fall to the ground. “Once they were all domesticated, but now they’re wild. There’s probably a million of them here now, and their population can double every nine years.”
“That’s scary.”
George shrugged. “Yeah, the government brought them in from India. Now they’ve gone wild to fend for themselves.”
Chuck gulped another swig of water and sopped his forehead with his handkerchief. He found a stool-like rock to sit on. “This adventure is beyond what I could have imagined.”
Out of the