Sandy Bottom

People die in these parts with depressing frequency. Near another place where I lived previously, in a very similar setting, in recent years an enterprising English adventurer aspired to ride a bike through The Back Of The Black Stump, to raise money and awareness for some worthy cause or other. He came over a bit faint, got a bit hot under the collar, fell off his bike beset by thirst, and crawled under a tree where he died of lack of water. Less than two kilometres away there was a deep, cool permanent waterhole, full of ducks, geese, ibises, barramundi, turtles, and the odd freshwater crocodile.

I wipe the sweat out of my eyes, survey my progress so far, and carry on with grim determination. I won't melt here and die from internal organ failure, caused by overheating, dehydration, and energy depletion up to the point where protein, i.e. muscle and organs, get metabolised for energy recruitment, which causes metabolic collapse and death.

Because I have a secret weapon.

Everyone knows that camels are exceptionally well adapted to surviving in waterless environments. It is a widely held notion that this is because they carry water in their hump or humps on their backs, like a long-range fuel tank on a fourwheel drive, and that they live on that for weeks at a time. While this is a charming idea that is often bandied about as gospel, it is as wrong as billy-o.

A camel's hump is not made of water. It is, in actual fact, made of fat. And camels can live on it for extended periods of time because it does two things. One, fat metabolises into energy, and allows the camel to keep plodding onwards on its great big flat feet without slowing down. And two, the metabolisation of fat for energy creates a byproduct, and that, as it so happens, is water. Enough of it to meet the requirements of the organism producing it, at least for some time.

I am not a camel.

I may, in a bad light, appear to have a hunchback, but it is not a hump.

I have big, flat feet, but they are not round, and I have more than two big toes sticking out.

I have a big nose and evil-looking round eyes, but they are not, unfortunately, equipped with nostrils that can be closed to the world, or a third eyelid to keep sand and dust out.

Moreover, I don't bite and randomly kick out at people, or, at least, not at all people.

But I am fat adapted.

I live on fat. I only eat animal products, and specifically those with a high fat content: meat, seafood, eggs, cheese. Nothing else. This is sometimes referred to as the Mesech diet, or, occasionally by confabulating doctors, clinging desperately to deeply flawed textbooks and Directives By Management, as madness.

Nevertheless, it is standing me in good stead now. In spite of the gallons of water I am shedding in sweat I am not thirsty, and after the first five minutes of warming up I settle into a steady work routine, swinging the hatchet like a man possessed, and ploughing my way through the overgrowth along the track. This kind of work is second nature to me, I used to be a Parks and Wildlife Ranger and environmental worker, and this sort of stuff was my stock in trade.

An image comes to me, through the hazy vibrations of the hot air: there was an old Celtic god who was depicted as being hard at work with an axe, cutting down trees. His name was Esus, NOT Jesus, and, from his general pictographic representation, it is widely believed by scholars in Celtic culture that he was, in actual fact, the God Of Cleaning Up The Backyard, And When You're finished With That Clean The Gutters And Do The Dishes. This notion appears to be confirmed by the fellow's habitual appearance, in engravings, as disgruntled, badly put upon, and pussy-whipped. Recent archaeological digs have unearthed altars with dedications that suggest he was also, in certain parts, revered as the god of Fuck This I'm Going To The Pub.

It occurs to me that, right now, I am doing The Works Of Esus, a notion that has a high likelihood of pissing off any number and grouping of evangelical christians, who would be sure to think it blasphemous. This is undoubtedly a good thing, and I take heart from the notion to push through, clearing vegetation until, finally at long last, the corner of the track and the shoulder lie clear before me. Behind me lies a trail of sweat-soaked dirt a meter wide and twenty meters long. Small birds come flying in from out of nowhere to drink from the puddles of my sweat, and a passing-by lungfish jumps into one of them with a big smile on his face. Good on him. Be my guest, why don't you.

In front of me, stretching out into the middle distance like the gaping maws of a crocodile encouraging you to think that the water looks great and inviting and it's probably not that bad really, lies a spread of white, yellow and red sand, by this time scalding hot under the feet. And next to it, there is now a hard shoulder, denuded of vegetation.

I eye it off, and nod to myself. Time to give it a crack.

I get my bike, retreat back up the track a bit for a good run-up, and take a deep breath.

Then I stand up on the pedals and push. Hard.

I make it around the corner without losing too much speed, and line up for The Great Sandy Desert.

I fly over the first section of solid edge. Encounter a low-lying wash-out of a dry creek bed.

Skid and fishtail through the yellow sand.

Bounce back up and over its steep but hard bank on the other side.

Catch my front wheel in a sink of fine bulldust, counter-steer hard to the other side, wrench the handlebars, and slip back out of it.

Onto hard red dirt, and onto gravel, and, finally, to the end of the track, where black tarmac starts.

I made it.

Time well spent.

I would have been pretty mightily pissed off if, after all that, I hadn't been able to ride out.

I turn and head home. A drink seems like a good idea.