Oceania: Day 26: 7-29-94: Galloping Horses, Bullwhips & Boomerangs, Kanga-Lizard Fricassee, New Stars And Old Injuries

I awoke early and gulped down my first hot breakfast since the beginning of the tour. It was a nice change of pace, and it put me in a good mood for the morning's first activity: horseback riding. Labeling myself an "advanced rider" (a bit of a stretch, but I'd been on a horse before -- as recently as Fiji, in fact), I was placed in the first riding group of the day. I moseyed on over to the stables with Brad and waited for the rest of the posse to arrive. Bonnie, Autal, Marc, Irmi and Jody soon joined us.

We all mounted our horses and started trotting off down the trail. It was a little bumpy at first as I relearned how to ride without hammering my buttocks and thighs against the saddle. Once I matched the animal's rhythm, the ride became more enjoyable. Soon, however, I was craving a bit more speed. My prayers were answered when the trail guide suggested we canter. Bonnie, Jody, Mark, Irmi and I took him up on his offer, whilst Brad and Autal declined, preferring to spare their backsides.

Then we were off -- Yee-HA! We sped across the Ross River Valley, tramping up a cloud of dust that marked our progress.. As soon as the trail opened up sufficiently, we were given the okay to travel at an all-out gallop, something I'd never done before. Holy Shit! It was all I could do to hold on! My feet started slipping out of my stirrups as my horse attained a velocity previously unimaginable to me. Nonetheless, I loved every minute of it and surprisingly maintained my balance and rhythm. The gallop was fleeting, but fun.

We arrived back at the stables just in time for some billy tea (tea leaves and water cooked over an open fire in a can called a "billy") and damper (fresh bread baked in an iron pot under hot ashes). Then I got to try my hand at cracking a bullwhip and tossing a boomerang. The former was an utter failure: I ended up whipping myself more than anything, and as much as self-flagellation appeals to the Masochistic side of me, I was very disappointed with my efforts. (When I later returned for a second round of attempts, I did manage to eke out one or two faint snaps, but Indiana Jones has nothing to fear from me). My boomerang skills were only slightly better. While the results were better than my initial experience with a boomerang on the Bushtucker Tour, I still wasn't able to get it to come back to me. (Though in my defense, the ranch hand told us that boomerangs were never originally intended to truly return to the thrower; they usually, at best, swoop around in an arc. Using that benchmark, I fared fairly well.)

I took a walk over to the bar (not the Bush Pig, but the Homestead's other, nicer one) for some lunch, and I chatted with Paola and Monique over a steaming bowl of vegetable soup. Then I teamed up with Robby and shot some pool against various opponents (lost a few, won a few).

At 2:30, I rounded up some of my friends (Patrick, the other Patrick, Max, Fraulka, Rachel, Mark, Robby, Dave, James and Jody) and organized a volleyball game. My team won every time, thank you very much. Patrick1 and I even took on Robby and Dave in a game of 2-on-2 (another victory).

Soon it was time for our Clydesdale-drawn wagon ride, which brought us out into the bush for a traditional outback dinner. While we all sat on logs around a blazing campfire, sipping some free (or, as Scott would say, "F-R-Double E") wine, one of the ranch hands informed us about the Aborigines in the Ross River area. I'm pretty sure he told us that the local tribe believes they developed from a race of giant caterpillars, which have long since solidified, forming the surrounding mountain ranges -- though as I'm writing this, I'm thinking that maybe I just had way too much to drink!

As the sun set, our dinner was ready. We ate a meaty concoction, consisting "mostly" of Goanna Lizard and kangaroo (trust me, it tasted better than it sounds). After the meal, Fumi, Donna and myself were asked to act out a kangaroo hunt -- as the kangaroos, natch. After hopping around, eating and attempting to mate, I was crippled by a hunter's boomerang. I tried to limp away, but his partner's spear finished me off. Before I knew it, I was kangaroo stew (Jeez -- they could have at least let me finish mating first).

Next, we all left the orange glow of the fire to find a spot with better visibility of the night sky. Our knowledgeable ranch hand pointed out constellations unique to the Southern Hemisphere. He showed us the Southern Cross (an emblem on the Australian Flag), Scorpio, the North Crown and the South Crown. He also helped us locate Alpha Centuri and Beta Centuri, as well as Venus and Jupiter. It was strange to look up and not recognize anything; it was like I was on a different planet.

Then it was back to the campfire, where we looked at Aboriginal weapons, a shield, a coolaman (food tray) and a nulla-nulla (digging stick). We also passed around a didgeridoo, and I had my first opportunity to play one (I produced a sound akin to two geese farting in a windstorm). This was soon followed by a second opportunity (maybe only one goose).

Finally, we returned to civilization. No one was really up to the Bush Pig again, so we went to the place where I'd had lunch. This bar was decidedly calmer and more comfortable. I found a back room far from the maddening crowd (more like a study, really) where Brad, Monique and Paola we're already lounging on leather sofas in front of a raging fire. I decided to join them (next to Paola, of course). The next couple hours passed quite pleasantly, and were among the most enjoyably relaxing of the trip. Paola spent much of the time tutoring me in Dutch, and I proved to be a decent student. Inside of two hours, I learned names for numerous colors, numbers, animals, opposites, greetings and body parts.

As midnight approached, Paola said she was tired and ready to go to sleep. She asked me if there were any final words I wanted to learn -- several provocative ones passed through my mind, but once again, I failed to take advantage of the opening she was offering, and I merely asked her how to say "goodnight" (goede nag).

Brad, Monique, Paola and I decided to head back to the rooms together, and an incident occurred along the way which radically changed the entire mood of the evening. Walking along the unlit dirt road back to the dorm, we passed our friend Rolf. No sooner had we gone 50 feet, when suddenly, we heard Rolf cry out in the darkness. We raced back to find him lying in the street, grabbing his bad ankle (he had seriously damaged it in a car accident 2 years previous) and howling in pain. It was obvious that he was in incredible agony. Through gritted teeth, he told us he had tripped over a sand embankment and twisted his leg. We advised him to rest a bit, and then we helped him back up to his feet, offering to support his weight for the rest of the journey. But Rolf insisted he was well enough to walk unaided. A few steps was all it took to belie him. Rolf winced and moaned, and Brad and I quickly grabbed either of his arms and helped him along. Even "crutching" Rolf in this way did not alleviate his pain substantially, so we ended up carrying him. We managed successfully for a while, until our muscles tired and he became too heavy. We gently eased Rolf down and took a breather. A quick look around revealed that we were still in the middle of nowhere with nary a streetlight or Tiki torch to break the blackness. When Brad and I recuperated enough to have another go at it, Rolf declined our offer to be carried again, but he did acquiesce to being supported. After a good deal more yowling, Rolf seemed about ready to pass out. Luckily, we made it to a dimly lit table, where Rolf could lay down while Brad and I examined his injury. The ankle was indeed swollen, but Rolf assured us that such swelling was normal for his leg ever since the prior accident.

At this point, long suppressed emotions (undoubtedly aided by his pain and whatever alcohol he had consumed) rose to the surface, and Rolf broke down in tears. He jumbled his languages, spewing forth a German/English hodgepodge that was hard to follow (Rolf's heavily accented English was difficult to understand even in the best of circumstances). One word rang out clearly enough, however -- kruppel. "I'm a cripple," he wailed. "I should just cut my leg off!" Wow. We were stunned and speechless. We tried to comfort him with caresses and soothing words, but Rolf could not be consoled; he catharsis would not be squelched. He kept repeating "I am a cripple" in English and in German and in that eerie hybrid language, over and over again, until his voice cracked with the strain. It soon became clear that there was something far more wrong with Rolf than his ankle -- his mind had yet to accept the full extent of his injury from the car accident (at least until this moment), and he was an emotional wreck. The rest of us became uncomfortable: we alternated between calming Rolf and turning our heads away. Tears welled up in Paola's eyes, and a lump formed in my own throat. There was nothing we could do but wait for all the anguish to be released. Hopefully, this would allow Rolf to completely accept his new reality and finally move on. The awkward moment seemed to drag on for hours.

Eventually, the tears dried up and Rolf pulled himself together. We finished our walk to the dorms in silence and saw Rolf to his room. We were all visibly shaken by the experience we'd just been through, emotionally and physically drained. We spoke about it briefly, and I tried to break the tension with some mild humor. After a round of somber "goodnights," we all shuffled off to bed. Any thoughts of romance between Paola and myself were now replaced with more sober musings: How would I deal with such an injury? Hmm . . .