October 1, Day 10 Broken Hill

We got a cab into town where we were booked into the Royal Exchange Hotel. Our driver was a woman who looked like she was in her seventies. She was a dry old character and when I told her where we were going she looked me up and down and said: 'Oh ... that's were all the fancy people stay'. Well fancy that. I think she thought I asked a lot of questions for a fancy person but she lightened up a little and as we sped past the RSPCA she gave me a nod and said: 'RSPCA... retard speed police check ahead'. Apparently the local cops like to camp there with their speed guns. Good to know. Wonder if it works in Queensland.

The Royal is a grand old hotel and we had good rooms. Ours was off the verandah and had a nice view of the CBD and the memorial and restaurant up on the slag heap that passes for a hill here. We dumped our gear and headed off to the local pub missing lunch by 5 minutes and not for the first time on the trip. I asked the barman if we could squeeze in a little late and the answer was the same as it was in the other places we tried it: 'OK but all you can have is fish or schnitzel.' Schnitzel it is.

Andrew, Nat and Dustin were about 2 hours behind us and we followed their track on Anthony's I phone. We decided to conduct a walking tour of the CBD while we were waiting and there was quite a lot to see. We wandered through a great little art gallery with some pretty impressive names in it. I particularly liked the war painting by Lambert. Then we did the block noting with some appreciation the beautiful Trades Hall and the Barrier Truth Building. The Barrier Daily Truth was a pretty vigorous paper in its day and it serialised the work of Joseph Furphy, one of Australia's great writers in the earlier part of the last century. The Furphy family gave their name to the Australian slang term for a rumour. A furphy is a story of dubious truth. The term originated with the Anzacs in the first world war because the Furphy family's foundry in Shepparton made water tankers for the AIF. The men would gather round the water tankers and share news and that is where rumours were born. All the Furphy water tankers were stamped with the family name and a few famous words of advice:

"Good, better, best - never let it rest - til your good is better - and your better best."

It was also good to see Henry's happy face on a giant wall mural just a little ways along. Not long after  we all ended up at another, somewhat less distinguished art gallery. This last one was lots of fun though because it was full of all sorts of crap.

The phone went off to announce the arrival of the Hippie's crew and so we wandered back to the Hotel to let Dustin into his room. A text came in from Matt announcing the disappearance of Des Porter's De Havilland Dragon in the mountains south west of Gympie. It was a beautiful aircraft and by all accounts Des was a great guy and we all hoped for the best for him and his five passengers. Alas it was not to be.

Nat was pretty keen on Bells, a little milk bar across town which hadn't changed in 50 years of operation. So we called up the maxi-taxi, piled everyone in and set off for a time warp back to rock and roll juke boxes and malted milk shakes in stainless steel buckets. I think the Choir scored some slinkies and someone couldn't finish their milkshake which was pretty bloody soft. The maxi came and retrieved us all again and as the sun set we headed back into town and a dinner we didn't much feel like with all our tummies awash with milk. Needless to say we rallied and had a pretty good night in town even though the checkout chick at the register imploded at the end of it all when confronted with a pretty simple maths problem.