Mount Isa, Queensland

And just like that we were back...

​When we left Mount Isa in January 2018 I said something to the effect that I’d had a fantastic year but that I didn’t want us to come back, I said this for two reasons, one, there are so many other places in Australia to live and, two, there is a running joke in Mount Isa that everyone always comes back… Which obviously has some truth to it as, we did come back, and I was feeling energised by our decision and upbeat about what lay ahead for us in this next chapter.  

View from the famous Mount Isa lookout, looking south towards the power station, in the foreground to the left of the image, the Hard Times Underground Mine tourist experience

Inhale sulphur, exhale hopes, dreams, aspirations...

Lophognathus, commonly known as the Tata Lizard because they appear to "wave" with their front leg

Major Flooding Event

​Only about a week or so after we had arrived, having relocated from the Lake Moondarra Caravan Park, back to our original site, number 57 at the Sunset Caravan Park, we moved Florence once again, but this time to the safety of Shovel’s parent’s house. Classified as the “2019 Monsoon Trough Rainfall and Flood Event,” the flood was a significant and devasting disaster that impacted communities throughout North-western Queensland, the Gulf Country and even places like Townsville on the coast, covering an estimated 100 million hectares. The Flooding Event killed over 500,000 head of cattle and 30,000 sheep and countless native species and wiped-out vegetation as dry soil turned instantly to mud, gushing into the Gulf of Carpentaria from the Flinders, Cloncurry, Leichardt and Norman Rivers. Flowing parallel to the Sunset Caravan Park in Mount Isa is a tributary of sorts from the Leichardt River that was rising with the continued rains, quickly. The Caravan Park didn’t flood as the riverbank was high enough to withstand the deluge, but we felt grateful for the opportunity to retreat for a few days from the wet. 

No fresh produce at the Mount Isa Woolworths during the January 2019 Flooding Event.

Everyone else was doing it...

 ​When it rains it pours, is a true idiom of the rainfall in Mount Isa, which has on average only about 430mm per year, concentrated mainly in January. With the rain, the landscape instantly changes, and it is not uncommon to wake in the morning to road closures due to flooding from overnight rains. But as it doesn’t rain often in Mount Isa, when it does, it’s a spectacle, and everyone gets out to have a look at the flooded roads or hoone around in the newly created red outback mud. During the intense rains of January 2019, the drive out to Lake Moondarra, Mount Isa’s main dam, which supplies the town’s drinking water and is a recreational oasis for ski boaters and fishing people, was like peak hour traffic in a capital city. We were bumper to bumper as cars navigated the flooded bitumen. Driving through flood water is exhilarating and anxiety inducing all at the same time, it definitely shouldn’t be encouraged and the moto, “If it’s flooded, forget it,” does ring true, but the release of endorphins, making it unscathed to the other side, is shall I quietly say worth the frayed nerves…   

Telstra Hill

​Upon leaving Mount Isa, as we traversed the east coast of Australia and spent the winter months in my hometown of Geelong, my thoughts of our year in Mount Isa would often be of Telstra Hill.  During the ordeal of our second miscarriage in late 2017, Telstra Hill became a place of solace and reflection, and I treasured the open, unobscured views, juxtaposed with a feeling of being engulfed by an ancient natural world, humbled by the enormity of the landscape, me a tiny molecule in its extreme vastness. Enduring Telstra Hill I would often curse the washed out, pothole ridden, worn bitumen as I stumbled on loose rocks that had fallen from the cliff-face of the manmade road, heaving to take a breath without inhaling a fly that would often result in the infamous fly cough… if you know, you know… the tension induced by mining town life would soon evaporate, giving way to acceptance, a feeling of tranquillity, my soul nourished by the experience…

Watching a rain cloud move across the landscape

Kangaroo in motion

the flies...

Prior to leaving Mount Isa in January 2018 Shovel and I, during a stormy night, took a few redundant caravan items to the top of Telstra Hill. We called it the “Guerrilla Garden of S & G” and this is what remained a year later…