Desperados

When you run into the same ruddy, mustachioed bloke several times while on holiday and the conversation always proves engrossing, this becomes blogworthy.  Unlike another notable Australian couple, whom we met in Italy and who told us, "Don't come! Everything is hundreds of miles away, and it's not worth seeing once you get there," this fellow and his wife made the prospect of Australia a great deal more appealing.

Kim and Zane

Just one of the tales with which they regaled us was that of Coober Pedy, an opal-mining town of 1,700 souls in northern South Australia. Its church and its homes, "dugouts," are built entirely underground to avoid scorching daytime heat which can top 110 Fahrenheit. The first tree ever seen in Coober Pedy was built of scrap metal. It still grows there.

Below ground in Coober Pedy

But the best story of all was their own.

"I worked for over fifty years, from 5 in the morning to 6 at night. What for? Money," Zane told us with disdain when we first met. "I wasn't there to see my son grow up; we had this big house we didn't need--all for the money. One day I says to 'em at work, 'I'm out o' here in two weeks.'

"'Ye cahn't do that,' they told me.

"'Oh yes I can,' I said.  And I did."

Kim nodded in solemn agreement. They are in this together. They have chucked it all and are living life before it's too late.  On their deathbeds, these two will not be saying, "I only regret that I didn't spend more time working and making lots of money."

"We sold it all and got an RV. Now, when we aren't traveling on holiday or working, we're driving around looking for work. If there aren't jobs where we've gone, we relax for a bit at a camp, then drive some more."

In the end, they have all they need--enough for the occasional beer, pack of smokes, and holidays all over the world, from Europe to Bali. They even saved enough to have their son join them for a few days in Bali.

The secret?  Three or four months out of the year, they work a cattle station in the Outback--rent, food, and utility free. That this is still possible somewhere gives one hope that the entire world is not becoming paved, mechanized, and manned by immigrant laborers.

On the Outback, work life carries on from dawn until after dusk. It has to be both harder and much more fun than whatever drudgery Zane did before. Every day, he rides out with the ringers (cowboys), doing what they do: mustering cattle, doing "yard work" like branding, driving trucks, mending fences, shooting dingos and maimed cattle, and culling feral camels. He talked bemusedly about what he's heard of American ranches, where those in charge supervise and Mexicans do all the real work. This clearly goes against his grain. He is among the last of a breed, a kid who dreamed of being a cowboy when he grew up and is lucky enough to live in a place where he still can. 

Though all this might echo the Wild West and paint Zane as a living Grey, he will remind you that Australia now has more stringent gun regulations than America. These forbid even his wife from holding a key to the gun cabinet without a permit, call for a separate lock box for the clip, and require regular inspections by the authorities. The reason for these regulations--the 1996 Port Arthur, Tasmania, massacre, in which mentally disabled gunman Martin Bryant killed 35 and wounded 23--hits very close to home for him. His cousin died there while shielding his wife from bullets with his body.

Arguably the most important role in the Outback--station cook--requires no six guns and is played by Kim.

"What do the ringers like to eat?" we asked.

"Anything," she laughed. "Usually beef, beef, beef, and beef.  And it's all gone in minutes. "

You have to keep in mind the size of an Australian cattle station and its workforce. Theirs is a vast 88,000 square kilometers in area, bigger than the states of New Hampshire, New Jersey, Connecticut, Delaware, and Rhode Island put together, or about the size of Serbia. They have yet to see all of it, but they know there are seven bodies buried about the place--put directly in the ground where they dropped, in the 1800s.

There, they are also plagued by a problem peculiar to Australia's landlocked ecosystem. When a non-indigenous organism is introduced there, where it has no natural predators, it eventually becomes a pest. We Floridians could relate to some of these. 

Cane toads (Bufo marinus) were introduced by the government in 1935, for what seemed at the time to be a perfectly rational reason: protecting sugar cane from the cane beetle, which cane toads find quite tasty. Now they are such a successful invasive, yet highly venomous, species that they threaten everything from innocent native frogs to pets, humans, and even crocodiles. Children who handle them and then rub their eyes will quickly grow swollen goggles. Dogs who eat them will die. Just like our neighbor Frank's ongoing war against alien Cuban frogs, Zane throws cane toads against the wall or sticks them in the freezer for a humane end which they hardly deserve. 

The giant killer toad, Bufo marinus

Camels, imported as pack animals during colonization of the west and the interior in the 1800s, have become scraggly feral pests as well, now useful only for amusement in impromptu home-grown rodeos. The ringers have to put on dresses and race the rude beasts without tackle, while carrying a purse. Camels are gawkily unruly and enjoy biting, which makes herding them, stuffing them into vans, and riding them while carrying a handbag all rather challenging. "We cull them now, and they're starting to send them back to Afghanistan," said Zane with some satisfaction.

Kangaroos are as common as coyotes are in our suburban neighborhoods. In dry spells, you might see one hopping down the middle of the road.

And crocodiles, Kim informed us, are far worse than the gators that lurk in our Florida canals. She told us with glee, "When camping, we always ask permission before swimming in a stream, in case there are crocs. They'll drag you in, roll over and over with you until you drown, then pull you down and put you away in the muck, until you're all puffed up and rotten, then they'll eat you!"

"They can do that with a 400-kilo cow, too," added Zane with relish. "Drag 'em in by the nose and eat 'em later."

It's no wonder these folks have grown bored with Swamp People.