2 Crazy Sheilas

If you have been reading my blog you are all aware that I was last off to Kroombit, a cattle station in the middle of nowhere Queensland. I was completely sure that it would be a horrible time and I would have no fun at all, besides being reminded of good old Grant County (and I was), which didn’t turn out to be as bad as I thought.

As soon as we stepped off of the bus and glimpsed at the resturant, which was a wooden shed, the bar (a.k.a. old trailer) and our entertainment, which consisted of a country radio station and a mechanical bull, I was immediately reminded of Grant County. This was made even more realistic when I saw the old beaten up, dirty, scruffy men sitting at the ‘bar’ having a good old Aussie beer, Tooheys. I thought being reminded of Grant County was going to be a bad thing, but as I stated before, it wasn’t as bad as I thought, almost kind of welcoming (p.s. that will most likely be the one and only time I will ever say that so don’t get to used to it folks!).

We were quickly assigned to our rooms, a small wooden shack with three bunk beds and headed out to the campfire circle to have a beer (on happy hour special of $3.00, another reminder of the midwest and its cheap alcohol) and waited for our outback dinner. While we waited for dinner and had a few beers I sampled some mystery meat sitting out for taste-testing, in which we would be told the source after dinner. I swore I was eating possum or something horrible, and to my surprise it tasted good which made me even more weary because I was thinking how horrible it would be to have tried something unquestionable and actually liking it! Later, after our roast beef, mash and veggie dinner, we found out it was goat…not so bad huh?

After dinner we gathered around and learned a little about the cattle station we were on, which if I could have understood what the poor old man, Alan, was saying through his thick Aussie accent and over the country tunes, I would be able to repeat right now. After smiling and nooding for some time we left the fire circle and went out to a clearing and learned how to crack some whips! I stood up on the milk crate, strapped on my protective goggles, and gave it a go! The first time, being that I smacked myself in the back of the head with the whip, didn’t turn out so well. After a lot of coaching, flinching, and horrible whipping technique I managed to crack the whip a few times! Once everybody had a shot at the whip it was time to have a go at the mechanical bull, and go figure, my name was called first . I hopped on and held on tight with my right hand and threw my left into the air, with a count of three and am instruction to lean back on three I rode my first mechanical bull….very poorly, Miranda said I shot off of it like a bullet the second it had started! In order to redeem myself I hopped back on and gave it another go, this time I think I lasted about 3 seconds, not good enough for a professional. Miranda was next and didn’t do considerably better than I did, and was okay with !After we all rode the bull one of two times we headed back to the campfire circle where we played games and dwindled off to bed.

The next morning I was shocked awake by a shotgun going off, nice alarm huh, and told to get up and get out to breakky. After breakfast and packing up our things a few of us were off on a horseride to muster goats out in the paddock (or was we call it, field). Myself, stating that I was a beginner and nervous on horses (which I am, being that they’re so huge and intimidating) was assigned to one of two of the most docile horses on the station, named Avis. Avis treated me very well and listened and did everything as I directed as we mustered the goats in the paddock. While mustering we were told to yell, “AYYY UP UP UP” in order to move along the goats. I felt like a maniac speaking goat but it surprisingly worked! With the team of about 15 to 20 of us we managed to successfully muster the goats into the pen and ride out horses back to the stables. Getting off of the horses, quite hilariously as we all were walking funny and rubbing our sore butts, we headed to the goat pen.

Once at the goat pen we were able to have a go at some clay pidgeon shooting, which I definately took part in. Having never shot a gun before I was very nervous, especially since the shotgun was half the length of my body! Being American, and almost all internationals thinking that we as Americans always carry and shoot guns (on a daily basis) everybody was stoked for my go at it. I will have to say that I did not impress as I missed all five of my clay pidgeons, and may have put the stereotype that Americans are crazy gun carrying maniacs to rest for the others on the trip.

Shooting five bullets was enough for me and our next activity was a little bit of a competition. We broke up into groups of three, Miranda, an old American guy (mid-70’s) and I formed a team and called ourselves Team America. The object of the game was to stand in a circular pen where a cowboy put a goat into, and when the timer started one would run and catch the goat, another would pick the goat up and place it gently into its side, and the third to go and grab the ‘hot’ branding iron (which was painted red in effect) and brand the goat for 3 seconds (the other point is that only one person could leave the fence at a time), after which the timer was stopped. I had the job of running, catching, and gragging the goat back to the fence, our American teammate tp tip the goat over and Miranda to run and grab the iron and brand the goat. The time had started and I got lucky and got to the goat right away and was able to drag it back to the fence, where our other teammate had a bit of trouble tipping it while Miranda ran for the iron. All in all we had done a really quick job and were sure we had once…and sadly did not, as we lost by .1 seconds after another team! Bummer huh! The goat racing was pretty hilarious and fun and after we all held hands and played spin the bottle with a taser gun! It sounds crazy huh, well it was. We were instructed to take all of our metal off and hold hands and where the bottle stopped the two people inbetween had to each hold onto a pop can while it was hit with a taser…at which point we all got shocked and screamed!

Being shocked was the last activity for our time at the cattle station, and as much as it made me feel like I was apart of the Jackass cult (I mean come on who willingly lets someone else shock them! Its ludacris!), I was ready to get back to civilization.

We all boarded the Oz bud and headed to Hervey Bay, the outlet to Fraser Island, and all sand Island (the biggest in the world actually) and said to be one of the natural wonders of the world. Once Miranda and I arrived in Hervey, after a stressful ride as we found out that our tour had cancelled on us but we were luckily able to book another tour last minute to go over to Fraser Island the next day, we had some pizza with a few new British friends and watched a movie. The movie made me tired as so I headed to bed being that it was going to be an early one the next day because we were heading to Fraser.     

All in all my time in Kroombit ended up being a really fun time and I learned a lot about all the hicks out there and the lifestyle that comes with it. Although I may now have a partial understanding for them I still will never be a country girl, even if I’m from there!

~Claire