Have Car, Will Travel

Sitting on the verandah rail, overlooking the most enormous cattle station I've ever seen, I ponder how I got myself into this position.

Only days before we were both so happy - and overly excited about our pending "road trip" - nothing could possibly go wrong!

I love road trips, ever since my parents took my sisters and I along on road trips during the school holidays, nothing could compare to the wild ruggedness of the outdoors!

I wasn't naive going into this... or so I thought. Sure, the destination was chosen in a rather spontaneous fashion (if you consider throwing a dart at a map to decide your destination spontaneous).

However, we had roadside assistance, a relatively brand new car, car insurance, plenty of plastic and of course plenty of gal tunes to play while we're travelling.

What neither of us couldd predict was that there would be a kangaroo out there with our name on it! It shot up out of nowhere - no time to swerve, put on the brakes or any other evasive action

Now before you start worrying about the kangaroo - don't! He got off pretty light... he jumped on top of the bonnet and over the car - and continued on his merry way!

It was a completely different story for us. My car, which only days before had been paid off, was totaled! There was nothing I could do to save my car as we swerved out of control, hit a tree and stopped dead in its tracks. Luckily, aside from a scratch on my forehead, neither of us was hurt.

Some "road trip" this was turning out to be. Jane, being the great sport she is, had seen some humour in all this; although her laughter soon died when she realised we'd have to abandon the car, dragging our suitcases along to the next town - only another 300kms away!

A couple of hours into our hike we were rescued by our very own outback hero by the
name of Grainger who just happened to be on his way back from a rodeo in the previous town. We hit it off instantly, both drawn to each other immediately.

Grainger had the body of a Greek Adonis, the sexiest smile, and the cutest dimple in his left cheek. Long lustrous brown hair that had the habit of falling into his turquoise blue eyes, which seemed to twinkle; a mouth so inviting it called to you. Suddenly this trip didn't look so bad after all!

We stopped in at the mechanics where we arranged for the tow truck to pick up my car. As the town was too small to host any hotels or motels, we were invited to stay with Grainger and his younger brother. Judging by the look on Jane's face upon meeting Bastian, she was hooked! ;)