for your hard core outback hard to reach places

Really enjoy Robert Ryan's down under contributions.

pnichols wrote:
Hmmm ... that rain forest photo above looks like a pristine, beautiful, and warm place.

But, is it soon going to be ruined by the likes of this?:

No, the problem is hunting for Gas near the Great Barrier Reef.Sort of along the lines of your Alaskan Pipeline issue. Aborigines have the same problems as the US's First Nations Aboriginal people. and unlike other groups do not respond to normal initiatives. Housing built for Aborigines tends to go unoccupied as they believe spirits of their ancestors can be trapped inside walls.That is why the go "walkabout'. They cannot watch Films or TV showing deceased Aboriginal people as that would be offensive.

Hmmm ... that rain forest photo above looks like a pristine, beautiful, and warm place.

But, is it soon going to be ruined by the likes of this?:

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-02-05/marijuana-swap-for-gas-marks-path-for-australia-aborigines-jobs.html

pnichols wrote:
Robert,

Don't parts of Northern Australia still look like your top two photos above?

Yes Australia is not what you would think.
In Tasmania they have some the World's tallest trees and probably the Tallest if the Forest had not been cut down in the early part of last Century.
Tasmania some of the tallest trees.

Top part of Australia has the World's oldest surviving Rain forest.Called the Daintree.

It is located in the north-eastern part of Queensland in Australia. It is said to be as old as 135 million years and hence is the world’s oldest surviving rain forest. It is the largest rain forest in Australia and covers about 2600 square kilometres. The rain forest is home to many exotic plants and animals including 30 percent of Australia’s reptiles, marsupial and frog species, 18 percent bird species, and 65 percent bat and butterfly species and over 12000 species of insects

The Daintree Rainforest grows right down to the shoreline.

Robert,

Don't parts of Northern Australia still look like your top two photos above?

Come-on now .... isn't that bottom photo from a spot in Washington or California? (just kidding). I never would have guessed that places like that in the bottom photo could be found anywhere on the Australian mainland (... not counting islands off it's coasts).

Mr Wizard wrote:
that cradle mountain pic is Beautiful

That is how the rest of Australia would have looked if the continent had not become drier.

... and in Australia you get nasty droughts over many years like we here in CA are experiencing for about the 4th year.

We have never done this before - but as of recently we are now watching the humidity gauges in our stick house, and the RV when traveling. They of course can read all over the map over short durations, but their readings have been trending lower over the long term.

that cradle mountain pic is Beautiful

Mr Wizard wrote:
it snows in OZ.. i didn't know that !

Yes mainly in the Australian Alps(Southern NSW top of Victoria). There has been more snow than Switzerland in some years. In the Island State of Tasmania, they do have blizzards in the middle of Summer!!1. Tasmania is Australia's 6th State.
You get Europe, Deserts like Nevada/Utah(vastly greater in area), Jungles like South East Asia and snowfields like Switzerland.
Snowing in Tasmania

Snowing in Cradle Mountain Tasmania.

b,

You should see our Class C now sitting in a campground over-night on the way back to home in CA. It's a real dust-ball ... inside and out ... even though we tried our best to maintain positive air pressure in the interior whenever traveling out on the desert roads East of Quartzsite.

We spent some time out in the middle of nowhere in Northwest Texas DURING AUGUST a few years ago in our Class C. The DW nearly had heat stroke out away from our Class C rockhounding. I had to fire up the Onan, put the coach A/C on MAX, and idle the V10 with it's cab air on MAX too ... in order to cool her down. It sure was remote, pristine, and quiet out there. You often find that in hot places because most folks don't know how to deal with heat and won't go to places where it's hot ... so that's when/where one can really get away, if you're prepared.

By the way, you should have visited ALAMO lake in Arizona while there for Quartzsite. Many miles on a desert road to get to it that dead-ends at it. This beauty is way out in the Arizona outback and is representative of one of my favorite RV exploring excuses -> locating and RV'ing to bodies of water that are where water doesn't belong.