Which is probably for the best, or you’d be reading some other idiot’s book!
In the end, we lived for ten years in Lancashire. But we were never from there.
I did, however, take my first three driving lessons there. The driving instructor’s son was the ring-leader of the local stone-throwers, and for no reason I could ever establish, that man shared his son’s irrational hatred of me. They were cut from the same cloth perhaps, man and boy, and I was terrified of both of them. Towards the end of my third lesson, I was trying to bring the car to a halt on the side of our road. The instructor had spent the last hour berating me, and was disgusted with my ineptitude. He’d long since stopped advising me and merely barked orders, sighing theatrically when I failed the manoeuvre on my first attempt.
“Closer!” he shouted, as I nudged the car towards the curb. He seemed genuinely angry, and I half expected him to grab the wheel one-handed and do it himself, just to prove how easy it was. So I swung in as close as I dared, and was rewarded with a gravelly crunch.
“No, NO!” shrieked the instructor. He leapt out of the car and bent down to study the wheels. “My hubcaps,” he said with venom, when he got back in, “you’ve smashed them to pieces.”
I never got in his car again.
And that was why, more than ten years later, I was a backseat passenger for the entirety of the Voyages of Rusty. Strange, isn’t it, how such small events in your past can make a big difference in your future?
After eight days in the blazing wilderness, with the girls driving in shifts from morning till night, we finally made it across the Nullarbor.
Sydney appeared like an oasis – at once an historic port, a modern metropolis, and the most famous part of the country – about which we knew absolutely nothing. Sydney was an unknown quantity to all of us, and that made it all the more enticing. Once out of the desert we pushed Rusty to his limits, speeding through the New South Wales countryside right into the heart of the city. Not only were we all excited about this next stage of our adventure – but my dear old Mum, bless her little cotton socks, was waiting for us there.
She’d set out on her own little adventure at about the same time we were stuck halfway across the country in the world’s least reliable vehicle.
The scene was set for an epic Slater family reunion – and we all know what happens when Slaters get together, don’t we?
Mum; Incoming
Because we’d had so much trouble with Rusty, we were a bit late picking Mum up from the airport.
Three days late, to be precise.
Luckily, being a mum, she was both highly resourceful and prepared for disappointment. Having promised to be there to meet her, I was kind of expecting to look after her – but I should have know that within minutes of us being back together, she’d be looking after me again.
By the time we arrived she’d not only booked herself into a hostel and spent several days exploring Sydney, she’d also booked us into the same hostel; and now she was bored with sightseeing, raring to go, and counting on us to provide the excitement.
Personally, I was just hoping it wouldn’t get too awkward.
I mean, travelling with my new girlfriend and my sister was one thing.
Travelling with my new girlfriend and my sister – and my mum – was something else.
But she was delighted to see Roo again, and overjoyed that we’d become an item.
“You’ll have such beautiful children!” she exclaimed.
So, maybe a little bit awkward, then.
The first thing we tackled was the Sydney Harbour Bridge – climbing it, because… well, because it’s an iconic Australian structure, of course. And because you can.
The guide made us put on suits that looked suspiciously like prison overalls, and Mum emerged from the dressing room trailing a foot of spare material from both sleeves and both legs.
“It’s made for a giant,” she moaned.
“Ah, what size do you normally take?” the guide asked her.
“In these? I haven’t got a clue. It’s not something I wear very often.”
“She takes Size Gnome,” I chipped in.
“Well, we can’t have anything flapping,” said the guide, “as it could distract the drivers on the road below. But don’t worry – we’ve got overalls to fit every size!”
A short while later he was forced to concede defeat. “We’ve got every size except yours,” he admitted, “so we’re gonna do the roll-up thing.”
All four of us took a limb, and rolled up Mum’s suit like we were changing her tyres in the Grand Prix.
Then we spent some time clipping our hats, sunglasses and special-issue face-cloths to ourselves with lanyards, and practicing with the Navy Seals radio – a high-tech headset which transmitted the guide’s comments as vibrations through our jaw bones, allowing our inner-ear to ‘hear’ them in spite of the traffic noise and the deafening wind.
“Good to go,” the pit-crew boss said, and we followed him out onto the bridge.
At first we walked through the middle of the bridge’s structure, suspended above the thundering traffic below on a narrow walkway of steel mesh. Looking down whilst walking made the mesh seem transparent, which was a truly eerie feeling.
A series of ladders led us up onto the bridge’s main steel frame, and we followed the curve of it all the way to the top. The view, three-hundred-and-sixty degrees over the city and the harbour, was incredible – very nearly worth the two-hundred dollars each we’d paid for the privilege. Roo and I paused there for a lingering kiss, much to the disgust of three turban-wrapped men at the back of our group.
“You don’t have to do that every time we stop, you know,” Mum said. “It’s very nice up here, but I’d like to get down sometime today.”
We spent about two hours on the bridge. “I’d love to have your job,” I said to the guide afterwards. “How did you get it?”
“Oh, I just walked in and asked for it. They do all the training here. It’s not as fun as it looks though, you have to be very fit. That walk we just did is nearly half a mile, and sometimes I have to do it four times a day.”
“Wow, you guys have got it tough,” I said, straining to keep the sarcasm from my voice.
“Hell yeah!”
Next on our list was a beach trip.
Assuming we’d find Bondi horrendously crowded, we decided to visit one of Sydney’s lesser-known beaches. A trip to Manly Beach involved crossing the harbour by ferry, which we wanted to do anyway, so we spent the morning watching jugglers, human statues and didgeridoo players in the bay area and then headed to the dock with our bathers and towels.
I struck a suitably macho pose under the sign for Manly Departures, and then we were on the ferry, transfixed by the gleaming Sydney Opera House sliding past to starboard. It looked magnificent, in a what-the-hell-do-they-do-with-those-pointy-bits-on-top kind of way. I never got the chance to go in, but I have it on good faith that the ceilings are vaulted to match the exterior shape, rising inside to majestic peaks much as they do on the outside. Now, I’ve been in a lot of Australian buildings, and I couldn’t help but wonder how they clean out the cobwebs up there. Once, when I left Rusty’s door open to let the hot air out, I caught an ambitious spider spinning a web right across the opening! So you can bet those pointy, spirey-type things are chock full of the buggers.
And you could bet they were bigger than the ones in Roo’s games room.
Maybe they keep lizards, I thought.
When the ferry docked, we sauntered off in a cheerful mix of locals and tourists. They all rushed off in the same direction, clearly ignoring the beach, leaving us staring down at it alone. It wasn’t quite what I’d expected. About fifty metres wide, the strip of sand was littered with rocks and gravel, and sloped down to the same stretch of water that the ferry plied. It wasn’t a particularly enticing swimming experience, but we made the most of it, stretching out on our towels and watching a bunch of local lads trying to turn back-flips off
the beach wall.
Another ferry docked an hour later, sending swarms of people skittering past our empty strip of sand, all clearly too busy to catch a few rays.
“I know this isn’t the best beach in the country, but I’m surprised we’ve got it all to ourselves,” Mum said.
“It’s filthy,” Roo pointed out. “I don’t really want to stay here. That swim left a layer of diesel all over my body! I can feel it, all slimy-like.”
“Sorry love,” I said. “Gill, you want to call it a day? Go find some ice cream?”
“Hell yeah I do! This beach stinks of sewage.”
So we packed up, and said goodbye and good riddance to Manly Beach.
“What a shithole,” I said as we walked away. “Even Blackpool Beach is better than that!”
“I dunno,” Gill said, “last time I was on Blackpool Beach I found three used condoms and a syringe. And it pissed it down with rain the whole time. This beach is pretty shitty, but it’s still in Australia!”
“True.”
With no real plan, we drifted with the latest crowd of arrivals, past a row of shops and cafés. Mum bought us all ridiculously large ice creams, because it was Wednesday, and we sort of went with the flow while we ate them.
And that was when we found the real Manly Beach; a kilometre-long ribbon of the whitest sand, bordered by blue-green ocean so inviting my feet were in it before I knew what I was doing.
“Oh bollocks,” Gill said. “No wonder we were getting funny looks from people when they got off the ferry!”
“No bugger told us though, did they?”
“Would you go up to a bunch of half-naked people our age and start telling them where to go?”
“Probably not.”
We slurped our ice creams in quiet awe, scanning the hundreds of bodies sprawled across the sand, not even close to filling it. Dozens of jet skis zipped past, churning up the ocean either side of the ‘Swimming Allowed’ flags. Swimmers swam and surfers surfed, and it looked… exactly like the Australian beach scene I’d been anticipating.
“Shall we go for a dip?” Mum asked the others.
“Nah, I’m kind of dry now…” Gill said.
“I don’t want to get undressed again,” said Roo. “I stink of oil, and I’m scared that if someone smokes near me I’ll burst into flames!”
“Oh. Alright then. So, shall we head back to the ferry?”
That was Mum’s first beach day in Australia – and because we were having so much fun doing other things, it also turned out to be her last.
It probably didn’t give her the best impression.
Mum really fancied seeing some of Australia’s unique animals, so the next day Gill agreed to take her to Sydney Zoo. Both Roo and I felt we’d had enough close encounters with the local wildlife, and decided to forgo the entrance fee in favour of a rare bit of together time. No – it’s not what you think!
Unfortunately.
First we did our chores – and bought a nifty new phone with a ‘Skype’ button, as part of a decision I’d made to keep in closer touch with my family back in England.
Then we went in search of a hairdresser.
Roo had been toying with the idea of going blonde, and she thought a sudden change of hair colour would be a great way to surprise Mum and Gill when they got back. I had to admit, it’s a tactic that would never have occurred to me.
Sydney has everything, usually many times over, so it was no trouble at all to find a hair salon with an appointment free. It only took about two hours to transform Roo’s mousey brown locks into a platinum blonde bombshell.
“That’s fantastic!” I said, blown away by the transformation.
“I’ve got plenty of bleach left if you want it,” the hairdresser offered, “I mixed up way too much.”
I’m a try-anything-once kind of guy, so I thought, why not? And told her to go for it.
My hair is obviously made of something quite different to Roo’s, as after a similar length of time wrapped in cling-film it turned a shocking bright orange. I looked like one of the Rug Rats.
“Oh dear! That’s not supposed to happen,” the hairdresser said, which wasn’t the most comforting thing I’ve ever heard in a salon. “Don’t worry, let me try this…”
Two hours later I emerged with hair the colour of dirty straw.
“Well, that rules out horse-riding as an activity,” I told Roo. “If I get within striking distance of a horse, I’ll get eaten.”
“We could get some red dye from the supermarket,” she suggested.
“No thanks.”
“Really? What about purple?”
I was already used to Roo’s new hair by the time Mum and Gill got back, so I wasn’t prepared for all the gasping and shrieks of delight.
“Look at you!” Mum exclaimed, “you’re amazing! So blonde! So beautiful! WOW!”
Then she turned to me.
“And look at you! You’re… ah… what exactly are you?”
“A bloody idiot?” I supplied.
She seemed to consider this for a moment.
“Yes,” she said, “that looks about right, then.”
Mum; Outbound
Next we took Mum on a wine-tasting tour to the Hunter Valley, where three things happened: we all tasted a wide variety of Australian wines; Rusty broke down; and Mum got thoroughly drunk for only the second time in her life.
The first time had been on a pirate ship, on an all-you-can-drink excursion we’d booked onto as part of a Caribbean cruise. She’d gone into it with the best of intentions, wanting only to keep Gill and I safe from the evils of drink-diving. We’d persuaded her to have a cup of a bright red cocktail the crew were doling out from huge vats. She’d quite enjoyed it, pointing out that she couldn’t even taste any alcohol. But of course, we told her, that’s because it isn’t really alcoholic! And being ridiculously naïve, and already slightly intoxicated, she took our word for it and spent the rest of the afternoon drinking the stuff. When we carried her back to our cabin on the cruise liner, she lay on the floor for the next two hours, frantically holding on because she said she was spinning so much she was going to fall off! She made one long-distance telephone call to Dad, apologising incoherently for waking him up at 4am, then threw up in the sink and passed out on the carpet. It was like watching her experience a condensed version of my entire time at university.
This time however, she promised us faithfully that she would not get drunk.
Not in the slightest.
She merely became very happy, then very giggly, and then spent the rest of the evening loudly denying that she was drunk to everyone that walked past our tent.
Poor Mum was losing quite a bit of her holiday time to car problems. With Rusty boiling up almost everywhere we drove, it brought an unnecessary element of stress into every journey we made. When it happened again, only days after we’d paid a garage in Sydney to fix hoses and check the radiator, we knew straight away who to call.
We’d seen a cartoon spanner on a van driving around town, and Gill and I had erupted with laughter so suddenly she nearly swerved Rusty off the road.
LUBEMOBILE, it said on the side in huge red letters.
“What does he do, deliver sex toys?” Gill said, when she’d regained control of herself.
“I don’t get it,” said Roo.
Mum was similarly nonplussed.
“Lube mobile,” I repeated, by way of explanation.
“Yeah, they have those everywhere. They’re mobile mechanics. They have adverts on TV and everything.”
So this time we decided to leave Rusty behind our hostel and call in the grease monkey.
“There’s not a lot of room in that car park,” Mum pointed out. “I hope his van will fit.”
“Mum, it’s the Lubemobile! Trust me – it can slide in anywhere.”
Actually he reversed in, when he arrived, which seemed appropriate.
The mechanic was friendly, professional, and gave us a tip that he reckoned wou
ld stop Rusty having so many radiator problems in future; “Call a decent mechanic,” he told us. “The last one didn’t even tighten the screws!”
“Bet the Lube Mobile has no problem with tightness,” I muttered, noticing that Gill was having trouble keeping a straight face.
“He was a nice bloke,” Mum commented, as the Lube man repacked his tools.
“Yeah, not as slippery as I expected,” I said.
The joke was still lost on her, but Gill was delighted when she walked around the front of the van to admire the graphic of a fist clutching a rather phallic spanner.
“Tony, you’ve got to see this!” she called.
I went to investigate, walking past the dubiously-worded advert on the side (Dial 13-30-32 for Lube!) – and on the front was the coup de grâce.
‘The Mechanic That Comes To You’ it said across the bonnet.
“The mechanic that comes all over you!” Gill paraphrased.
“It could be worse,” I said. “The mechanic that just pops in…”
Once Rusty’s radiator was fixed (again), we decided to risk driving him north to explore Sydney’s Blue Mountains. We found a company that ran a caving experience, booked ourselves in, and crawled Rusty at twenty miles an hour around the narrowest ledge of a mountain road. Every meeting with an oncoming vehicle was life-or-death, and it took a good two hours to make the journey.
Once there, we encountered another amusing wardrobe issue; caving is another activity performed in overalls, though these were heavy, mud-stained canvas boiler-suits rather than the high-tech prison-wear we’d sported for the bridge climb.
Mum found a suit to fit, rolled up the legs and sleeves again, and donned a pair of rubber wellies. It was only then that we calculated the following equation:
Gnome + Overalls = Oompa Loompa.
It took great strength of will to avoid humming songs from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory as we headed down into the depths.
We’d all done a bit of caving before in various parts of the world, but there’s still something so exciting to me about being underground. The strange stillness to the air; the cool, even temperature and omnipresent, dripping moisture; and the calmness, the sense of millions of years of patient, geological history, surrounding and engulfing me in complete darkness.
Kamikaze Kangaroos! Page 27
