No Shirt, No Shoes, No Service

There are a lot of things that can be said about this country... The post title says 3.... You can go around and not wear a shirt... You can go around and not wear shoes.... But most importantly, you can go around, to most eateries we are sorry to say, and you get no bloody service.... Honestly... It's pretty bad and it's all over the place... No condiments, no cutlery, no napkins and no service with a smile... No help, no directions, nobody seems to care, nobody seems to live around here and therefore, nobody seems to know, anything... But the great thing about all that is....... No Tipping!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  We just don't understand it........ Well, maybe we do....

Moving right along......
If you come to this country, bring money..... The cost of everything is, or could be, from 10% to 100% more than we pay at home.... Things that are 'necessity' based, bread/milk/fruit/canned goods/meat, in a large supermarket, are within a reasonable price range... As soon as you start with the luxury, or 'options' based items, the price sky rockets... meals that we pay $8 - $12 for will go for $14 - $22.... You can barely escape a $40 lunch...  We paid as much as $2.11 per litre in Yulara and the average was $1.60 per litre for gas... Snacks are close to 100% difference, and even bottled water....... No two ways around it....... We reused water bottles for days but inevitably we had to buy more and more as the fridge in the van just couldn't keep up with the demand of keeping them cold...

So, bring money.... Even if you wanted to do this country on the cheap, you will still need $$$$$$.... Don't deny yourself... You can eat home made sandwiches etc and home cooked meals if you have a unit... But to see the attractions, you need $$$, for everything.... This is a great country.. So much to see and do.... There are treasures of every sort to be found everywhere... It all just depends on what your tastes are... It really has something for everyone... But don't deny yourself by going cheap....

The people are fantastic... We met so many nice travellers. Maybe they were great because they were travelling too, who knows..... In general, mostly everyone was great... The service industry has a lot to learn and you get very frustrated with them and want to curse and shake your head... We did both.... It doesn't help.....

If you come to this country, you will most likely survive it... 22 million people every day survive all the dreaded and demeaned scary creatures that we were so adamantly warned about... Too funny.... Contrary to  popular folklore, those nasty spiders and snakes are not roaming the wilds and tames just looking to get into your shoes or bathroom or kitchen or what have you.. We only saw two Funnel Web spiders, one was scurrying into it's web in the depression of a corrugated fence in Melbourne, and the second was in the toilet house in Wycliffe Well. We only saw one poisonous (Tiger) snake... It was coiled up in shock and fear in the middle of the road between Hughenden and Charters Towers and we drove over top of it (between the tires), and when we turned around and went back to see it, it had hustled itself back into the ditch on the side of the road.... Now, having said that, we ourselves didn't live in a household for our six weeks here, so that could be different.... But I'm really very sure that on  average, one would not ever see anything poisonous while here on vacation, and certainly not in a threatening situation....

This is a very beautiful, vast, extreme country... The people are just like people everywhere... They care about their families and they want a good future, and they complain about the government. There are always the bad with the good, but it is not a country full of rednecks going out every night shooting roos and crocs... At least not in the places we visited. I have not heard one man call a woman a sheila.. Although I did hear a gent call another man a bloke in his telling of a story....

If you can come to this country, I would highly recommend it... It is truly amazing.... You will not regret it.

In closing, we want to thank everyone from the bottom of our hearts for following along on our blog and for your comments.  It has made us feel like someone cares and we did enjoy the jibs and jabs... It brought smiles to our faces daily... Thank you...

And just to end the mystery... The gnome, Ja'Roam, was brought along on this trip purely as a folly, but soon he began to represent all of you whom we carried in our hearts on this trip. So now you know.... Also, he was a lot easier to bring along than all of you, I can guarantee you that for sure.....lol  xoxo

Thanks, and good night..... See you soon.... xoxoxoxo!!!!!!!!