Coffee karma

I am an easy traveller.  All I need is a good night’s sleep and two cups of strong coffee each day.  Where I go and what I do is largely irrelevant.  And I am not a coffee snob.  I don’t need good coffee.  It just needs to be caffeine, strong and liquid and oral.  All things are possible with sleep and coffee.

     As we packed, I told Tony I was bringing the stovetop espresso maker and coffee and please sort out a way to heat it.

     Tony returned from Bunnings the next day.

     ‘I bought this,’ he said with a big smile holding up a portable stove.  ‘We’re cooking with gas.’

     We didn’t get to make coffee at Tully for obvious reasons, but each day is full of new possibilities.  We set out from Townsville towards Charters Towers, a quaint former gold mining town.  

     After a quick wee, far from a roadhouse, chips and Twisties, we were on the road to Belyando Crossing, 193 km away.  And I couldn’t wait for a strong coffee cooked on the brand new portable gas stove.

     This was dry, inhospitable country, fit only for snakes and emus which we saw for the first time.

     ‘Can we shoot em, Dad?’ asked Kibby.

     ‘No,’ I said.

     ‘Why not?’

     ‘They are on our coat of arms and are protected.  Another game of hang man?’

     ‘Okay.’

     Eventually we got to Belyando Crossing, a location to buy fuel, pies and sausage rolls and gum.  First thing first, I got the stove, travel mugs and the coffee, sugar and powdered milk (breaching my Lenten vow).  Then I went to the loo, choosing to pay $3.15 for a packet of Extra rather than pay the $2 to use the toilet.

     Then I returned to complete my mission.  I filled the stove top and went to start the gas.

     ‘Tony!’ I screeched not unlike the crows hanging around the picnic tables.  ‘There’s no grill.’ 

     ‘I forgot,’ he said with such innocence my anger was fuelled

     ‘How could you forget?  I asked you one thing and that was to make sure we could cook the coffee and you just don’t listen like when I asked you to check the boxes for my cards …. ‘  I knew I sounded like a coven of crows, but I couldn’t stop.  How could the man I love fail me on coffee?

     ‘Cate, it’s in the past.’

     ‘Yes and because you disregard my requests you keep doing the same thing just like …’

     ‘Oh, shut up.’

     There is no point debating with Tony.  He is always innocent.  I took the travel mugs to the shop, keen to support a local business and enquired about buying coffee.

     ‘Yes, we sell coffee,’ said a young man with a strong English accent.  I held up the travel mugs and he must have sensed my urgent need for caffeine.  ‘It’s only instant.’

     ‘It’s okay,’ I said, simmering with rage at Tony.

     Soon we were back on the road, a crow’s flight to Clermont, 166 km away. I marvelled that a road could be so straight.  

     The scrub rolled by and my rage with it. 

     ‘What’s that island over there?’ Sutchy asked inadvertently of the peak, one of the Peak Ranges.

     ‘Naghir,’ said Tony and we all laughed.

Naghir is second from the right.

      The triangle rising from the flat expanse looked like Naghir rising from a green sea.

     We were on a road trip, a happy and memorable occasion.  I had to let the coffee incident at Belyando Crossing go.  There would be coffee in Clermont.

     There was indeed coffee in Clermont, served by a sweet-faced young girl with a beaming smile.

     When I said I didn’t need good coffee, I didn’t mean I'd drink a watery brew that tasted of the polystyrene cup.

     I smiled to myself.  I’d received a well-deserved dose of karma, a reminder not to be so precious about a hot beverage. 

     Emerald was a bustling metropolis, much bigger than I’d anticipated.  We checked out the Emerald Botanical Gardens and met German Harry who was feeding the possums.  He suggested we camp outside the gardens where there were several caravans parked. 

     ‘But there are no showers,’ I said.  ‘Only toilets and we have a camper trailer.’

     ‘Use ze bucket ven it is dark.’  He pointed to a tap.  ‘Zer is plenty of vater there.’

     This proposition piqued my sense of adventure after a night in the Townsville Big 4 bells and whistles van park.  This proposition was rejected outright by Seffy. We headed to the Nogoa Caravan Park where German Harry lived.  It’s less a van park for travellers and more a permanent home for local workers which makes for a much more interesting stopover.  Travelling is about meeting people and hearing their stories and learning about this amazing country.  The Nogoa Caravan Park, a steal at $20 for an unpowered site, offered just that.

     Under a sparkling sky, we dined on steak, fried red cabbage and onion, and dehydrated peas the colour of emeralds. It was heaven.

     Who needs coffee, anyway?