The mining town of Isa

Twenty-eight hours bus ride away, I was hoping Mount Isa was going to be worth it! Far into the Australian outback, far away from anything; I travelled through deserts and endless nothingness within an ocassional stop in some middle of nowhere town.

When I got on the bus I couldn't believe my ears when the driver explained for what felt like ten minutes about the dangers of leaving your feet in the aisle and how your trip could be ruined if you were caused an injury in this way. They really are thorough about things out here!

While on the bus I spoke to one women who was enquiring about whether a seat was taken to which I replied "I think a man is sitting there." Little did I know that that even the simplist of sentences was going to be hard for someone to understand out here.

"What a mam?"
"No a man"
"A nun?"
"No a man, a male!"
"Ohhh a maaaaan!"

Jesus, this is going to be fun.

Thank god, it was only one silly women on a bus that my accent made hard work for or this could have been a hard couple of months!

Mount Isa is a funny old place. Bigger than the places I stopped at en route (thank god!) but as lively as a bush in the outback. NOTHING happens here.

Its so quite, people do puzzles at the hostel... for fun!

On the plus though it is one of the best places to save money, as there's literally nothing to spend your wages on! There's one cinema, but the hostel has so many films there's not even any reason to go!

I found work at a bar/restaurant in one of the hotels in the town. Suprisingly it actually gets really quite busy and I do enjoy it a lot.

The only thing about this place is that it feels, in the words of Dylan Moran describing Oz, like "its located three-quarter of a mile from the surface of the sun, with people audibly crackling as they walk down the street!" I couldn't have put it better myself! This place is hot, with a capital H!... and the storms at night, I've never seen storms like it in my life! Amazing to watch, but so so loud! One lightening rod cracked only three streets away the other night and I heard it clearer than any lightening i've heard in my life... popping and cracking as it bolted toward the ground.

As dull as it sounds, i'm actually quite enjoying the quite life, at least for the time being... its some much needed time out, and i'm sure i'll be heading on to some crazy times once again once I leave this place!