Birdsville, Queensland
www.aussietowns.com.au/town/birdsville-qld
Due to apparently unpredictable road conditions, we couldn't drive to the camel base camp and were 'stuck' in Birdsville on 9 May, 2024.
Birdsville is a remote, small town (population about 110) in Queensland, famous for the Birdsville races, held on the first Saturday in September each year, when about 6,000 visitors descend onto the town.
Apart from the races, there is the Big Red Bash, held in July each year when the population swells to about 10,000.
bigredbash.com.au/home/
I was not prepared for a 'day off' and didn't bring my sketching kit. I had a biro, a mechanical 0.5 pencil, and a 140mm x 90mm waterproof 'Field notes' book (it does rain occasionally in Australia's deserts...) and no sketching paper or colours of any kind.
I borrowed some laser printer sheets from the Caravan Park office (they didn't have any graphite pencils...) and then went to the roadhouse where I purchased the one and only box of cheap coloured pencils. Anything and everything has to be flown or trucked in and ordered in advance, i.e. certainly no art materials or other stuff we city slickers conveniently can get any day of the week from the supermarket!
It was a hot day, the coloured pencils didn't work very well on the smooth laser paper and the flies, abundant in outback Australia, buzzing outside and inside my fly veil, were driving me nuts!
Next time, and I hope there will be a ' next time', I will bring at least some paper and the 'ArtGraf' graphite block.
Laser photocopy paper
Ballpoint pen
Coloured pencil
A5
