Move over Max and Priscilla  – the Old Chook is coming to town! To Broken Hill that is, one of the richest mining areas in Australia.

As of a few days ago, I have accepted a one year secondment to work in Broken Hill commencing in January 2019.

 

Broken Hill is in far west NSW and was the location for Mad Max 2 (aka Road Warrior), and Priscilla – Queen of the Desert. It creates the desolate moody background for  lots of other movies like Mission Impossible 2. Even though I have only been there for one short visit, I have a soft spot for Broken Hill. It was the original Old Chook’s first destination (see this post )

Being 1,100 km northwest of my current home, the landscape is very different and almost alien. The sandy beach of my home town will be replaced by sandy desert. Summer temperatures hover at 40oC and above for days on end. The winter is mild and it’s always dry.

It’s still a few months away but I am already getting excited. I don’t know anyone who lives there, I don’t know where I will live (yet) and I am leaving behind family and friends.  My friends are calling me brave, but to my mind this is a “safe” adventure. It has limits. It’s only a year, my old job will be waiting for me when I get back and I won’t be any worse off financially. I have everything to gain and nothing to lose.

“If you always do what you always did you will always get what you’ve always got”

I am looking forward to

• stargazing with a totally dark night sky and doing some astrophotography.
• Watching the sun rise and set on a horizon that is so vast you can see the curvature of the earth.
• Getting to know the locals and
• Stretching my own comfortable life.

Over the next few months I will be getting ready to go. There will be lots of planning. No doubt there will be spreadsheets!  Plenty of spreadsheets.

I will chronicle my progress  here and share this Old Chook’s  adventures in the outback! I hope you’ll enjoy the virtual journey.

The images here are from a road trip I took to Broken Hill in 2013.

This excerpt comes from a newsreel made back in 1953