End of year wrap December 2024

I've had a hard year, a dark year.  A large, smelly bag of dicks.

At times it has been utterly bleak, loaded with loss and change and also oddly hopeful as well. 

It was all about putting on my big boy pants and pushing through the shit stain, yeehaw! 

I don't usually take life so seriously and I don't plan on doing so in 2025 but it was what it was this year.

That's the bad stuff.   

I did however have a blast smashing dusty trails and road tripping around the massive continent of Australia.  

Hiking and travel, hell yeah!

I noticed our prolific, vocal birdlife in every corner of the country.  Australia is chock full of interesting birds, I just opened my eyes and ears for the first time -probably chasing a distraction- and realised how incredible Australian birdlife is. 

Brolgas, Apostlebirds, King parrots and Willy Wagtails.  This shit gets me excited now.  I am proof that when you hit 50 trips around the sun turning into a bird enthusiast is a very real and terrifying possibility.  

You are warned. 

Bush stone curlew cruising around central Cairns.

I experienced some very sad wildlife encounters (think kangaroos with broken bones and many emus and goats stuck in fences, I'll keep how I dealt with these issues to myself)) and also a few soul stirring ones like when I found an abandoned but very plucky new born lamb right at the end of a hike.  

She wouldn't stop bunting into me and baaing and insisting on some much needed help.  Fair enough right.  I scooped her up, all skinny, woolly and noisy as all hell and I hunted down a local carer to take her in.  

Latest update is Sadie the lamb is loving life on a hobby farm!  Win.  

Much respect to any and all animal rescue carers, you beautiful fuckin legends. 

I've relocated to South East Queensland where it's warmer and I can grow food throughout most of the year compared to the brief summer growing season in Tasmania.  

I yearned for a change of scene for years and now I am single and without pets and can pack most of my possessions into a small Suzuki I just wandered around Australia until I found a job I liked doing and a house to live in.  

Here's the good stuff:

Fav brew was this collaboration between Stone & Wood and Mountain Culture.

I spent a month driving around the Snowy Mountains and then hiking the Hume and Hovell Trail from Yass to Albury again.  There was a wild brumby aerial cull in this area at the time but I sighted dozens of horses afterwards while walking and driving around. 

I visited Mt Buffalo for the first time.  Fantastic views and easy walking trails, so many people packed into a small area though.

The Hume and Hovell was a smidgen busier than my thru hike a few years previously but I still managed to snag lovely, serene campsites all to myself every night
.

I spied this sign all over Australia, the fun police are out and about!

Crossing the windy Nullarbor Plain from Adelaide to Western Australia.

I played relief Cattle Station Cook again for a few months in various locations and enjoyed utilising the Yellowstone cookbook to knock up some delish Tex Mex nosh.
Saying that, I reckon I'm done with FIFO mining work and living on remote cattle stations now.  

I re-hiked the Northern portion of the Heysen Trail from Quorn to the Flinders Ranges and back again (yo-yo).  Absolutely stunning landscapes, loads of native wildlife and a seriously under rated walking track.  The Heysen is my top Aussie long trail.

I ran an Ultramarathon in Brisbane and journeyed up to Far North Queensland and visited Townsville (above), Cairns and Magnetic Island.  First time up in that part of the world in 20 years.

is an easy to read, old school memoir of the first non stop walk from Florida to Canada on the Eastern Continental Trail.  Badass.

This Spotify wrap up of my listening habits surprised me; I thought there would be more Colby Acuff and Flatland Cavalry in the top 5 but there you go.