Day 157 | to Katherine to join a circus: something I always wanted to do
92 km | Heading west total: 7,178 km
Yesterday at the Buntine Highway turnoff I met Alwyn Bell who offered me a job to work for his sideshows at the Katherine Show which is on this weekend.
He is in his fiftieth year of coming to Katherine. In 1959 he remembers driving from Alice and not meeting another car for the whole day. Bell Amusements have been around a long time and have all the best rides. 5 money spinners. Although he has a property at Queanbeyan most of the year is spent doing the show circuit: Darwin next then Adelaide, Melbourne etc. He does Mt Isa, Alice, Tennant Creek and the country towns as well. Most of the crew are family or have been with him for a while.
My tent is set up just behind No Limit.
(By the way the Mr Buntine for whom the highway is named, first name Noel, was the transport operator who invented the 3 or 4 trailer roadtrain and also the double-decker cattle trailer in the 1950s. For that he certainly deserves his road.)