Back to the Track

Gryphon wrote:

Brocky45 wrote:

I take it that the Ghan Railroad north of Alice was not built until after the war???

The railway north of Alice didn't happen until the early to mid 2000's
WOW!! I would have thought many years earlier. Did Darwin have any rail connections to Perth or Cairns / Brisbane???
Was the Japanese presence so great in in the Pacific north of Darwin so great that war material had to be brought up from other southern ports or was a lot of it Australian manufactured???

Terry

Gryphon wrote:

Brocky45 wrote:

I take it that the Ghan Railroad north of Alice was not built until after the war???

The railway north of Alice didn't happen until the early to mid 2000's
Terry

WOW!! I would have thought many years earlier. Did Darwin have any rail connections to Perth or Cairns / Brisbane???
Was the Japanese presence so great in in the Pacific north of Darwin so great that war material had to be brought up from other southern ports or was a lot of it Australian manufactured???

Brocky45 wrote:

Gryphon wrote:

Brocky45 wrote:

I take it that the Ghan Railroad north of Alice was not built until after the war???

The railway north of Alice didn't happen until the early to mid 2000's
Terry

WOW!! I would have thought many years earlier. Did Darwin have any rail connections to Perth or Cairns / Brisbane???

No other connections with other cities. I believe the US offer to build the railway during WWII but our Government knocked them back because they were going to use your Slave labour. Whether that is just legend or not I am not sure but that was the story amongst the Darwin locals when I used to live there in the 90's

Terry

Well one Chevy has reached kynuna.

My staff car got a rock through the windscreen one hour from home. Quick stop in nanango for a sheet of perspex and off again.

Various minor ailments on the first few days having driven the car less than 10km since purchasing it with unknown history.

This morning disaster in Blackall and johns 1937 Chevy Ute destroyed its auto gearbox. John fitted a Holden v6. He is now on a truck home to Brisbane.

Bev and I are soldiering on alone and hope to be over the nt border tomorrow.

Bev found a friend at the roadside near auguthella
Lang

The broken windscreen was very common once but are fairly few are between these days compared to 30 or 40 years ago

Paul

Paul, so are blokes who can fix them on the side of the road with a sheet of perspex.

. .Many moons ago a few of us were looking for gold out from Warrego (Tennent Creek ).
A crew of surveyers pulled up at our camp site and asked how long we were going to be
staying there, when we asked why , they said we are going to build a rail line through here.
Everyone had a good laugh, but that is exactly where the line passes through now...........
...............Billy................

We got to camoweal. Mt isa glass people cut a new screen but for safety reasons would not fit to a car. I got a length of thick string and will fit myself when in Alice springs in a couple of days.

Back in 1976 I was in the army and spent a month in woomera flying a Queenair doing photography and laser terrain profiling all along the proposed route of the new railway.

Our photos created the survey maps for the rail project.

Best part of the trip was buying a two year old Chevy blazer from a yank rocket man on his way home. Paid 1500 after trucking and right hand conversion it still owed less than 10000 which of course was worth more in 1976

One time ,most country cars had folding mesh windscreen guards,when a car or truck was coming ,you pushed a pedal,and the screen came down to guard against stones ,foot off the pedal ,and it folded up ........there were also fixed mesh screens ,but folders were better for visiblility.

The other trick was holding your hand against the screen to absorb the impact. I wonder if it actually worked?