Travelling With Truckies and a Hippie From Way Back

The two most interesting characters that I chatted to last weekend were both travelling home to the US on Qantas.

The first was a middle aged American women who had been to Australia many times before, on some of these occasions to exhibit show horses. She had many friends living here and some of them are truckies. Much of her stay on this trip was spent travelling with truckie friends with overnight stays being sleeping in trucks on the road side. One road trip she made was with a load of bricks from Wollongong, NSW to Gladstone, QLD. Her Australian stay was vastly different to that of the typical tourist.

The second character was a softly spoken American guy in his late 60's with a very long grey beard. He had done the Indian Pacific train trip across the country and spent the rest of his time in hostels in different parts of the country. His leisure activities were minimal and all that he could mention were reading and relaxing - certainly no mention of sightseeing or partying. He just reminded me of the classic 'hippie' type from the 1960's. In fact my 18 year old colleague who was nearby referred to him as a hippie before I made any such reference or comment!! I didn't realize that teenagers today would know what a 'hippie' type was as it's not such a commonly used term nowadays.

On a Qantas flight to Europe was a very friendly French businessman who spoke great English and had enjoyed his stay here. I also chatted to a sociable Swiss woman and a number of British tourists.

Till next time.

Peter

Souvenirs Australia Warehouse