Photos from Central Australia 1972

Thanks Nick, I will look into it and let them know of the photos.

Business was booming for someone. Notice the Mercedes sports car outside the Stuart Arms Hotel. Not sure whether they drove it up there or had it transported, but not the sort of car to drive out to the back blocks I wouldn't think.

I seem to remember a story about someone who has a series of sports cars up there including a Merc and an XK120 Jag.

Bob, there were plenty of "TOs" in Alice only 3 years later in 1975 when I first visited it.

Hi Barry,

I use a Nikon Coolscan 5000 scanner with a slide feeder attached. Got it shipped in a few years ago from a seller in Canada.
Due to the number of slides I wanted to scan (dad was a mad slide photographer) the flatbed and other type scanners on the market were too time consuming.
I can put up to 40-50 slides at a time depending on their thickness and walk away. With a few thousand to do it was the only way I was going to do it.

Fortunately the software with the scanner removes most dust spots and enhances faded colour (only really needed for old slides), but I still run each image through Lightroom to crop the black borders and play with colours if needed. Depends how picky I am with the final shot and how late at night it is lol. Some of these ones around Alice Springs I am still not really happy with and will play more with them later.

The scanner is set to save the files in 8bit Tiff files as it gives more scope to playing around with the final image. Once finished in lightroom then I save to jpg and upload. Although be warned, tiff files can be very large, 50+mg each.

Lyn

That struck me as well. These days you need a 4wd to travel up the bitumen to Alice don't you?

As an old Valiant owner I was pleased to spot one in the corner of one picture.

Cheers

Just to add a trip to Central Australia was a big deal back then. There was a song by Redgum called "Last Frontier" released soon after I went there that captured the spirit of why people like your uncle and I went there. Out of interest, John Schumann from Redgum was on the Australia Day Honours List 3 days ago.

Lyrics:
There's a corrugated highway Leading north from Port Augusta
lined with ratted cars that didn't rate a tow
The Salt plains out of Pimba And your eyes begin to stream
On to Kingoonya huddled dusty by the road
Romantic notions shattered Like the tyres that didn't hack it
This has got to be the country's last frontier
Where a sports car's next to useless Running cattle grids and river beds
We drove a van from 1963

Someone mentioned walkabout And kiss your job goodbye
Just to see the country shimmer through the windscreen
Drinking beer, telling stories While laughter filled the night
And flexi-time's behind you like a bad dream

You got a flat on Anzac Highway And Lawson on your shelf
Its a Southern Comfort, air-conditioned rage
Where a homestead's more than just a cheap print Dangling from a wall
And mateship's more than lines upon a page

We went looking for Australia In between the TV lines
'Cause the ABC just couldn't make it real
Colour documentary From a beanbag on the floor:
Never shows as much as it conceals

A stark and blistered Alice Springs And a river runs with shame
And you wipe the sheets of bulldust from your eyes
Another country's uniform And the mirage it falls apart
To the open gap between the truth and lies

Go and see your country, mate The travel agents scream
Politicians sell it's hard to score a pasttime
Signs and high-wire fences Hold the land where I belong
It's as if I'm in the outback for the last time