Travelling manners

After having my 2 bobs worth regarding some peoples lack of skill with a shovel leaving their stinking crap around camp sites and water courses, travelling manners are becoming another sad fatality. The friendly wave to a fellow traveller is a great Australian courtesy and good manners in remote areas. Forget about towns and cities.

The old man taught me to always wave to a fellow traveller because he may be the only one around to pull you out of a bog and vice versa.

eg The mate and I and our families were enjoying the solitude on the west coast of Fraser when along came a pair of Rangies. I lifted my arm and waved. So did the kids. They ignored us. About 2 or so hours later a bloke, totally exhausted, wandered into our camp yelling he was stuck in Wathumba Creek. Poor bugger was almost hysterical. The mate gave him the mail;

"Mate you drove past us with your nose in the air and totally ignored us! Now you want us to help YOU!!??

He offered money at which time I had to come into it before the hysterical fellow had bigger problems. We put him out of his misery and headed up. The tide on its way in. What confronted us was two Rangies, one 15 metres away from the creek up to the diffs and the other down to the running boards in the creek. Both connected by a strap. It took two linked FJ40's with low cam 350 Chevs and lockers (we actually taught some shovelling skills!) to ease each vehicles out. The hysterical Rangie being the hardest as the Island wanted it bad. We left not accepting a beer because of the tide and all done. Midges too crook anyway.

Our kids, mates and grandkids cope this yarn as a practical lesson in travelling manners. I wonder if the old Rangie mates reading this? Its been 25 years mate and I'm still waiting for the lottery ticket.

So if you see an old Troopie with a PTO on the front and an old bugger waves, wave back, you never know.

Sorry about the length of this, but the emerging bad travelling manners p##s me off.

Cheers

Seakarvan