Cameron Corner store - unwelcomed

Andy, that may not be a "4wd" story but it is a very relevant one about, and highlights some of the situtions seen during, Outback travel. You seem very well prepared and experienced and were willing to assist others less so, so it is shame this bloke went off half-cocked...

BUT from what I've seen "out there" with wa++ers who think trip preparation is buying a khaki shirt and throwing a catalog of bits at thier big shiny new truck, plus hold the opinion they're some sort of pioneers who are the first people this year to have travelled Beyond the Black Stump.... I can see his point of view, too!!

Andrew,

Fenn, and some of his mates, are 'characters' of the first order with a rough and rather distinctive sense of humour that many find appealing. It is just possible that you were on the receiving end of a roast and misunderstood the rough humour as a reprimand. Trouble is..... you will never know for sure.

Andrew,
Yep! it is not pleasant being the victim of such folk. Particularly when they have an audience.
I know nothing of Cameron Cr so looked it up in case I called in by accident. Well now I know where it is that ain't going to happen.
Why would you have wanted to go there?
Why would anyone go there?

It's shame to hear you had an experience like that with Fenn, we stayed at "The Corner" for a night back in 2010, and had a great time there. the food was great, we had plenty of drinks after dinner at the bar, and Fenn and Cheryl even allowed some of the boys in our group to be serving the drinks behind the bar by the end of the night.
all i can say is, you experience with Fenn is completely the opposite to what ours was like, i'd happily stop in there again and have a drink or 2 there.

I agree with rumpig above. We were there for a couple of nights in 2009 and had a great time with Fenn, his family and other travellers at the Corner.

I'm sure there's been a major misunderstanding. Fenn used to post on here, infrequently though. It would be nice to hear his side of the story before people start making judgements.

Regards

Seems to be a growing trend. I have declared to not visit the Innaminka store again due to the appaulling bad manners and general disinterest on display at the General Store there.

Without the Burke and Will historical interest, it has nothing else to offer.

As I told the lady at the end of a display of chronic disinterest, 'if you don't like your job, get one that you do like'.

And again .. travel to Tibooburra and it is a whole new and pleasant world, with welcoming people. They were not surprised at my comments and said they hear it all the time.

Never again, Innaminka!!

Jack

One has to remember that the people running these remote business places might have business skills - but often, they lack social skills.

Having said that, I think you'll find these people have to put up with some of the biggest dropkicks around, too.
Not everyone who travels to distance places is a sensible, properly-organised, well-prepared individual. Maybe you just caught him on a bad day.

I and my brother have come across any amount of dropkicks travelling long distances, who expect locals to support them, at their own cost, and at no cost to the traveller.

Some examples:

1. Pulled into the Balladonia Roadhouse one night. There are two "round the world cyclists" there, scruffy and dirty. The roadhouse manager is having a bit of a barney with one. When he comes over, I ask him what happened.

He says - "See that bloody cyclist? He's a Canadian and his mate is a Yank. He asks if we have a building he and his mate could camp in, as he doesn't have enough for a motel room."
"I said - Yep, there's a shed down the back you can camp in. $10 for the night".

"He says he can't afford that, and can he have a green rubbish bag? He wants to use that as cover when he beds down on the ground."

"I give him a green rubbish bag - and 5 mins later, he's back - asking - 'Seeing as the bags are free, can we have two more?!'.."

"That's when you saw me doing my lolly at the useless pr**k. We get them here by the dozen every month.
They all want help, they've all got no money, they all want everything for free. I've had a gutful of them!"

2. Another time the brother picked up a bloke wheeling a wheel along the road, between Norseman and Kambalda. He picks him up in the truck, and the bloke throws his wheel in.

The tyre has about 14 layers of worn plies hanging out of it. He says to the brother - "What's the next town, I gotta get this tyre fixed".
The brother says - "Kambalda - and that tyre's beyond help mate, you need a new tyre".

The tyre wheeler says - "Geez, I haven't got any money, so I hope I can get hold of another tyre for nothing!"
Then he goes on - "You know, people have been so good to us. Me and 4 mates left Sydney 3 weeks ago in our old Humber - and we only had a $1 between us when we left!"

"People have been giving us meals and petrol for free! - so we got all the way to Norseman on that dollar!"

The brother and I had a discussion about how, if you were running a servo or roadhouse, you'd give these deadbeats 10 litres of free fuel, to get rid of them, before they stole something!

Now, I'm not saying that Andrew is a moneyless no-hoper, like so so many travellers - but you can get some idea from the couple of foregoing yarns, of the constant stream of no-hopers and useless people, that regularly turn up at remote servos and roadhouses, who expect the owners to go out of their way to assist them - generally from hopeless positions, that are primarily of their own making.

I think part of Andrew's problem stemmed from the secondhand message, which is a notoriously unreliable method of communication.
As has been said many times, when a message is repeated, there's often a big difference between what was said, and what was understood.

Andrew,
I have stayed at Cameron Corner and found Fenn easy to get along with. Why did you ring the wrong number twice? Would have been less stuffing around if you called the store direct especially as you said you were very prepared then have the wrong number and had trouble on the bike due to road conditions (seems you didn't research the conditions very well). As for nothing to see out there, some of the best places in Australia there is nothing to see (especially tourists). I have no trouble recommending Cameron Corner as a great place to stop over and have a feed and night off from the road.
Cheers Mick

During my working days I've had to do the angel of mercy thing quite a few times.

What amazed us was the dorks who went up into the Corner Country in clapped out FWD's and Kingswood's.

We'd be advised that a motorist was in strife up that way, and either I'd have to deploy a vehicle from here or Tibooburra to attend to these people. A lot of them were not members of a motorist organisation and so could not get roadside assist, or else just didn't have the funds to pay for a tow truck to come and get them.

Coming back from Tibooburra one February afternoon, near Lake Cobham, we came upon a clapped out 'troopy' with four German kids in it. They had driven down from Darwin, in stinking hot weather, they had a plastic jerrycan of water and their clothes, bugger all else. How it got that far was beyond me, but their gear box was stuffed and the vehicle wouldn't move.

They wanted me to tow them into the 'Hill', but I knocked them back. Anyway, we didn't have tow rope. So after a bit of a conflab together they opted for Plan B. The vehicle was left on the side of the road and we dropped them off at one of the doss houses in town.

You know, not one of them said thanks, and they could all speak English.

You just get so tired and cynical about these so called ill equipped explorers.

Their troopy, so I'm told lasted intact for about three days, and a couple of weeks later the R.T.A. buried it somewhere.

In response to Andrew's comments from Fenn and Cheryl at CC

Hi
Can you post this for us?
The message we received from Omicron was that a phone call had been received
from a distraught push bike rider about 40km out. So as per the norm and
getting late, Fenn left a busy store to attend to this call out. First he
came across the bogged car and people came running down from the hill where
they had set up camp. This chap came down with them in leathers and Fenn
asked him if he had just come in from the Strez and if he had passed a
pushbike rider. He told Fenn then that he was the rider who called. I pulled
the car out of the bog and then asked if the biker still needed help getting
back to the corner. He said he was right and decided to camp with the people
from the bogged car, a group of young British tourists.

Fenn came back to the Store. The next day when the biker arrived at the
Store, Fenn did get irate with him because he couldn't understand why the
biker didn't just pull over and camp anyway. And not put a station and store
into concern for a travelers well being when it was only someone who felt
tired. This biker did not have a booking. Had not contacted us from
Lyndhurst to say he was on his way. Even though there had been some contact
previously we were not aware of who or where he was.

As people who know where the Corner is and been through before, we never
hesitate to help anyone in genuine need. But feel like we are being used
when something like this happens, particularly when the Store is full and is
short staffed.



So two sides to every story

Andrew has posted this on several other off road forums as well so not sure what his agenda is I've been to CC numerous times bought fuel, had a few beers and hung around for a while. Had no problems & loved the place

DD