The weekend plans went slightly awry. Saturday was supposed to be a day trip to Sydney to visit an exhibition. Being on an early flight meant catching the sunrise at Brisbane Airport just before boarding. If I knew then that hours later we would still be sitting at the gate, eating breakfast on board without having moved an inch! Technical problems with the pilots' chair meant we had to wait until it was fixed...but the upside is that I did get to watch two full movies. We arrived too late into Sydney to make the exhibition. Oh well, it was very relaxing to say the least.
I don't think you'd have any problems finding this old girl, sitting at the QANTAS Founders Museum in Longreach. In fact, as you drive into the town, this dominates the scene rather than any town landmark. Being able to get up so close to the Jumbo is an amazing experience. Better still is being able to explore the workings of this aircraft with a tour of it, with a wing walk included. It's only then that you realise just how big the 747 really is.
In 1926 Q.A.N.T.A.S. became the world's first airline to both build and fly it's own aircraft. It was a bold step for the engineering staff with their humble workshop in an isolated country town.
The engines and all metal parts were imported from England. Spruce and Oregon timbers for wing spars were Canadian, but the maple used for the propellers and the plywood needed for cabin construction came from Queensland. Large rolls of linen were imported from Ireland while the dope used to make the linen taut came from England.
Above is the original hangar where it all started.
The outback is fraught with danger, be it scorching heat, dry, parched scrub, freezing nights, any amount of wildlife, an unrelenting landscape where disorientation is easy, and......Road Trains! They are an integral part of the Outback landscape, just like kangaroos, red dust and endless horizons. Australia has the largest and heaviest road-legal vehicles in the world. They can be up to 5 trailers long, but only up to 3 are permitted in Queensland, and about 200 tonnes. As you can imagine when one of these passes you, you are blinded by the dust for a while, and driving behind one is another thing altogether! It was fortunate on the picture above that there was enough room to pull right across to the left...sometimes it's a single lane track.
Oh, how different it was in days gone by when it was permissible to smoke on public transport. This sign is on one of the trams at the Brisbane Tramway Museum. With such small compartments inside the trams I would imagine that everyone on the 'other' side of the line would also be exposed. Some things from the past weren't so good after all!
Two more gems for you from the Brisbane Tramway Museum. I can't help but think how wonderful it would be to see these old girls rumbling along the streets of the city, albeit totally impractical!
Car 47 on the left is a 1901 California combination car and this type was used in the first electric fleet. Car 65 was built in 1921 in Brisbane. They were commonly known as Jumping Jacks or Toast Rack cars because of their pitching action at speed and their seating arrangement.
As with all things from the past, and in a constant effort to solve traffic and public transport woes in large cities, there has been cries for the re-introduction of trams in Brisbane. With the current financial constraints I can't see it happening. Such a shame, in my opinion, as they function very well in European cities, and seem to offer efficient cheap transport.
There was a time when Brisbane, like many other cities around the world, had an extensive network of trams. A massive fire destroyed much of the fleet of city trams in 1962, and this was seen as the beginning of the end, with the tram network being closed down completely in 1969.
Fortunately the Brisbane Tramway Museum has managed to preserve some of the rolling stock, and with the hard work of volunteers we can experience a jump back in time and ride some of the restored trams over a short track. Tram 99 seen here was used between 1936 and 1945.
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