Waggin' Trail: Stromatolite of Love

Those of you with misspent youths will quickly recognise my clever appropriation of the Lou Reed song and correctly guess that I am at the famous Hamelin Pool stromatolite site with a diesel mechanic who has all his front teeth. Since I arrived at the campground with a completely different bloke who I am also leaving with (try to keep up, I realise it's confusing), the grey nomads now know me as Whore of the Caravan Park. Jason (first bloke) says he is going to write "Britney of Hamelin Pool" in the dust on the back of my bus.

Day before yesterday I was camped at Coronation Beach with the usual grey nomad pack when another old bus pulled up into the last campsite, next to mine. Jason, who's about my age, hops out with his dog Gooch and soon both dogs are in each other's buses and we're having a great time. Jason plays for the other team as they say and is great company, so we decide to "tagalong" with each other on the road next day to Monkey Mia.

So we arrive at Hamelin Pool yesterday with harmless expectations of seeing the amazing ancient stromatolites, a side detour en route to Monkey Mia. After five minutes of being awestruck by the prehistoric spectacle we are soon engrossed in seeing who can take the most glamorous self-portrait shot of themselves without looking like pumpkin heads.

The Hamelin Pool campground is so cute we decide to stay there instead, and within half an hour I come across an intelligent, sensitive & articulate burly diesel mechanic pining in lonely isolation behind the generator shed. These country blokes are refreshingly straightforward. Here is pretty much the conversation within the first three minutes of meeting:

Him: (Looks me up & down) "So, what are me chances then?"

Me: "Depends on how good your cooking is."

Him: "Fresh roo steaks on the barbie do ya?"

Me: "It's a small step in the right direction."

Him: "Also I am incredibly wealthy."

Me: "That and an absence of bodily diesel odours could work wonders."

This motivates a miraculously rapid repair of the campground generator which runs the shower block. Somehow things get very chaotic and funny with people racing to use the showers, Jason alternating between chatting up backpacker boys & giving me hilarious diesel mechanic updates ("Heads up - he's just had a shower!" "FYI - he's just asked if I'm his competition!"). The whole place is like a combination of Gilligan's Island and the Benny Hill Show.

Anyway, Jason gets a massive camp fire going, I make salad & get all the grey nomads on to the now-famous Wagatini Cocktails, Duncan the diesel mechanic turns up in a clean shirt & fires up the barbecue, while I roll my eyes at his wild promises of trips to Paris & tiger shark fishing. But the kangaroo steaks are awesomely delicious! It might have been better the next morning if I had not chosen peak grey nomad shower hour to try and sneak back across the campground to my bus wearing only Duncan's bathrobe. I am sure I can hear hisses of "Jezebel!" "Slattern!" and "Hoyden!" as they shuffle past with their bathroom kits. On my way out I run over one of the camp sign posts and further embarrass myself trying to coax Smokey out from under the camp kitchen with some chicken in front of a bunch of Japanese tourists who are keenly photographing all the activity.

All of this in less than 24 hours. Don't try it at home kids!