Holidays the HST way - Printable version

Actually I end up sounding like Bill Bryson but this is the true story of how My friend Martin and I spent a holiday in Queensland under the influence of beer, weed, anonymity and Hunter S Thompson.

Here we Go, Here We Go , Here We Go

In July 1984 I was on a bus to Queensland trying not to pine for the woman I loved,
The woman who once loved me was on a plane to Europe to join a Con-Tiki tour.

I was having trouble accepting our 4 year relationship had ended 5 months ago until her farewell at the airport the day before when she boarded the plane with her new boyfriend.
That kind of drove the nail in the coffin pretty much there.

It wasn’t coincidence that I had arranged a holiday the day after she’d left,
I needed a break.
Self pity and depression suck the life out of you.
So me and Martin my only non muso best friend decided to go to Queensland and use my Sister’s house as a holiday base.
2 weeks of Sun, beer and with a lot of luck – babes.

One of the reason we caught the bus was to save money, air fares were expensive and quite frankly both our cars wouldn’t have made it past the state border.
One very important accessory I had collected a week before our departures was a book. I knew the bus trip would be tedious even with Marty so I looked for a decent sized novel to keep me company, what I found instead was a collection of short stories and essays titled “The Great Shark Hunt” by Hunter S Thompson”.

It would change the whole scope of our holiday; we just didn’t know it yet.

I stared browsing through the book a couple days earlier and became fascinated with certain entries. Short stories and articles like The Great Shark Hunt, The Banshee Screams for Buffalo Meat and it’s prequel Fear and loathing in Las Vegas.
These stories filled me with awe of the road trip and the spirit of adventure and how being a total reckless idiot can be exciting.
To a 22 year old impressionable and love depressed lad from Chadstone this was manna from heaven.

This was all very timely because my travelling partner Martin was already a HST in the making.

So I suppose I have to give you a short history of Marty to set the scene.

Martin was born in Manchester England the last of a brood of nine children, his Mother had him very late in life and a popular theory we held was that it was an accident in more ways than one. The family moved to Australia when Martin was one month old and in the process lost all birth, baptism and hospital certificates proving he had ever existed (He travelled on his Mothers passport) The family consisted of 8 boys and one girl. Every male member in the family had red hair, freckles and pale skin, the females dark hair and a wonderful peaches and cream complexion.
The age difference between Martin and his eldest sibling was 25 years and by the time Martin was 17 he was the only child left at home with his Mother (his Dad dying of a heart attack when Martin was 13) Martin’s Mum by now was entering her sixties and was obsessed with helping at the local church, so Martin virtually did what ever he wanted.

Martin was impulsive, loud, opinionated and made of rubber, – he could do back somersaults on his parents bed by the time he was 10 – he could back these personality flaws up with quick fists and a determined desire never to back down from a fight. I liked him because he was loyal and trusted friend built up over the years of walking to and from school and developing similar interests like music , books and movies.

When Martin and I hung around together or went out we would have a fun night, sometimes he would get a bit “silly” but I could always pull him back and we’d still had a good time. But when I wasn’t there he managed to get himself in all kinds of trouble at places we frequented all the time, at this point in our lives he’d been arrested twice for drunk and disorderly and once each for assault and criminal damage.

I will have to admit he always managed to come out of whatever he’d gotten in trouble for with just a warning and nothing else, I still believe it was because his mum spent so much time in church- praying for his mortal soul. Maybe she would include me for this bus trip.

The Hunter S Thompson book had released me from something, from my sense of responsibility. To Martin and my common sense. I felt like I needed to let go.
Where else would you find a better place to do this?
1000 miles away where no one knew you from Adam.

The whole thing started off on the right foot.

Martin was to meet me in the City at the bus station half an hour prior to leaving as per instructions. I was late due to trying to take a suitcase on a train in peak hour.
When I arrived Martin was there but only in spirit, he was trying to chat up a middle aged lady who I could best describe as a junkie, she kept moving away from him every time he spoke as I got closer I realised why. He was pissed as a fart.
It was Marty’s reasoning that if he got absolutely shit faced he would sleep for most of the trip. I reminded him that it was a 30 hour trip.
“That’s alright I bought weed, you can smoke on the bus” He said

“Tobacco , not dope you fool” I clarified. Alcohol did this too Marty, slowed down the basic brain function to less than zero.

I dragged him away from the woman and took over to the counter to check us in. The man who would be driving the bus was standing behind the clerk allocating seats.
It was if he was evaluating everyone who was travelling on his coach and judging by the look Marty and I received we had been labelled trouble.

“Is he drunk?” the bus driver said looking over the clerks shoulder.

“No he’s diabetic, he’s on a low” I cut in before Marty could answer sounding as insulted as possible

The bus driver just nodded his head and stepped back emotionless.
“I’m going somewhere quiet to shoot up then” said Marty as he started for the toilet rummaging through his coat pockets on the way. I thought he can’t do any damage in there and sat down to wait for boarding.

Within 5 minutes the call came out and I dragged both our bags to the bus to be loaded, the driver ignoring me and taking everyone else’s luggage, I was wondering where Martin may be so I just dumped the bags behind him and went to look in the toilets.

As I entered the place reeked of dope and Martin was flushing out his make shift Orange Juice bottle bong. “I should sleep now” he said his eyes bight red. I told him we were getting ready to board and as we entered the waiting lounge that led to the bus loading area there was a scene happening. A group a people were gathered around someone who had had a fall, as we got closer it was obviously the bus driver his blue shirt all covered in dirt from the foot path. He had stepped backward unaware of the suitcases I left there and had gone arse over tit.

“Careful man, that’s my clothes” slurred Martin, no one paid attention because he was facing the other way when he said it, distracted by a pretty girl walking past, his eyes working faster than his mouth.

I grabbed his shoulder and joined the queue that was boarding the bus.

Back in the early 1980’s it was still permissible to smoke on public and interstate transport, but changes were slowly canging things and smokers had recently been banished to the back of the bus near the toilets.

Our carry on luggage was what ever fitted into our jacket pockets and in our hands. Our seats were standard for that time in history: uncomfortable and hard.

We were all set to depart, the motor was running and the bus driver climbed up the stairs and stopped at the front of the bus to address the passengers.

“Good Afternoon Ladies and Gentlemen, my name is Ron, I will be your driver for the first part of your journey, We will collect another driver at Albury and we will interchange from then on until Brisbane”

Martin let out a bored but genuine yawn

All eyes left the driver and focused on me.

“There are some basic rules” All eyes snapped back to Ron. “ Please refrain from smoking when the bus is stationary”
The sound of a match lighting I turned to Martin blew it out and took the cigarette from his mouth “wait” I whispered through clenched teeth.

Ron continued

“We have the toilet amenity at the rear of the bus and I cannot stress this hard enough please sit down to do your business, due to safety laws the lock is disengaged on these types of long distance travel and a sudden brake or hard cornering will result on the door swinging open. My best advise is to wait for the scheduled stops on the way , now we’re in for a long drive so please respect your fellow passengers area and we’ll all have a good trip”

There were a few muffled “Thanks Ron “ from the older passengers and judging by my head count three quarters of the our co travellers were over sixty.

Ron took his seat and the bus left the terminal.

Martin was unconscious, his last words being
“I wish I had of gone to bed last night‘

I picked up my book and started to read the collective works on Dr Gonzo, about his early travels through South America and his observation skills and fluid style.

Everything was peaceful. Martin missed the first changeover and meal break as he was still sleeping. I had left a note folded on my seat if woke up and discovered the bus was empty it read

“We have been kidnapped . Call the police. They didn’t take you because like the rest of the world, they hate redheads”

He didn’t wake up but had starting dribbling quite fiercely, so I turned his head to the window and it made a pleasant thud, thud sound in time with the wheels as it bounced off the glass we moved on.

We left Melbourne at 10 AM and by 2.00PM I was tired of reading and getting a bit bored so I decided Martin had had enough sleep because I didn’t want him awake all through the night annoying the shit out of me.
I eventually managed to wake him, he looked a sight with a big dribble patch on his shirt and his bright red hair sticking up defying gravity on one side.
“I need to piss and eat” he managed to squeeze out after ten minutes.

“You can’t eat till we stop about 6” I told him “and be warned you have to sit down to piss or else the door could burst open”

“What?” he asked ”How does the door stay shut if I sit down to have a leak?”

“That way you’re facing the door and can hold the handle”

“Bullshit” and with that he got up and went to the toilet at the back of bus.

He came back a few minutes later, with a smug look on his face.

“They’re full of shit, you can do it easy” He said proudly

I got up and thought I’d give it ago and when I open the door there was urine everywhere, he proved a point but missed the bowl. I didn’t bother and decided to wait, the bus was very bumpy. I opened up the door to leave and one of the elderly women passengers was waiting to go next. I hurried back to my seat. She passed me minutes later and gave me the foulest look imaginable.

Martin was too hung over, tired , shell shocked to be too much of an annoyance and we both passed the time away either reading or watching the afternoon disappear and night time approach out the window.

About 6.30PM we arrived at our scheduled dinner break at some place that specialises in serving shit food at high prices to starving people.
Martin and I grabbed hamburgers and chips and sat off by ourselves, the old lady who followed me after the toilet episode sat with the drivers and all during the meal the way she was talking and staring over at us didn’t fill me with confidence.

Both drivers gave a look that warned “we’re watching you” I tried to give the old lady a look that translated to ”I hope you got a strong bladder sister” but I’m not too sure how successful I was.

We boarded the bus and were on our merry way, the plan to ride the boredom out till our next stop at about 11.00PM and have a joint and hope to kip through the night.
Things were OK until Martin pissed around with the little light above his head trying to get it “just right” that he managed to break the globe, so he spent most of the time leaning over me to get some decent light to read.

Around eleven o’clock we rolled into another one of those chuck stops, only this one didn’t have hot food, all the old ladies made a beeline for the dunnies.
We did what we said we would and hoped for a restful night.

The bus seats were impossibleto get comfortable let alone sleep in and I think the bus company worked on the premise that you get either so bored or tired Mother Nature would kick in eventually.
For me the added use of the weed helped.
I pretty much dozed off straight away.

I was woken by Martin trying to push pass me It was still very dark , I glanced at my watch and it was 3.30AM, I would’ve liked to sleep longer.

“I need a piss bad” whispered Martin as he lunged down the aisle, half asleep.

I had no idea where we were but the bus was leaning to and fro an awful lot, so I assumed we were travelling over some hills or mountain range or something.
My mind was then snapped to attention,
Martin wasn’t going to prove a point again was he?

It was inevitable it would happen: The bus lunged to the right, the toilet door swung open, Martin came flying out backwards flailing like some cartoon character trying to grab the side of a cliff he inadvertently ran off.
It seems he managed at least to finish his business but hadn’t put his tools away. He managed to grab hold of arm rests either side of him to break his fall and prevent him crashing full force onto his back in the aisle. But there was still the little problem of his dick hanging out of trousers.

The second driver had a small area next to the toilet at the back of the bus so that they could get a good rest for the 4 or 8 hour change-over required by law.

Martin’s little accident had woke him up and most of the rear seated passengers.

It was Ron

When he popped his head out of the curtain to see what was going on all he could see was Martin helplessly struggling to put his pecker away, Martin saw his confused look and pointed to the door. It was closed.
“Are you alright?” he asked.

Martin nodded

“Good, that’ll teach you to piss like everyone else next time” and he shut the curtain.

The actual driver controlling the bus, never slowed down but I’m positive he swerved unnecessarily when Martin was trying to get back in his seat.

The next morning about 7.00AM the bus rested at another roadside café, by this time it was obvious we weren’t going to make conversation with any of our fellow passengers, there was even a gap of 3 people in the line between us.
I had been struggling in the bad light of the bus to continue reading my book and draw some inspiration from it.
But I was too tired and treated all the old people with the same contempt they were pouring on me.
Martin who was born without the glands that secrete embarrassment, didn’t notice or care.

The weather was noticeably warmer the more North we travelled and that was starting to have an effect on our overall morale. We could feel the holiday spirit engulfing us , making us happier, expectations were starting to build as we rode ever so closer to our sunshine paradise. We had about 8 hours of travel left and I didn’t anticipate any problems until Martin played Mr Unpredictable again.

In actual fact it was my fault, Martin drinks Coke like water and when he bought one for breakfast I shook it up when he went to the toilet, not realising he wouldn’t open it at the table like he always does to drink it with his breakfast.
Of course he pulled it out and opened it 10 minutes after the bus took off spraying the old couple in front of us and the ones in front of them again, strangely we didn’t get a drop on us. Once again nothing was said we just kept getting those looks that only pissed off old people can give.

Officer Porn Star and our arrival.

Believe or not we both dozed for most of the morning, come lunchtime we were both feeling a lot better. Martin still had a point to prove, and continued to piss in the bus toilet standing up.
I continued to wait till the next stop because I knew what he’d left in there.

Just out of Brisbane town the bus was pulled over at a road block.

The police were searching for a man in his twenties in relation to a murder that happened on a Gold Coast beach the night before.
I could see a policeman walking around the bus looking underneath for something or someone.

I had to laugh, was their assailant Lizard Man and were they searching to see if he had hidden under the bus by clasping his claws to the under carriage?

It became even more amusing when I saw the policeman’s face and pointed out to Martin that this big tanned cop had an uncanny resemblance to John Holmes the porn star.

This started a flurry of crappy jokes:

“I hope he doesn’t hit us with his trouser truncheon”

“ Hello, Hello, Hello I’m Officer Iva Longprong”

“I hope we don’t see his long schlong of the law”

Then I had a chilling thought.

“Where’ve you hidden the drugs?” I asked Martin

“Don’t worry, they’d have to rip the bus apart to find ‘em” he answered very sure of himself.

Constable Holmes eventually boarded the bus and after a quick exchange with bus driver Ron, (which finished with Ron shaking his head in our direction) Officer Porn Star made a bee line towards our seat. As he passed the elderly passengers their heads followed him and smiles broke out on all their faces.

“Hello boys” said Constable Johnny Wadd

He hadn’t removed his sun glasses and I could see my hair was sticking out all over the place.

“Hi” we both replied

“This is just a routine check and but it’s obvious you’ve pissed off the driver so play along OK”

“Sure” we both said

“I don’t know if you’ve been listening on the radio”
he pointed to Martin’s portable radio
“but there was a murder on the Surfers Paradise foreshore last night and a man fitting your age with blond hair solid build and tan is believed to be in the area”

I grabbed Martin’s radio from the seat flap in front of him

“We had this one until Marty here dropped it before we got on the bus and it doesn’t work, he was going to pull it apart when we got to my sisters”

I started tugging the back of it, but Officer Bulge continued.

“Yeah well , it obviously isn’t you, but that description describes just about every male in the state, behave yourself boys”

“Thanks Mate” I replied still struggling with the radio

“Not good with long bus rides mate?” Policeman Penis asked Marty

“Nah” He said

I turned and looked at Martin he was a weird shade of pale and blotchy red.
The Policemen left and I watched all the disappointed faces as he walked back up the aisle.

“ You fucking dick” Martin hissed snatching the radio from my hands.

“Settle petal, are you OK, seriously? I asked he really didn’t look well.

“I am now numb nuts. Look at this”

Martin pulled me close so I was blocking the view of the seat opposite and with a simple snap the radios back came loose to reveal an ounce bag of grass.

“Oh fuck” was all I could say.

Everyone from down south knew of the reputation the Queensland coppers had, they were a breed of their own and under the Bjelke Peterson Government they were regarded as nothing more than his bully boys.

In the early 80’s Queensland Premier Joh Bjelke Peterson was at his peak in terms of power and as was exposed a decade later: corruption.

Two things we knew for sure about the Queensland police – if three or more people gathered and they looked like hippies they could legally be slapped silly by the constabulary and second they locked you up if you were caught with marijuana for a long time.

That’s why Officer Porn Star was such a surprise. He was nothing of what we expected to encounter. This pleasant surprise and the fact that we weren’t caught with a Queensland death penalty amount of drugs filled us with more delight of being in the sunshine state.

We rolled in Brisbane bus terminus about 4.00PM that afternoon to be greeted by my Sister Linda her husband Rob and my three nieces.

It was great to see big Sis again and Rob was a top guy, the biggest surprise were the girls they had all turned into these little blond, tanned angels. They were now 9, 7 and 4 it had been a good 2 years since they had moved up here. I gave them all a big Uncle hug.

Martin came up behind me and said “Hello”, the two older girls hung onto their Dad for safety, the youngest cried.

We had arrived, I needed a shower, some family catch up and a beer, it was Friday night and everything was all right. Except for the girls they didn’t want to sit in the back with me and especially Martin because we stank.

Welcome to Queensland.

The Horror The Horror

That first night we collapsed into our beds in the extension and slept like coma patients, though I do have some recollection of things smacking into the windows at various times.

Since there were no curtains in the building we were rudely awoken by the morning sun which rises a bit earlier and with a lot more intensity than down home, no matter how far I covered my head under the blankets it and my hangover were not going to let me relax, I decided to get up.

Martin on the other hand could have slept through the bombing of Dresden was contently sleeping a string of drool covering his chin.

I got up and played with the kids for awhile, reassuring them Martin wasn’t a goblin who would eat their dolls if they were naughty as their Father told them last night.

Rob and Lin were hosting a Bar-B-Que this night as a get together to introduce us to their new friends and just have a bit of fun, so the day was pretty much a lay back and do nothing affair.
It gave me time to read my book.

I was amazed the the Gonzo style of writing of H S Thompson was only a fraction of his works and he had traveled far and wide and put himself in some dangerous situations, but I was drawn to his weird, drug crazed adventures the most. I had already read the Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas extract three times and thought I go look for the book in its entirety.

So I tagged along with Rob, Lin and the girls on their trip to the shopping centre to see if there were any bookshops.
No such luck but I did find a copy of the video of Animal House and as luck would have it, it was the video shop that my sister was a member.
I thought I could watch that tomorrow why recovering from another expected hangover.

I was a huge fan of the Nation Lampoon Magazine that was responsible for the movie Animal House.
Writers like PJ O’Rourke went onto stellar careers, Chris Miller and Doug Kenney were rude, crude and hilarious and John Holmes was probably the best of the lot until he went to Hollywood and wrote and directed some of the shittest but highest grossing movies of the 1980’s.

Animal house was how every male from 16-23 wanted to live just for a short time in their life.

Plus it had a road trip scene.

When we returned home Martin had risen and was sitting eating a bowl of Corn Flakes dressed in only a pair footy shorts.
It took me half an hour to reassure the girls AGAIN that he wasn’t dangerous.

That day we hung around enjoying the sunshine and preparing for the party.
Mine and Martin’s preparation was to continue drinking and get in the holiday spirit while sitting and wondering where all those Toads and Cockroaches disappeared too.

The people who came to the party were a lovely bunch all in their mid thirties with young families , the majority immigrants from down south looking for the Sunshine state lifestyle.

Both Martin and I got into lots of discussions with couples asking them our unsolicited questions of why would they want to live in a state run by a psuedo-dictator.
It just showed our ignorance, all we heard down in Melbourne was how Bjelke-Peterson beat the hippies and used the police to do his will.

These people were praising his State run health care system, how groceries , petrol and the general cost of living were cheaper and they had wonderful weather to back all this up.
I wasn’t convinced isn’t this what Hitler did (minus the beautiful weather) before he turned nasty.

Eventually we cottoned on to the fact that if we kept up this line of conversation no body would talk to us, so we settled into having a good time always mindful that just beyond the flood light nestled in the damp grass, hundreds of Cane Toads lay in wait for the lights to go off.

There would be no pissing in the bushes tonight.

Most of the families left before midnight due to their young children and as the numbers thinned I heard the tick, tick, ticking I heard last night in bed, looking round I discovered it was winged cockroaches flying into the windows on the unlit area or rooms of the house.

The bastards were trying to reclaim ground by hostile action with their slimey mates waiting in the shadows; nighttime was shaping up to be a scary time in Insect-town.

Later that night I fell into a drunken sleep to the sound of Martin snoring and a squadron of flying bugs searching for a weakness in the glass.

Prelude to Road Trip

Our first Sunday was a quiet affair spent mainly trying to hide from the brain penetrating rays of the Queensland sun again.

After a very slow lunch and a breakfast that was closer to afternoon tea I thought the only one way to fix this was to start on the beer again,

Hey I was on holidays!

Rob and Martin agreed.
The girls thought we were silly, they thought Martin was spooky.

I started a conversation about my HST book and Rob started recalling his younger years when he used to camp on the beach or even the side of the road in what is now outer suburbs back in Melbourne, the early sixties were a great time with less rules and less expectations.
This reminded me of the video and we all piled inside to watch Animal House.

We had a good old laugh watching the movie and Rob asked what we had planned for the week?
We knew we wanted to head down to Dreamworld one day and then spend some time down on the Gold Coast. We knew we couldn’t afford long term car hire especially with both of us being under 25.

Rob said he knew a local who did Hire-A-Bombs and we could do that for a day, since everything heading south was gettable via bus, we could go on a road trip up North.
“What a great idea” we both said and rewound the movie to watch it again.
We ended up watching it three times and stayed up drinking while the others went to bed, they had school and work to go to.

Ahh! the life of the idle.

We were woken up with a loud “You’ve got 15 minutes”
It was Rob dressed in shorts and boots.

“You’ve got 15 minutes till I leave ,I can drop you off at the hire car place on the way, I’ve already rung and they’re fine with it”

This was delivered louder than necessary whilst he walked around kicking our mattresses.

“Come on, don’t tell me you’ve already forgotten what we talked about last night?”

I woke up to such a shock my head forgot it was hung over; it didn’t take long for it to remember again.

Rob kept hovering and continuously repeating

“Come on, I don’t wanna be late for work because of you drunk slack arses”

14 minutes and 59 seconds later Martin and I were in Rob’s car pulling out of the driveway desperately trying to pull on jumpers and shoes.

“You know this could have waited until tomorrow Rob” I complained

“Not by the way you guys were talking last night” he replied.

I looked at Martin and he just shrugged neither of us could remember going to bed let alone anything after dinner.

In a drive which took exactly 90 seconds we stopped outside an ordinary looking house.

“Here we are” Said Rob

I made inquiries about the hire car place but Rob just told us to follow him.

“We could of walked here” Martin whined still struggling with his windcheater.

We followed Rob to the front door and an elderly lady eventually opened the door behind her were half a dozen kids – all preschool age.

“Howdy May” Said Rob as he greeted her. “These are the two lads from Melbourne who want the car”

“Looks like you come to Brissy just in time, looks like that Southern climate has worn you down” She said to us “Welcome, come in and don’t let the little ones out”

My brain wasn’t working that well at the moment but even I could tell things weren’t right here.

Rob who was chatting away with May as we entered soon explained everything.
“OK guys this is May. May is our local crèche, day care centre and car hire, she also caters for parties on weekends”

“Hi” Martin and I both mumbled.

“OK who’s got the card?” May asked

More confusion. Then it clicked.

Credit card.

I pulled out my trusty Bankcard.

Martin didn’t have one due to certain problems in his past that dictated that he should not be trusted with one.

Those of you not familiar with Bankcard, it was the Australian forerunner to all those other credit traps that we have now.

Only it was more honest, it had 666 printed on the card as its logo.

May pulled out here Bankcard slider machine and swiped my card

“That’s in case you try to drive back to Melbourne” said May and followed it with a quick grin. “You go out to the car and I’ll make sure the kiddies are safely locked away”
Rob led us out the back door onto the yard where waiting for us was a big shiny Ford LTD one of those early 70’s monster that had a lounge for a front seat.

“Cool” said Martin

“Keep drooling Red, My money my drive” I said stamping my authority on the proceedings.
Martin and I walked around the beast rubbing our hands on the panels and kicking the tyres proving that we knew absolutely nothing about cars. Rob went inside and came back with the keys for the car.

“May said to be back no later than 7 o’clock tonight , the tanks full of petrol and don’t stack it” he said.

He threw me the keys and Martin and I piled in. There was a Brisbane equivalent of a Melways street directory in the back seat so we wouldn’t get lost. It was time to hit the road.

The car started without a hitch and as I reversed it out of the backyard down the driveway I kept hearing little pops. As we progressed further along I could see that I had run over two bouncy balls and a wading pool.

Ooops!

But that paled into nothing when I took out the old letter box with the rear bumper swinging onto the road.

We were hung over, we hungry, we had a powerful car that we were unfamiliar with, in a place we knew where nothing was, and to top it all off one of us was borderline insane.

Road Trip

The LTD was like a truck to drive in as much as it seemed to be as wide and as long as one.
I was constantly worried about side swiping cars that I may have inadvertently drifted into.

“We’re do we go to Marty?” I asked

“What are those mountains in the distance?” he replied

“Haven’t got a clue” was my answer.

“Well I suggest food, then we find those mountains and then Noosa sounds nice”

Now that sounded like Martin had some semblance of an idea of where we were heading, albeit everything he mentioned was in a northerly projection but that was about it.

I made him crawl over the back and get the street directory.
First we had to find out where the shops were then find the highway.

One of the beautiful things about Brisbane and South East Queensland is that there are really only two directions to go for any distance.

North and South or Up and Down as we liked to call it.

If you headed east you pretty much hit water, if you headed West you hit Mountain or desert.

We found a milk bar who after a lot of begging (and a large tip) microwaved some sausage rolls for us for breakfast, this gave me time to clear my head with coffee and plan a course with Martin.

We immediately realized we had a problem.

The street directory was 10 years old and there seemed to be whole sections between Brisbane and the Sunshine Coast where no one lived or even had roads because they just skipped it. At least we knew what the Mountains were, they were called the Glasshouse Mountains and they scattered all over the place.

We decided to have a look at one of them and then head into Noose Heads because we heard that was nice and serene (a word Martin found on a brochure)

We found a way onto the main highway but couldn’t for the life of us find a decent
AM station on the old solid state radio that was installed in the LTD.

We settled on a Country and Western Station because they played Johnny Cash every third song.

We eventually made it to the closest mountain, which were pretty easy to get to because of all the signs, not because of Martin who had the habit of turning street directories upside down to follow the road.

We left the main highway onto a gravel feeder road and really gave the LTD some stick, I was so confident that I started do fish tail down the empty road finishing with a complete 180 using the hand brake. Dirt and dust flew up everywhere and as it settled the confused faces of about 12 school kids appeared in front of us.
They must have been on a walk or something, I just took off when the teacher started towards the car.
The mountain was nice and we can say we had been there but so what?
We left for Noosa Heads.

The drive back to the highway was just as much fun with the wheelies and donuts, Martin eased the pain of me not letting him drive by smoking the biggest joint he could roll and refused to share.
The responsibility of driving he said.

We rolled into Noosa just before lunch and thought we’d have a look at the National Park that was attached to the town, a beautiful spot that over looked the town and beach.

Martin and I got out and walked around some tracks, I was following Martin down one track that we thought led to another viewing point when he abruptly jumped off the path without notice .

I was left face to face with the biggest spider I had ever seen outside of television. It was as big as my hand. I nearly walked straight into it, the fucking insects up here, what was this?

The Queensland small car eating spider?

Martin was in the scrub bitterly disappointed because I wasn’t covered in web with a spider eating off half my face. He did insist on bagging rights because he said I squealed like a girl.

We headed back to town to have some lunch.

Being a non holiday period and a work day the town was a quiet affair, so there was a air of relaxation and no need to hurry, we settled for a nice counter meal at the nearest pub.

Martin also thought drinking should also be a high priority since he wasn’t driving and started downing bourbons.

After a lovely meal in an empty pub with people giving us table service because they were bored, we headed down the Main street looking for souvenirs.
It was then that Martin realized he better take out some cash for the week.
We forget these days how hard it was to keep cashed up back in the 80’s. With limited ATM’s and credit cards not to mention the regemented banking hours.
As he went over to fill in his withdrawal slip he spent a good minute trying in his half stoned state to full his bank book out of his back pocket, it was fight the bank book was winning. I took this moment to write on the back of the slip.

SHUT UP AND DON”T LOOK AROUND I HAVE A GUN.

I was sure he would see it and it would be a wasted effort, so I went and sat down near the door while Martin joined the queue.
I was looking out the window at some hot Mum when I was tapped on the arm by a man in a suit next to him stood a security guard.

“Excuse me sir will you just stand up for a moment?”

“What for?” I said . I didn’t like his tone or the guard’s proximity of his hand to his gun.

“We believe you tried to be humorous using your friend over there as a target.” He said

“Don’t know what you’re talking about” I replied admitting nothing in tone or expression.

“Did you write this?” He held up the withdrawal sip

“Never seen it, it was probably done before we got here”

“Your friend over there says it’s your hand writing”

The suit pointed to Martin at the counter, Martin smiled and waved back.

“You prick” I mouthed so he couldn’t mistake it for anything else.

The suit who turned out to be the Manager then proceeded (with the security guard standing a little too close for comfort) to tell me how this branch was only held up last week and how childish gags like this aren’t tolerated., and how I could be technically arrested on intent to rob the bank.
I was really blanking out everything till he said the part

.” …..your friend there says you have a history of this and asked us to go easy. So I suggest you get in your car and go home”

“Can I go now?” I ask feeling rather foolish.

“Please” he replied. Martin had stood next to him.

“Can I take my pet idiot as well” I said pointing to Martin and turned and left.

“At least you didn’t squeal like a girl this time” Martin said as we walked down the street. I laughed.

Martin’s Mum must be working overtime at that church back home.

We headed for the beach and Martin for some unknown reason decided to take a route off the path, I was forced to follow like before. I was thinking the idiot’s going to try and make me walk into a spider’s web again.

Sure enough I saw his body stiffen and he leaped aside again, I was more than prepared and stopped well short. Martin however landed in a swampy area in his bare feet and discovered where all the Cane Toads hide during the day time.

He won the squeal like a girl contest by a large margin in a matter of seconds.

Not to mention the silly dance and “nearly–shit-in–your-pants” challenge.

After a relax on the beach and a general look around it was getting onto late afternoon and I thought we better move on. The twilight that we are used to in Melbourne doesn’t happen in South East Queensland due to being so close to the coast and it gets dark rather quickly.

We still had a bit of a journey back and I was getting tired.

I was about 15 kilometres from home when for the first time that day I actually paid attention to the fuel gauge, it was on zero.

Oops, I thought.

I woke up Martin who was drooling on himself again, and decided to make it interesting. Payment of the car hire if we make it back before we run out of petrol. Martin looked at the gauge and said “Deal”

I was gambling on the premise that these gauges were always faulty and the bet was on.

It was a hair raising journey and I rolled down a lot of hills in neutral pissing off people behind me, but I rolled into May’s driveway with the engine still running.
We went in to May and settle the bill and her first question was ”Did you bring it back with a full tank?”

“Oh Sorry I forgot” feigning total ignorance “We’ll be back in a minute”

Martin and I jumped back in the car and went looking for a petrol station , it probably would have been a good idea to ask May before we left..

We finally found one only to run out of petrol about 200 feet from the bowsers.
When we finally returned May had itemized the account.
Car Hire –
1 working day $30
Extras
Clean (outside) -$5
Clean (inside) – $5
Mail box – $12
Assorted Toys
& Pool $8
Total $55
Not to forget the $2.50 for the container to carry the petrol back so we could actually make it to the petrol station to fill up.
(if you times that by about 500% to bring it into days values, you start to get the picture)
So it cost Martin dearly in the end.
At least May didn’t charge us to use the phone so we could get Rob to pick us up.

Lazin’

The next few days were just for relaxing.

We decided to go and have a look in Brisbane.

It was really weird – beside being nice and clean and having bugger all traffic, they had lines painted down the middle of the foot path so that pedestrians kept to the left no matter which direction they were heading. We waited to cross at an intersection and were highly amused when the traffic went one way, the pedestrian lights said DON’T WALK, then the lights changed for the traffic going the other way but they still said DON’T WALK.
Then it flashed WALK and it was movement in every direction.
People streamed everywhere. Crisscrossing , straight.
I saw some guy waiting to do a U turn and he was too slow his car looked like in was being attacked by ants.
Something you never see at home but it seemed to keep things flowing.

We bought some colourful Tee Shirts to try and fit in but our pasty white skin gave us away.
The public transport in Brisbane was exceptional and you get anywhere you wanted as long as you knew where you wanted to go.
Luckily for us my sister had fistfuls of timetables and brochures for us.

We even headed down to Dreamworld for the day.
Back in 1984 it was still pretty new and a big novelty.

Martin and I loved it.

The place was virtually empty, they had beer in the kiosks and the rides were fantastic.

It was the first time I went on a roller coaster that did a loop the loop , not one but two in a row.
The closet thing I have got to Disneyland so far in my life.

We even bought super size sombrero hats and bull horn bottle openers to hang around our necks.

Which was ultra daggy and downright dangerous on anything that went fast and downhill due to the bottle opener bouncing off your chest and smacking you in the face or the sombrero flicking back and its strap strangling you.

But it was our fashion statement to the great state of Queensland.

Linda didn’t live far from the beach, so a couple of times we even strolled down there and just laze next to the shore and read or just hang out with a couple of beers.
Once Martin fell asleep and I left a note on him saying

FREE TO GOOD HOME

And then I walked home.
He woke up to all these school kids throwing peanuts at him, thinking he was a homelss drunk , he woke up foaming and drooling and chased them away.

Obviously no one wanted a rabid stray.

I was continually reading sections of my Hunter S thompson book and decided since we only had 4 days left we should make a concerted effort to get down to the Gold Coast and spend the night.
The HST way.

The HST way meant just Martin and myself no change of clothes or toiletries just us and money.
There was to be no pre organisation except the tickets to and from our destination on the bus. It took me thirty seconds to convince Martin it would be a good idea so we booked our bus tickets and arranged to go the following morning, a Thursday.

We told Rob and Lin that we would call them when we got back to Brisbane and if we liked it may stay another day. Martin insisted that we take his little QANTAS travel bag so he could carry a book and his transistor now only half full of dope. I threw in comb for good measure.

So we had our total requirements for our night out on the Gold Coast.

The Bus left home about 8.30AM so we had a good early start so we were confident we would find somewhere to stay and something to do.

We were young, dumb and one us dangerously stupid off to spend sometime in a strange place the Hunter S Thompson way.

The Gold Coast Experience

The bus trip was a standard hour and a bit ride down to the Gold Coast and as we alighted at Cavill Avenue it had an air of party about it.
It was colourful and bright.

There was also construction everywhere and in some spots it was in shadow all the time due to the high rise buildings.

Marty and I thought we may as well find somewhere to spend the night but didn’t know where to start, there were a hell of a lot of high rise accommodation and it looked pretty daunting.

We eventually walked into an information shop, one of those ones with a massive blue “i” out the front. Martin walked in and proclaimed

“We need somewhere to spend the night. We’re young and rich”

The poor girl behind the counter took him for his word and then proceeded to show us luxury suites available along the beach front.
After stroking his chin and oohing! and ahhing! a lot I pushed him aside and I took over.
“We’d like to spend some of the money on entertainment, do you have anything in a budget range?”

The girl pulled out another brochure showing more fancy places.

“A bit more budget?” I asked

This went on until she eventually she pulled out a piece of paper with four names on it.

“Try these” she said

We took the list and as luck would have it, across the road and down a short side street was an old style dual level motel complete with car parking out the front of the rooms and white metal balustrade on the second story landing.
All you could see were rows of doors and parked in front of the door where old Holdens and Fords with baggage piled up in the back seats.
It was dwarfed either side by larger apartment buildings while behind was a vacant block revealing more apartments on the other side of the road in the block behind.

Perfect.

It had the “drifter welcome here” feel about it.

Judging by all the buildings and construction going on, this place wasn’t going to survive much longer and it had the appearance that hinted the owners were only holding out for a better price.

It only just reached minimum health requirements.

It was on the list.

We found the front desk and after slamming on the bell for about a minute a tired looking guy in his mid thirties popped his head around the corner, looked us up and down and disappeared again.

We were just about to start smacking the bell again when he returned.

“How can I helps ya?” English was a second language by the sounds of it

“We’d like a room please”

“Which one?” he asked whilst playing with something in his pocket.

“Anything on the first floor would be nice” I replied

He pulled a key out of his pocket and tossed to Martin who snatched it out of the air.

“$30 Check out at 10 o’clock, can’t have the room till 2”

He managed all this without looking at either of us once.

“Deal” I said and gave him the money.

I signed my name Hunter S Thompson.

This is probably where I made my biggest mistake.

I didn’t ask Martin to give me the key.

Martin was the world’s worst key-wallet-small package holder in the entire country.
In his short life span he had had so many keys cut and locks changed because of keys lost- it was ridiculous.
This year alone he had already lost two wallets with all his identification and licenses.

He also had this stupid habit of putting keys in his wallet, which was bad enough in its self, but he would snap open his wallet like a note pad to retrieve the key and nine times out of ten it would fly out of its hiding place and fly across the room.

I would regret that later.

We left the motel content that things were going well so far and decided to look around Surfer’s Paradise and see what it had to offer.

We didn’t have to wait long.

We were trying to get past a pack of pensioners who had just alighted a bus when one of keeled over in front us holding his heart.

Before we could even react two minders had pushed everyone out of the way and giving CPR and slapping his chest.

The funny part about it was all the old folk forming groups and saying things like:

“Knew he shouldn’t raced down the stairs so fast”

“It’s because his always arguing” and shit like that.

I got the impression they were hoping he wasn’t taking the bus ride home.

We side stepped the heart attack guy and were confronted by these gorgeous girls in bikinis and sashes. Meter Maids they were and they put money in nearly expired parking meters.
I was really starting to like this place.

We went in and out of shops that were one of three types: Takeaway food, Souvenir or expensive clothing stores.
Not a lot to capture the imagination.
At least Brisbane had some good Comic and Record stores.

We headed down the beach and found it to clean with lovely white sand.
Scattered with people who looked like they’d been in the sun too long or people who shouldn’t be undressed in public.

It was obvious who the Southerners up for a break were.

The glare was blinding.

After grabbing some food and running amuck on the beach asking people if they knew where the murder had taken place last week (the answer was usually the unsettling “Which one do you mean?”) we popped into Cavill Avenue Amusements which was just one huge pinball parlour/ video arcade.
It also doubled as a pseudo crèche for teenagers on holidays whose parent didn’t want them around for a day.
The parents just gave the kid or kids $20 each and told them to hang around here all day.
It was full of seedy looking characters who kept forgetting that they had asked “If we wanted to buy Smack?” 10 minutes earlier.

We carried on like kids and Martin won a 4 foot Pink Panther. We took it to the bottle shop where we then grabbed a slab of beer and headed back to set up base in our Motel room.

We were in a party mood and started drinking and hitting the weed.

After about two hours we realized we should find out if there was anywhere to go for the night.

Preferably somewhere where the dress code wasn’t an issue.

We didn’t walk far, just around the block and virtually behind our Motel was a venue called Bombay Rock. A late night Rock venue that catered for the tourist trade like us.
We were set.

That would take care of tonight’s entertainment and we went back to the Motel room to binge.

While we were getting comfortable in our Motel room we invented a game to play, it involved the lead of the electric kettle to the handles of the bed side drawers ,which made a pretty good sling shot to shoot the Pink Panther that we had tied by the tail to the light fixture. We used empty beer cans as ammunition. It was a game of skill where one of us tipped the doll and set it swinging and the shooter had to hit it in the white part of its chest.

It kept us amused for some time.

Martin who got so excited at one particular shot tried to recreate his old back flip trick he used to do at home.

He actually accomplished it but lost his footing and crashed onto the floor and put his elbow through the plaster wall.

The wall was the only thing that sustained any permanent damage.

We only left the Motel room once more that afternoon to get some take away food and continue watching bad TV, shooting beer cans, smoking and talking amongst ourselves.

We decided earlier we were going to go to the venue about nine o’clock and as the time came closer I had to admit to Martin that I was pretty much cactus and didn’t think I could handle a night out now.

Martin smiled and said
“I got that covered” and produced something – and for the sake of my Mother if she ever reads this- it was of dubious gain and dubious mixture, but it did the trick.
We left the room in a frightful mess but thankful we had somewhere within walking distance to crash.

As soon as we hit the carpark Martin came up with the idea that since Bombay Rock was behind our Motel and that there was only a vacant block separating them , it would be a short cut.

So without any investigation he climbed the fence (it was quite dark at the back of the property) and jumped over.

I heard a loud smash and lots of swearing. I rushed to the fence climbed a rail and looked over.
From what I could see it was a good ten foot drop and there seemed to be piles of scaffold stacked near the boundary.

This is what Martin dropped right on top of.

I tried to see if I could help but he managed to unhook himself and after assuring ourselves that he wasn’t seriously injured arranged to meet at the venue.
Martin could take his short cut and I’d take the safe way.

As it turned out I beat him there because he had to limp all the way.

He also discovered he had a big rip up the arse of his trousers, which he hid by tying his jumper around his waist.

To our relief the entrance didn’t have a bouncer out the front and the tickets were sold via a lady in a booth, so no one questioned our – or more importantly Martin’s – appearance.

It was only half full so there was plenty of room to move. The bands for the night were called The FIXX. A touring British band who had a song in the charts and was capitalizing on it and an unknown local band that will remain unknown because I still don’t remember their name or performance.

The bar was our first port of call and what a wonderful readymade idiot proof piece of work it was. The set up was troughs of beer in ice protected by a sneeze guard type plastic cover.
Each trough had either XXXX, Fosters or Victorian Bitter beer cans piled in it, so to order you gave the bartender $1.50 and asked for either a Blue a Green or a Yellow.
Simple.

Martin decided he would shout the first round and pulled out his wallet in the most crowded part of the venue and did his stupid flick the wallet trick.
I looked in horror as I could only assume was our Motel key disappear under 200 sets of legs.

We looked at each other, confirmed the fact that Martin was a moron and decided it was a problem we would deal with later.

By now the speed had kicked in and we were feeling a second lease on life, and for some reason I just didn’t feel like hanging with Martin.

Before too long I was chatting with a group of people and it soon became clear that no one who was at the venue actually lived in Queensland, we were all tourists, all out on a bender. It made it easy to have a good time when everyone else thought like you did.

Now I could fill you with all kinds of stories how I was surrounded by women and everyone listened to my witty banter but it would be bullshit, I can’t remember a thing except all the toilet doors had been removed from the cubicles in the toilets. I only remember the lights coming on the bands had left the stage and a loud ringing in my ear.

Almost as if by magic Martin appeared beside me and said
“Good night wasn’t it” I think I agreed.

Now the next part I do remember because it sobered me up.

It involved standing in the cold trying to figure out how to break into our Motel room.
We weren’t allowed to take our beers out of the venue and all our beer was in the room.
I was dehydrating and using cigarettes to warm myself’.

After nearly three quarters of an hour of watching Martin try and pick a lock with two twigs I realized – why don’t we just tell the Inn keeper or whatever the fuck he was called and get a new one.

That simple thought seemed to brighten us up measurably and went to smack the bell at reception.

We only had to do it once and the same guy came out looking no different in grooming or dress.

“We lost our key” I said hoping he’d understand.

“What room?” he asked.

I told him

“Extra $5 plus $5 bond” he said

“Deal” Martin and I said going through I pockets and left a whole heap of notes and change on the counter. I took the key. This time it had a very large yellow tag attached.
I don’t remember much after that other than cracking a beer, pushing cans and rubbish of my bed and feeling warm again.

We were woken by the high pitched squeal of the alarm.

Martin must have been a bit more alert than me because he had set the clock radio and crawled under the sheets, something I hadn’t managed to do.
The clock said 9.30 AM.

I crawled off the bed and struggled with the stupid thing until I unplugged it from the wall. Then realizing Martin had hardly moved I kicked his mattress.

“Get up , we’ve got half an hour to piss off” I croaked.

I saw Martins underpants thrown over a chair and remembering he slept naked, picked them up , walked over to the door and threw them outside in some bushes.

I don’t know why, he must of done something to warrant it but I didn’t feel like consulting my list.

Looking back upon the room was a Jackson Pollock nightmare.

There were beer cans, food rubbish, beer spray and a large Pink Panther swaying in the breeze of the open door. Martin’s radio lay smashed in the middle of floor. Martin must of forgotten how to operate the easy latch last night and used his boots.
I went into the bathroom and splashed my face and washed myself as quick as I could.

When I came out Martin was frantically searching for something with a sheet wrapped around him.

“I just saw the Motel guy and his going into the rooms to clean, if he sees this we’re fucked” I had to agree with Martin, this would take some explaining if we were still here when he walked past.

Martin couldn’t find his undies and decided his beloved drug smuggling radio had out lived its purpose. The Pink Panther was to be sacrificed for a quick getaway
We left the room as the Motel keeper was entering the room two doors down from ours. Martin and I strolled confidently up to reception placed the key on the desk and ran into the pedestrian traffic for cover.

We had an hour before our bus left so we thought we’d get breakfast at a coffee shop.

We asked to leave when the lady behind the counter pointed to Martins lily white arse hanging out of his jeans.

He tied the jumper back around his waist and we went to another a couple of doors down. Where I thought it would be a great idea to have a bacon and fried egg sandwich, which I promptly threw up in a bin on the foot path.

We caught the bus back to Brisbane without incident and slept most of the way back,
I remember waking up and trying to read bits and pieces from my Hunter S Thompson book and saying to Martin

“How does the bastard do it?”

I must have said it a little too loud because a lot of heads turned to my voice, except Martin who was drooling on himself.

Lin was at the bus station to greet us and laughed till she cried, she was so pleased the children were being looked after, because they would never sleep in the house again if they saw Martin like this.

She asked what had we got up too?

Martin and I replied,

“What happens on holiday stays on holiday”

That evening after a shower , rest and feed we told them everything.

Home and Epilogue

We had to go home on the Sunday so we just hung out with the Family, as it would be some time before I would see them again.

We went shopping so Martin could find a new pair of jeans. He still couldn’t understand what happened to his underpants , we also bought some presents for the girls.

Rob gave us a treat on Saturday night by pulling out a high powered Slug Gun and we spent all night with a torch blowing away Cane Toads in the back yard.

It was the ultimate revenge for Martin even though we had to collect all the carcasses on Sunday morning before we left.

The bus station was a sad affair because it would be 12 months before I saw Lin and the kids again. It would be under less celebratory circumstances than this trip.

Rob would get some wild hair up his arse and want to become a teenager again and desert them in another six months – no one saw it coming – especially Linda and the kids sadly.

We climbed on the bus and came face to face with Ron again. He pretended we’d never met and we accepted that as forgiveness.

It didn’t matter, the trip back seemed so much shorter because we managed to sleep so much easier.

Our bodies were just giving in.

After I returned to Melbourne I managed to devour most of
Hunter S Thompson’s books and continued to enjoy his works as time progressed. I still do today.

I was surprised that he committed suicide in 2005 until I read a few more articles. The man had lived like Hemmingway and died like him. There was no way he was going to pushed around in a wheelchair and not be part of the lifestyle. In the end it was an addiction.
Not just the drugs, guns and cars.
The whole attitude.

I realized after the holiday I didn’t want to live like Hunter and only started writing again this year after a very long layoff,

As for Martin he became a printer for various companies, still is.

He never managed to get jailed (which at one stage in his life was a strong possibility) but did loose his licence for a long time (another funny story how he lost it and why he couldn’t get it back)

He was best man at my wedding in 1991 and he looked marvelous, Trimmed beard, suit , short hair.

Then about 2 years after that he had a lifestyle change (if possible)

These days he rides a 18 gear tricyle around has hair and a beard around his waist (it’s still vivid red) and a nose piercing.

Still loves his weed and the blues. Two things I have no tolerance for anymore.
He is still single.

He sees my Mum still and my younger brother a bit but I haven’t had physical contact with him for nearly 3 years.

Which will change soon – if I can arrange it.

Thanks for those who shared this journey.

It was a great stroll down memory lane after a being jolted out of my memory banks after a few unrelated incidents got me thinking.

So in no particular order thanks to Mr Khan, Bill Bryson, my old photo collection under the bed, My friends Jimmy and Martin and the memory of Hunter Stockton Thompson (deceased).

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shortstory, huntersthompson, feast, danny, memoir and dannygonzo