Fitzroy River Lodge, 18 12 S, 125 34 E
Yesterday was southwards, today westwards again, 290 km through the flat tablelands of the catchment area of the Fitzroy River, only occasional hillocks of granite with heaped-up rounded boulders, looking like giants’ playgrounds. Strong winds from the Tamani Desert to the south today too, and plenty dust devils, some I chased for ages, trying to get photos, some suddenly hit me sideways, so I largely kept to a sedate 80-90, better for fuel use too.
Yesterday was southwards, today westwards again, 290 km through the flat tablelands of the catchment area of the Fitzroy River, only occasional hillocks of granite with heaped-up rounded boulders, looking like giants’ playgrounds. Strong winds from the Tamani Desert to the south today too, and plenty dust devils, some I chased for ages, trying to get photos, some suddenly hit me sideways, so I largely kept to a sedate 80-90, better for fuel use too.
A fascinating area in terms of landforms – although a non-geologist would probably have called it flat and boring – that’s the fun thing with geology I was thinking, wherever you go you tune in to the landscape and try to work out why it is, what it is – here it seems the rivers have been flowing and the land has been rising for the last 20 million years or so, as Australia has pushed northwards against Asia (the big effects of that we saw in Timor...). So here we see the river cutting stepwise down through the underlying rocks, every few million years creating a new flood plain and tableland....
I pass the Tamani turnoff – the “El Diretissimo” route to Alice Springs through the desert, “only” about 800 km to the SE, but gravel and corrugated all the way – only for the dedicated and passionate 4Wdriver! The usual signs now and then to faraway cattle stations and tribal communities, all on gravel roads and barred to visitors, apart from a couple of tribal art galleries, but my campervan can’t manage the gravel and the galleries are closed anyway on a Sunday. Then about 70 km from Fitzroy, the really big cliff-line around Ngumpan, where the river has cut down to the level it has in Fitzroy itself today – quite spectacular buttes and pinnacles, no problem making cowboy films around here....
I stop at the rest area atop the cliffs, looking at the flatlying sandstones underneath me and am joined by Terry – a retired policeman from Bundaberg in southern Queensland, who is driving his BMW motorbike the opposite direction to me, having taken the whole Australian circuit clockwise - he’s now on his way home, a lot of it on the same route I’ve come - he’s only got about 3,000 km to go now, but admits he’s tired, especially in this heat (much more pleasant in Broome he says, not so violent heat).
After a few pleasant exchanges, we look at the same landscape and come to quite different conclusions – Terry says “I get strength from this – all over Australia I see these same beds testifying to the biblical flood”. For the 3rd time on this trip I’m locked into the same discussion with committed biblical creationists – each time with perfectly reasonable and friendly people, not with any dogmatic ignorance or unwillingness to discuss, but with a deep conviction that their Christian belief is incompatible with my scientific background. How I hate the dogmatic Richard Dawkins and his rampant atheism that does more to destroy religious peoples’ possible belief in evolutionary theory than to promote it – I myself don’t understand at all why evolutionary theory disproves the existence of God, a Supreme Being, the Unknown Prime Mover, the Big Bang, call Her what you will......
I try to explain that the different cliff-lines Terry has seen through his trip are of quite different ages, showing YES that Australia has been flooded, but many times, starting over a 2,000 million years ago, and in between parts have been uplifted, parts have been crushed together and then parts have been flooded yet again – and the cliff we’re looking at tells me of 340 million year old rocks exposed as the land has been uplifted quite recently, less than 20 million years ago. As I try to explain the physical certainties around radioactive half-lives to determine absolute ages and the wonders of the fossil record that support evolutionary theory, he remains totally unconvinced – “You can’t prove any of it” ..... I stop myself from the obvious like “I can prove a lot more than you can mate” and we shake hands part as friends, him driving his BMW ever eastwards and homewards, me looking at the Devonian cliffs realising that I may have been teaching geology for 40 years now, yet I’m not at all equipped for stand-up fights with committed creationists and I hate the Dawkins atheist line even more...
Ah well, on to Fitzroy River Lodge, just by the “old” crossing of the river itself, built in 1935 – which says something about just how “old” this place is. The new overpass bridge was built in 1974 and all the buildings belonging to the lodge are either on stilts or on artificial mounds so that they are even higher than the overpass – making even me believe the tourist hype that “the Fitzroy River in flood is an awesome sight” though not quite accepting “and one of the largest rivers in the world”. Right now most of the river and all of its creeks are nothing but sand, not much water in sight at all – but all that will change drastically in the next 4 to 6 weeks the locals tell me....
I get well established in my “donga” – up on a little artificial mound this too -half of a simple container with a small window, a door and all mod cons, not least air-con. Fine.... Internet connection a bit dodgy though, I’m several hundred metres away from the main lodge – we’ll see , if necessary I can work from the lodge itself.... Sit on the lodge veranda, enjoy an antipasto meant to be a starter, but more than big enough for me (realising again that Ros & I will get by very well by sharing 1 Ozzie main course, and notice that the evening air actually does get a little cooler around here......
I pass the Tamani turnoff – the “El Diretissimo” route to Alice Springs through the desert, “only” about 800 km to the SE, but gravel and corrugated all the way – only for the dedicated and passionate 4Wdriver! The usual signs now and then to faraway cattle stations and tribal communities, all on gravel roads and barred to visitors, apart from a couple of tribal art galleries, but my campervan can’t manage the gravel and the galleries are closed anyway on a Sunday. Then about 70 km from Fitzroy, the really big cliff-line around Ngumpan, where the river has cut down to the level it has in Fitzroy itself today – quite spectacular buttes and pinnacles, no problem making cowboy films around here....
I stop at the rest area atop the cliffs, looking at the flatlying sandstones underneath me and am joined by Terry – a retired policeman from Bundaberg in southern Queensland, who is driving his BMW motorbike the opposite direction to me, having taken the whole Australian circuit clockwise - he’s now on his way home, a lot of it on the same route I’ve come - he’s only got about 3,000 km to go now, but admits he’s tired, especially in this heat (much more pleasant in Broome he says, not so violent heat).
After a few pleasant exchanges, we look at the same landscape and come to quite different conclusions – Terry says “I get strength from this – all over Australia I see these same beds testifying to the biblical flood”. For the 3rd time on this trip I’m locked into the same discussion with committed biblical creationists – each time with perfectly reasonable and friendly people, not with any dogmatic ignorance or unwillingness to discuss, but with a deep conviction that their Christian belief is incompatible with my scientific background. How I hate the dogmatic Richard Dawkins and his rampant atheism that does more to destroy religious peoples’ possible belief in evolutionary theory than to promote it – I myself don’t understand at all why evolutionary theory disproves the existence of God, a Supreme Being, the Unknown Prime Mover, the Big Bang, call Her what you will......
I try to explain that the different cliff-lines Terry has seen through his trip are of quite different ages, showing YES that Australia has been flooded, but many times, starting over a 2,000 million years ago, and in between parts have been uplifted, parts have been crushed together and then parts have been flooded yet again – and the cliff we’re looking at tells me of 340 million year old rocks exposed as the land has been uplifted quite recently, less than 20 million years ago. As I try to explain the physical certainties around radioactive half-lives to determine absolute ages and the wonders of the fossil record that support evolutionary theory, he remains totally unconvinced – “You can’t prove any of it” ..... I stop myself from the obvious like “I can prove a lot more than you can mate” and we shake hands part as friends, him driving his BMW ever eastwards and homewards, me looking at the Devonian cliffs realising that I may have been teaching geology for 40 years now, yet I’m not at all equipped for stand-up fights with committed creationists and I hate the Dawkins atheist line even more...
Ah well, on to Fitzroy River Lodge, just by the “old” crossing of the river itself, built in 1935 – which says something about just how “old” this place is. The new overpass bridge was built in 1974 and all the buildings belonging to the lodge are either on stilts or on artificial mounds so that they are even higher than the overpass – making even me believe the tourist hype that “the Fitzroy River in flood is an awesome sight” though not quite accepting “and one of the largest rivers in the world”. Right now most of the river and all of its creeks are nothing but sand, not much water in sight at all – but all that will change drastically in the next 4 to 6 weeks the locals tell me....
I get well established in my “donga” – up on a little artificial mound this too -half of a simple container with a small window, a door and all mod cons, not least air-con. Fine.... Internet connection a bit dodgy though, I’m several hundred metres away from the main lodge – we’ll see , if necessary I can work from the lodge itself.... Sit on the lodge veranda, enjoy an antipasto meant to be a starter, but more than big enough for me (realising again that Ros & I will get by very well by sharing 1 Ozzie main course, and notice that the evening air actually does get a little cooler around here......
Helt enig når det gjelder den falske motsetningen mellom evolusjon og skapelse. Selv om det har foregått en evolusjon er livet på jorden uansett så fantastisk at man lett kan tenke seg at en høyere makt har noe med det å gjøre.
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