There's a corrugated highway Leading north from Port Augusta
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lined with ratted cars that didn't rate a tow
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The Salt plains out of Pimba And your eyes begin to stream
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On to Kingoonya huddled dusty by the road
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Romantic notions shattered Like the tyres that didn't hack it
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This has got to be the country's last frontier
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Where a sports car's next to useless Running cattle grids and river beds
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We drove a van from 1963
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Someone mentioned walkabout And kiss your job goodbye
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Just to see the country shimmer through the windscreen
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Drinking beer, telling stories While laughter filled the night
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And flexi-time's behind you like a bad dream
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You got a flat on Anzac Highway And Lawson on your shelf
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Its a Southern Comfort, air-conditioned rage
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Where a homestead's more than just a cheap print Dangling from a wall
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And mateship's more than lines upon a page
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We went looking for Australia In between the TV lines
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'Cause the ABC just couldn't make it real
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Colour documentary From a beanbag on the floor:
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Never shows as much as it conceals
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A stark and blistered Alice Springs And a river runs with shame
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And you wipe the sheets of bulldust from your eyes
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Another country's uniform And the mirage it falls apart
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To the open gap between the truth and lies
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Go and see your country, mate The travel agents scream
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Politicians sell it's hard to score a pasttime
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Signs and high-wire fences Hold the land where I belong
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It's as if I'm in the outback for the last time
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The Last Frontier
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| Redgum |
