Brings back a lot of memories! during the days of the old commonwealth dept of works, worked at all the old repeater stations on the telegraph line when they were still in use, particularly Fairview near Laura, Moreton telegraph Station, Cowen and if I remember correctly Musgrave. First trip was in the mid sixties, we used to do all the building works and repairs for PMG and also the airports for DCA at Cooktown, Cowen and Iron range
Virtually no photos, apart from an extended trip to Iron Range airport in 1968 to relocate a wartime building from the far side of the airstrip to near the terminal and renovate it for the itinerant workers to stay at when doing runway repairs or relieving the permanent groundsman at the strip. We made a frame to sit under the building and used two parallel sets of portable train tracks for cane trains in the paddocks to pull it with the truck to the other side of the strip, have a photo of the building in the middle of the runway.
Used to drive to Portland Roads every 2nd sunday, about 3 hours one way on the track in those days, for the Maluka (a coastal trader) to dock at the jetty with our food and other gear for the job, have to see if I can scan some photos and try and post them.
Remember crossing the Wenlock in late October one year, with an early wet season starting, had the doors open on the 4WD international truck (C1600 model I think) and about 300mm of water running through the cab, the climb out on the southern side was all slippery clay with a vertical shelf on the bank just above the water line. There was a 4WD club from South Australia camped on the southern side as the water was too deep for the landrovers, they were all taking photos but no one offered to send me one, would have loved to have seen what it looked like, but made it out without having to drag out the cable on the PTO winch.
