Tracks

Chapter 7

The section of the journey immediately after Tempe Downs highlights the tension between the nature that Davidson craves and the imminent intrusion of the world. She is struck by the beauty of the natural world and aware that in two weeks she will be at Uluru and have to see Rick and comply with her commitments to National Geographic.

The serenity is often tempered by the people she meets on the journey. She concedes that there are some travellers that were ‘lovely’ but the misogynistic men she meets in the bar or tourists she encounters around Uluru detract from her experience. The interferences remind her of who she is and what she hopes to achieve. She is reminded of her place as a woman by the brutish men and reminded of her desire to be an individual when confronted by others.

At Uluru she steps outside of her own concerns and trades them for concern on behalf of the traditional land owners. Struck by the disrespectful nature of the tourists who climb over the rock, Davidson feels saddened at the powerlessness of the Indigenous population, inundated by people seeking photos and leaving rubbish. It parallels her own sacred plan that has been invaded by others. As if on cue, Rick arrives bringing her friend Jenny. Davidson resents the imposition and is upset by her friend’s presence. Rick follows Davidson for a while, photographing her and the Indigenous people from Docker River, even taking photos of their sacred ceremony. His actions infuriate Davidson and segregate them both from the Indigenous people. In despair, Davidson leaves alone despite asking for a guide, acknowledging she will always be a ‘whitefella’ looking in from afar.

Chapter 7 Quotes

I had approximately two weeks’ travel before I could expect to reach Ayers Rocks, and I was not looking forward to my arrival. Rick would be there to bring me back to reality. And I knew that the Rock was tamed, ruined by busload upon busload of tourists. (Davidson) Chapter 7

If felt vulnerable. Moonlight turned the shadows into inimical forms and I was so glad of Diggity’s warmth as we snuggled beneath the blankets that I could have squeezed her to death. (Davidson) Chapter 7

I went into the bar for a beer, there to be met by a group of typical ockers, all talking, as is their wont, about sex and sheilas. ‘Oh great,’ I thought, ‘just what I need …’ (Davidson) Chapter 7

Uluru they called it. The great Uluru. I wondered how they could stand watching people blundering around in fertility caves, or climbing the white painted line up the side, and taking their endless photos. If it had me almost to the point of tears, how much more must it have meant to them. (Davidson) Chapter 7

Rick arrived the next day, all bouncy and enthusiastic and full of energy. (Davidson) Chapter 7

I posed in caves and walked back and forth across sand-dunes. I led the camels over escarpments and I rode them through wildflowers. ‘What about honest journalism?’ I shouted, and set my face into cement-like grimaces as I stamped along. Poor Richard, how I made him pay. I think he was truly frightened of me at times. (Davidson) Chapter 7

Rick called the ranger at Ayers Rock, to test his radio, but not only could he not contact him, a mere twenty miles away, but he had a crackly conversation with a fisherman in Adelaide, five hundred miles to the south. (Davidson) Chapter 7

I constantly imagined what it would be like, how much better it would be, if I were on my own. I was no longer blaming Richard, however, but myself. I knew I had to take full responsibility for his being there, had to come face to face with the fact that this trip would not, could not, be what I had planned and wanted it to be. And instead of seeing the potential that was there, I mourned for the loss of my hopes. (Davidson) Chapter 7

That night injected two new elements into our relationship. The first was tolerance – that is, the necessity to compromise. It set the real basis for an unlikely friendship which, although it was to have its ups and downs, was there to stay. The second was sex. (Davison, about Rick) Chapter 7

Whatever justifications for photographing the Aborigines I had come up with before, now were totally shot. It was immediately apparent that they hated it. They knew it was a rip-off. I wanted Rick to stop. He argued that he had a job to do. I looked through a small booklet Geographic had given him to record expenditures. In it was ‘gifts to the natives’. I couldn’t believe it. I told him to put down five thousand dollars for mirrors and beads, then hand out the money. (Davidson) Chapter 7

We didn’t talk much on the way home. I did not know then that it was merely a rule of etiquette to give some little gift at the end of a dance. I felt it as a symbolic defeat. A final summing up of how I could never enter their reality, would always be a whitefella tourist on the outside looking in.
And so it dragged on, that gradual decaying of my little hopes and dreams. (Davidson) Chapter 7

Chapter 8

With her dreams in disarray a despondent, Davidson moves on from Docker River. Reality comes in the form of three bull camels that terrorise her and her travelling camels. She is forced to kill all three to save her own caravan of camels.

Davidson seems to unravel following her ordeal. She hears voices in the night arguing, representing various sides of her conscious: encouraging, threatening and questioning. She spends time talking to herself, Diggity the dog and the surrounding landscape. Feeling she is losing control, she steels herself to get to the next station, Mount Fanny.

She is restored by finding the station and encouraged when a group of Aboriginal men stop by her camp and spend time with her. They are cheerful and comfortable with silence, traits that Davidson admires. They agree that a man will guide her. The man introduces himself as Mr Eddie.

Chapter 8 Quotes

I was twenty miles out, tired and thirsty. I drank some beer. I was about to turn off and make camp when through the beer-hazed afternoon heat came striding three large strong male camels in full season.
Panic and shake. Panic and shake. (Davidson) Chapter 8

So tired, I slept in the creek and thought of nothing but failure. I could not even light a fire. I wanted to hide in the dark. I thought it was surely longer than two days, I had walked so far. But time was different here, it was stretched by step after step and in each step a century of circular thought. I didn’t want to think like this, was ashamed of my thoughts but I could not stop them. (Davidson) Chapter 8

There was nothing but chaos and the voices.
The strong one, the hating one, the powerful one was mocking me, laughing at me.
‘You’ve gone too far this time. I’ve got you now and I hate you. You’re disgusting, aren’t you? You’re nothing. And I have you now, I knew it would come, sooner or later. There’s no use fighting me you know, there’s no one to help you. I’ve got you, I’ve got you.’
Another voice was calm and warm. She commanded me to lie down and be calm. She instructed me to not let go, not give in. She reassured me that I would find myself again if I could just hold on, be quiet and lie down.
The third voice was screaming. (Davidson) Chapter 8

Aborigines. Warm, friendly, laughing, excited, tired Pitjantjara Aborigines, returning to Wingelinna and Pipalyatjara after a land rights meeting in Warburton. No fear there, they were comfortable with silence. No need to pretend anything. Billies of tea all round. Some sat by the fire and chatted, others drove home. (Davidson) Chapter 8

I talked to my companions a little. They decided that one of them should accompany me to Pipalyatjara, two days’ walk away, to look after me. I was sure it was going to be the talkative one, the one who spoke English, and my heart sank.
But as I was about to walk off with the camels, who should join me but – the little man. ‘Mr Eddie,’ he said, and pointed to himself. I pointed to myself and said ‘Robyn’, which I suppose he thought meant ‘rabbit’, since that is the Pitjantjara word for it. It seemed appropriate enough. And then we began to laugh. (Davidson and Eddie) Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Davidson achieves her desire to connect with the Indigenous people through her relationship with Eddie. She is pleased to spend time with him on the way to Pipalyatjara but is eager to meet a man named Glendle, a white community liaison officer in the town. Her desire to meet Glendle and speak with him in English underscores her shifting desire for independence and individualism against the need for interaction and support.

On arriving in Pipalyatjara, Davidson meets Glendle and finds him to be a warm and kind individual who is willing to give up his accommodation for her. Davidson gets a glimpse of the difficulties of working in Indigenous communities, balancing the needs of the community with the burden of external forces like mining and government. The ongoing struggle to protect communities from influences and the desire to not appear paternalistic is a difficult balance for Glendle.

The time in the community is eye-opening for Davidson. She reconsiders her animosity for Rick as she is urged to consider how he has been a friendly support to her. She also sees an exchange between Eddie and his wife Winkicha that emblematises a deep love and respect which transcends traditional gender stereotypes. She concludes that outsiders from non-Indigenous societies may have been influential in any chauvinism expressed within Indigenous communities.

After it is agreed that Eddie will accompany Davidson, the pair continue together. Language is sparse but Eddie manages to show Davidson through his actions and a few words many important aspects of travelling through the area. She learns about local flora and fauna including a tobacco-like plant that Davidson tries. More importantly, she learns how to slow down and shake off the idea of time and schedules and embrace a natural rhythm. Eddie is a key to unlocking access to many Indigenous people they encounter.

Once again, this idyllic time Davidson manages to achieve is interrupted by the reality of a township and the arrival of Rick. His insistence on taking photos and exchanging trinkets with Eddie, although seemingly innocent or maybe a reckless attempt to fulfil his duty to his employer, alienate Eddie and infuriate Davidson. Davidson is caught between worlds for a while, in tune with the land and Eddie having escaped time and routine, but still related to a world that contains men on motorcycles that Eddie is weary of and, Rick, the symbol of media and society.

Chapter 9 Quotes

When Eddie walked a little behind I could feel him looking askance at me – feel his puzzled eyes on the back of my head.
‘What’s wrong with this woman? Why doesn’t she just relax? …’ (Davidson) Chapter 9

That night Glendle cooked tea. Eddie had set up camp outside and old men and women were constantly coming up to see him and talk to Glendle and me. I was once again struck by these old people. They were softly spoken, chuckled constantly and seemed completely self-assured. (Davidson) Chapter 9

Ceremonies are the visible link between Aboriginal people and their land. Once dispossessed of this land, ceremonial life deteriorates, people lose their strength, meaning and identity. (Davidson) Chapter 9

We walked off and he continued to smile that special happy smile to himself. I asked him who it was, and he turned to me beaming, and said, ‘That was Winkicha, my wife.’ There was such pride and pleasure in his face. I had never seen that particular quality of love shown so openly between a man and wife before. It staggered me. (Davidson and Eddie) Chapter 9

If there is sexism amongst Aborigines today, it is because they have learnt well from their conquerors. The difference in status between black women in Alice Springs and black women here was unbelievable. (Davidson) Chapter 9

Eddie picked the plants he wanted while I watched. The vague uneasiness and fidgetiness of having the projected pattern of the day rearranged was soon soothed by the meditative way in which we searched for them. (Davidson) Chapter 9

The thing that impressed me most was that Eddie should have been bitter and he was not. (Davidson) Chapter 9

Eddie looked at me and scratched his head. ‘Who is he, what does he want, why all these photos?’
I tried to explain, but what could I say. ‘OK, Rick, that’s enough.’ Rick pulled out another camera. ‘Look, I’ve got the perfect solution.’ It was an SX 79, an instant Polaroid. He took a photo of Eddie and handed it to him.
I was furious. ‘Oh, I see, sort of like beads for the natives. Look, Rick, he doesn’t like being photographed, so quit it.’ (Eddie and Davidson) Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Heading on to the Gunbarrel Highway, Davidson knows she will not see anyone for some time. As she journeys, her rigid sense of self dissipates and she tunes in to nature. She identifies subtle changes in the environment and lets go of daily routines. She feels like she has become a part of the dirt of the desert. Casting off her clock, a final symbol of shedding societal concerns, she walks naked in the desert. She plays with the camels and Diggity.

Her transformation continues as she encounters more wild camels. As her gun jams, she is forced to chase them and distract them until they leave. In this way she has been a part of the situation rather than a forceful influence. This mirrors her new interaction with nature as she becomes a part of the day’s rhythm rather than imposing her own lifestyle upon it. She embraces the disorder of the world around her rather than trying to structure it.

Anticipating the difficulties that she will encounter when she returns home, Davidson is at the same time comfortable walking naked through the desert and aware of the other world to which she must return. Strangers still intermittently interact with her on the journey including a young man testing a vehicle that spends a night with her. He is rude and leaves abruptly. Unknown to Davidson, he spreads news of their encounter which fuels media interest in the story.

Arriving in what seems to be the heart of the world, Davidson feels she has reached a moment of enlightenment. She pauses to try and remember the lessons she has learned that have led her to this moment of change and clarity. The ‘sense’ of magic is ripped from Davidson one night when Diggity becomes ill after ingesting poison from a bait dropped to eliminate dingoes. This is reframed as an intrusion into Davidson’s life, mimicking white man’s constant invasion of the nature and Indigenous lands through which she has passed. Diggity is doomed and convulsing on the ground when Davidson puts her out of her misery. However Davidson’s torment has just begun. Her attachment to Diggity is evident throughout the journey and foreshadows the grief she now feels.

Chapter 10 Quotes

Despite the fact that this leg would be the first real test of my survival skills, despite the fact that if I was going to die anywhere it would most likely be along this lonely treacherous stretch of void, I looked forward to it with newfound calm, a lack of fear, a solid reliance on myself. (Davidson) Chapter 10

Throughout the trip I had been gaining an awareness and an understanding of the earth as I learnt how to depend upon it. (Davidson) Chapter 10

And just as Aborigines seem to be in perfect rapport with themselves and their country, so the embryonic beginnings of that rapport were happening to me.
And my fear had a different quality now too. It was direct and useful. It did not incapacitate me or interfere with my competence. It was the natural, healthy fear one needs for survival. (Davidson) Chapter 10

Here would be some feed for the animals and a place where they could roll in the dirt to their hearts’ content. They were unsaddled by mid-afternoon and immediately began to play. I had been watching and laughing at them for a while and suddenly, spontaneously, there off all my clothes and joined them in a romp. We rolled and we kicked and we sent the dust flying over each other. Diggity went apoplectic with delight. I was covered with thick caked orange dust and my hair was matted. It was the most honest hour of unselfconscious fun I have ever had. Most of us, I am sure, have forgotten how to play. We’ve made up games instead. And competition is the force which holds these games together. The desire to win, to beat someone else, has supplanted play – the doing of something just for itself. (Davidson) Chapter 10

OK, you fusty old Freudians, you laudable Laingians, my psyche is up for grabs. I have admitted a weak point. Dogs. (Davidson) Chapter 10

It’s an accusation that brings an explosive response every time because it seems to me that the good Lord in his infinite wisdom gave us three things to make life bearable – hope, jokes and dogs, but the greatest of these was dogs. (Davidson) Chapter 10

When the beliefs of one culture are translated into the language of another culture, the word ‘superstition’ often crops up. (Davidson) Chapter 10

The Wards had given me a leather muzzle to put on her to protect her from strychnine baits, which were dropped way out in the desert from light aircraft to exterminate the Australian native dog, the dingo. But she had hated it. She had whined and scratched at it and looked such a picture of misery and heart-break that I eventually took it off. (Davidson) Chapter 10

She was on her side convulsing. I blew her brains out. I knelt frozen like that for a long time then I staggered back to the swag and got in. (Davidson, on Diggity) Chapter 10

Chapter 11

In the following days, Davidson is just a shell of her former self. She moves onward through the journey but is without emotion. She realises how much she relied on Diggity as a source of companionship and security. The landscape matches her mood as she feels distant from earth. Eventually in a place she feels is special, she dances until she is exhausted. She dances in the same way the nankari or medicine man had taken away the curse that had been sung over Eddie. She dances out her frustration with Rick, the death of Diggity and the frustrations of the trip. Exhausted, she feels she is healed.

She is now ready to conclude her trip. Its conclusion is reaching out to her in the form of journalists hunting her for the story. She hides from them but this becomes more and more difficult as she gets closer to the coast. She feels unprotected and vulnerable. The man who had been driving through the desert had caused this commotion – another example of gender imbalance, unable to resist sharing that he had been with her, feeling entitled to the use of this information regardless of Davidson’s views. Davidson is shocked at the amount of attention she is now receiving and knows she will appear crazy to them.

Jenny and Toly fly in and meet with Rick and Davidson. They spend time together and Davidson shares her stories while they hide out in a house Rick has arranged. They retrace some of Davidson’s last days and she receives a second chance to experience the beautiful landscape she was distracted from enjoying by Diggity’s death. Davidson and Rick spend some time in the desert together before heading toward Carnarvon on the Coral Coast of Western Australia.

Chapter 11 Quotes

They were disturbingly vivid. I woke to the reality of loneliness, and was surprised at the strength which enabled me to accept it.
It may seem strange that the mere death of a dog could have such a profound effect on someone, but it must be remembered that, because of my isolation, Diggity had become a cherished friend rather than simply a pet. (Davidson, on Diggity) Chapter 11

I decided to use my hated radio set that night to call Henry and check up on the direction. I wasn’t so much panicked as uneasy. I wanted to talk to someone. Everything was so still and there was no Diggity to play with or talk to or hold. It took me half an hour to set the wretched thing up – a long bit of wire draped over a tree, and another along the ground. It didn’t work. I had carried this monster for fifteen hundred miles, loaded and unloaded it hundreds of times, and the only occasion I needed it, it wouldn’t work. It had probably been broken all along. (Davidson) Chapter 11

It wasn’t bush folk. It was the jackals, hyenas, parasites and pariahs of the popular press. By the time I saw the long-lens camera trained on me, it was too late to hide, or get out the gun and blast it at them, or even realize that I was crazy enough to do such a thing. Out they spilled. (Davidson) Chapter 11

I was now public property. I was now a feminist symbol. I was now an object of ridicule for small-minded sexists, and I was a crazy, irresponsible adventurer (though not as crazy as I would have been had I failed). But worse than all that, I was now a mythical being who had done something courageous and outside the possibilities that ordinary people could hope for. And that was the antithesis of what I wanted to share. That anyone could do anything. If I could bumble my way across a desert, then anyone could do anything. And that was true especially for women, who have used cowardice for so long to protect themselves that it has become a habit. (Davidson) Chapter 11

The world is a dangerous place for little girls. Besides, little girls are more fragile, more delicate, more brittle than little boys. (Davidson) Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Rick leaves for a photography assignment and Davidson drifts toward the coast, staying at another ranch on the way. The camels have become distracted by the heat and Zeleika is not well. Davidson spends time at the ranch until Zeleika has recovered then heads to the coast to rejoin Rick, freshly returned from an exciting adventure.

There is a peaceful time spent on the coast, without struggle. The camels walk on the beach and wade in the water. Davidson can relax. Her only fear is about her reintegration into society, apprehension at how she will fit back in to a ‘clock-driven’ world. In some ways her journey has helped her transcend the white man’s world and join that of the natural order. She has changed.

Her final reflection is simple. She realises that she can be as strong as she allows herself to be and that the hardest part of any venture was to simply to begin.

Chapter 12 Quotes

It’s hard to say who Jan and David were more pleased to see – me or the camels. I knew my beasts could enjoy a happy and pampered retirement here – to this day, my friends at Woodleigh are the only people I can really discuss camel behaviour with ad nauseam and know that they will understand. They dote on them as much as I do and are virtual slaves to their every whim. Dookie, Bub, Zelly and Goliath had landed on their feet. This was their new home, and they immediately took over. (Davidson) Chapter 12

I felt free and untrammelled and light and I wanted to stay that way. If I could only just hold on to it. I didn’t want to get caught up in the madness out there.
Poor fool, I really believed all that crap. I was forgetting that what’s true in one place is not necessarily true in another. (Davidson) Chapter 12

The trip was easy. It was no more dangerous than crossing the street, or driving on the beach, or eating peanuts. The two important things that I did learn were that you are as powerful and strong as you allow yourself to be, and that the most difficult part of any endeavour is taking the first step, making the first decision. (Davidson) Chapter 12

His links with the special places we passed gave him a kind of energy, a joy, a belonging… He knew every particle of that country as well as he knew his own body. He was at home in it totally, at one with it and the feeling began rubbing off on to me. Time melted — became meaningless. I don’t think I have ever felt so good in my entire life. He made me notice things I had not noticed before — noises, tracks. And I began to see how it all fitted together. The land was not wild but tame, bountiful, benign, giving, as long as you knew how to see it, how to be part of it. (Davidson, about Eddie) Chapter 12

And that term ‘camel LADY.’ Had I been a man, I’d be lucky to get a mention in the Wiluna Times, let alone international press coverage. Neither could I imagine them coining the phrase ‘camel gentleman’. ‘Camel lady’ had that nice patronizing belittling ring to it. Labeling, pigeon-holing — what a splendid trick it is. (Davidson) Chapter 12