When I left Melbourne at 7am, it was 7 degrees and pitch black outside. To assist myself to dive into the V8 racing experience, I’d decorated my fingernails as racing tracks so they were also black (with white road markings!):
Isn’t it funny how, when you’re on the WAY TO your holiday/ break destination, it seems like a super-quick journey? Even though it took 9 hours door to door (stopover in Brisbane), it felt like 2hrs. I can jump ahead in this story for a moment and tell you that the 3hr direct flight back seemed to take all day.
In Brisbane I spent most of the time boarding the flight to Townsville complaining that ‘this plane doesn’t have TV screens’ and asking ‘why on earth you’ve separated me from the people I’m travelling with’ and ‘I don’t have an in-flight magazine’. The stranger sitting next to me said, ‘I don’t really care about that stuff, this is my first ever flight’. Meet Allan – the farmer from country QLD who has never ever flown before and is off to visit his son and have some boy-time at the car racing.
“I’m like a kid at Christmas, here!”
I realised I was being silly and started seeing the world through Allan’s eyes and saw how lucky we were to even BE in a massive hunk of metal about to take to the skies to get an 8hr road journey done in a quarter of the time.
“I hate the city. I hate the traffic. I’m just used to dodging kangaroos, wild goats and pigs!”
I told him he could hold my hand if he needed to.
As the plane took off at warp speed, Allan turned to me and said “Bugger me silly!”. He asked what I was talking about when I had mentioned the TV screens. I told him that, usually, behind each seat there was a TV screen for you to look at with about 20 satellite TV channels. “Get OUT! Bugger me!” he said.
As we flew over Fraser Island, Allan told me it is heritage listed and is the biggest sand island in the southern hemisphere. It was massive.. much bigger than I’d imagined when I’d read about it. It’s home to Hervey Bay, where you go whale watching.
Fraser Island from the air
At one point, Allan suggested I look down to the water and I saw about 50 ships docked. He taught me that was at Hay Point just outside Mackay and the ships were loading coal to be exported all around the world. I nearly said ‘Bugger me!’
Somehow Allan and I had found ourselves in Premium Economy (Virgin Australia) which meant we could have anything from the menu without charge. When I told him this: “You’re jokin aren’t ya? Well I’ll be damned. I’ll have a Crownie thanks love!”
As we were about to touch down, I found out that flight control at the airport at Townsville is actually run by the Army, who have the largest land garrison in Australia right there in Townsville. They recently sent 800 troops to Afghanistan.
And did you know Townsville is the home to James Cook University which attracts over 15,000 students from around the world – most of which go there to study Tropical Science?!
I asked Allan how he’d enjoyed his first flight and he said it was “Bloody marvellous. Can’t wait to tell my son I met a good sort on the plane who sorted a beer out for me”.
I was so happy to have had that little reality check and to see the world through Allans eyes for a couple of hours. I hope I remember it the next time I find myself so ‘inconvenienced’ when flying.
So – from the plane, I grabbed a bus headed for the Ferry terminal to take me to the hotel at Magnetic Island. The bus driver gave us a lovely little detour up to the top of Castle Hill to look out across Townsville and get our bearings:
Townsville from Castle Hill
First impressions : Townsville isn’t as rural and dry and remote as I’d imagined. It was lush, neat, simply gorgeous. From Castle Hill we could hear the V8′s on their qualifying laps… it was getting exciting!!
All the Melbournites turned their faces to the sun and simply stood in silence for about 4 weeks. (ok, minutes)
The ferry trip was only 20 minutes and I was surprised and delighted to discover (only in Queensland!) the bar was licensed! (we were on holidays after all!).
3000 people live on Magnetic Island and there’s a bus that will take you around the whole island to all of the interesting spots. There’s even a theatre restaurant!!?
Like every Peppers Resort I’ve stayed in, the ‘Maggie Island’ resort is absolutely gorgeous. The view from all of the rooms is a feast for the eyes:
Was it still the same day as when we’d left Melbourne?? It already felt like a week of bliss had been experienced.
Quick change, unpack and down to the dock for a twilight cruise along the Island to watch the sunset before dinner:
(that photo collage was created with an iPhone app called Diptic.. which is super cool and fun)
Then a divine dinner in the hotel restaurant and hit the hay to prepare for the big day of V8s coming up….
Get up, jump on ferry, then bus to the track. As soon as you get off the bus, you feel it, smell it, HEAR it – the action of the cars and the excitement of the die-hard fans. Look around and everyone is decked out in their team colours or slogans:
“Holdens were invented to keep idiots out of Fords”
It’s all in super-good fun. Everyone’s a good sport. I did not see one altercation or bit of angst amongst fans all day.
Thanks to my mad Tweeting (as usual), the Holden Racing Team (thanks TOM) intercepted my tweets and invited me to the their garage for a pit tour, so I threw myself into that and found out:
- The cars can get 800litres to 100kms.
- The top speed is about 300km/hr
- The brakes can reach about 1200 degrees celcius and go white hot.
- You can save about 1kg in weight if you prime the metal roll bars inside the car, instead of paint them.
- The entire outside of the car is made from carbon fibre. The idea is that the outside of the car just comes off in a crash, leaving the driver safe inside the roll cage.
Being in the garage is a certain kind of GREAT because you overhear drivers talking with mechanics and officials talking with other officials and computer screens giving all sorts of super important stats and it’s just an experience you don’t get every day. The drivers wear special shirts under their suits which have water veins in them… attached to a sort of esky it the car filled with dry ice. When driving, they press a button and shoot cold water through this shirt to keep them cool… it can get up to 50 degrees inside the car!
It might have been from Dancing with the Stars but I recognised James Courtney – the No.1 leader of the V8 Super Car Championship and said hello:
I walked around the entire grounds and found the corporate stands really entertaining – XXXX beer had a pop-up pup with giant inflatable beer cans. Telstra had a pop-up store. Pepsi Max was the best of all with Billy the Kid (an amazing DJ) and his breakdancers putting on shows every hour. It was hard to drag myself away from that!
Via the Townsville Bulletin, I’d scored a spot as one of the VIP’s invited to do a ‘Grid Walk’ just before the race begins. The drivers get into their starting position and stay in their cars, while the grid girls hold umbrellas up to shield them from the sun and these VIP’s get to wander around the entire starting grid, checking out the cars and giving thumbs-ups to the drivers… can you believe it!? What a trip!! This is actually Craig Lowndes, sitting in his car, waiting for the VIP’s to finish gawking so he can get on with his race of 72 laps!?
Craig Lowndes - starting grid
Then it was time for the 72 lap race to begin! I took myself off to various different vantage points and found the mostexhilaratingone to stop at for a while – the cars were practically going sideways around the bend AND at their highest speed.
This was only part 1 of the race and it was won by Garth Tander who’d been in that Holden Racing garage with me, earlier in the day. Must have been my good luck!!! Part 2 of the race was to be held the next day.
YOUR say about OUR say!