Thousand mile detour to get supplies to Birdsville

The Birdsville Track is one of many roads and highways out of action and so Bruce Haulage travelled via Cobar and Charleville, then west to Windorah, in order to get through at the end of January.

Even then, driver Stephen Bruce only had a one-day window to get across the dirt section between Windorah and Birdsville before rain swept across the far south west of Queensland.

"It was pretty rough and wet - if we'd had two trailers we'd have been stuck for sure," co-driver Hayden Bruce said.

In other summers when the track has been closed, Bruce Haulage has been able to get into Birdsville via the Moomba-Innaminka-Arrabury route but even that is closed at the moment, due to the magnitude of the rain.

The effort was much appreciated by the Birdsville Hotel management team, who posted on social media that with rain cutting all roads, supplies at the hotel had been getting a "little" low.

"We are grateful for the committed team at @brucehaulagebirdsville for the huge support shown by travelling all the way from Adelaide up to Charleville and across to Birdsville during a small window of road access time," the post read. "Outback businesses supporting each other and getting the job done!"

Operations manager Darren Collins said while they weren't down to their last beer kegs, they appreciated the logistical nightmare it was for the trucking company to go the extra mile.

"They only just made it in, then they were stuck for six days," he said. "Birdsville might have only had 20 or 30mm but along the track they've had up to 10 inches."

The return journey was along the same roads, and Bruce Haulage was loading a road train on Wednesday to make the trip back north via Charleville once again.

"It'll come with an extra cost, but that's the cost of doing business in the outback," Mr Collins said.

HISTORY REPEATS:

The iconic pub is using the summer tourism slowdown to undertake renovations to its front bar and six bathrooms incorporated in the main hotel building, so building materials were needed as much as the food on the truck.

"We're keen to get the front bar re-opened as soon as we can - people travel a long way to have a beer in that bar," Mr Collins said.

He recalled past occasions when they'd had to fly food in from Quilpie with Rex Airlines, and said they were used to adjusting menus to suit what was available.

"We're still busy with aviation tours and those meals," he added.

Birdsville Police officer-in-charge Stephan Pursell said it was always good to get rain, saying that after years of 'dry floods' where the only water the region saw had fallen elsewhere, 2022 was looking to be a 'wet flood' year.

The road to Mount Isa is currently cut by the Georgina River at Marion Downs. According to the Bureau of Meteorology, the Georgina River was in major flood and steady at 8.46m at Roxborough Downs on Wednesday morning.

It was also a major flood, 6.35m and rising, 3.75m above the bridge at Glenormiston, and a major flood 1.53m above the approaches at Marion Downs and rising slowly.

Senior constable Pursell said Birdsville's local disaster management group had met and was well prepared for long-term flooding, including making sure there was a good supply of aviation fuel.

While the Simpson Desert is closed until March 15, he expected problems with motorists would begin to arise when roads were just starting to re-open.

"People will need to be aware of the conditions," he said.

He is anticipating a lot more tourists at the start of the season this year, with the history-making meeting of the Birdsville Races set to run on April 10 and 11.

"We've got a lot going on out here all year," he said.

"As well as the Big Red Bash, the Simpson Desert Ultra is attracting a lot of interest, and we've got the million dollar hole in one golf tournament this year.

"On top of that, there's the addition of water."

The promise of full waterholes, the possibility of Lake Eyre filling, and wildflowers getting ready to 'pop' means the pub and the community at large is gearing up for a huge tourist season.

According to Darren Collins, bookings for the Birdsville Hotel's attractions were rolling over from 2020 and 2021, on top of new travel interest.

"With the possibility of Lake Eyre filling and borders re-opening, it's going to be a bumper year," he said. "It's quite possible we'll have three planes doing tours based here this year."

ALSO IN THE NEWS:

Want daily news highlights delivered to your inbox? Sign up to the Queensland Country Life newsletter below.