Early on the 4th of May, a fully packed Dream Puppet van, ( the “Dream Machine” ), slipped down the driveway to commence a very long journey. Its mission:  to take “DREAMER IN SPACE” to peoples and schools of all descriptions in the centre, far west and north of Australia.

A couple of days before, I was given a real five leaf clover to take with me for luck. It would be almost four months and  over 20,000 Kms later before returning to that same driveway.

A lot of preparation before hand resulted in very few difficulties on the tour. The van was well checked, serviced and fitted with a new engine. Detachable shelving was snugly fitted around the show in the back to accommodate a small and large tent, card table, tools, puppet repair and maintenance ingredients, cooking goods, bedding, first aid, clothes, books, CDs, office files, contact addresses, etc., even a small portable B/W television set and no, I did not forget the umbrella.

 The first leg was from Melbourne to Port Augusta, about 5% of the overall distance to cover. Having a new engine, I had to vary my speed all the time to run it in and arranged the first 800 km service for Mt Barker, SA. The timing and distance was perfect; the service was done in the morning and I arrived at Port Augusta late afternoon,  5th of May, smack in the midst of an old car rally. All accommodation was booked out! What saved me was the small tent, though I did find the plug to my inflatable mattress missing! This was my only oversight in packing.  Five shows in two days and it was off to Ceduna, for one show, then across the Nullarbor!

This was my third crossing of the Nullarbor,   (which is Latin for no trees ). It was a strange and scary feeling knowing that I was not coming back this way - then again, it was also a relief. The return journey can be very boring. It took two days and Australia’s most expensive petrol to do it. There is no radio, more traffic than you would imagine, crap food,( so take your own) ,  and lots of overseas tourists in a daze of mild shock at the arid expanse that is so daunting. It finishes at Norseman and you feel deserving of a civic reception for such an amazing achievement. Instead, you get a very disinterested BP roadhouse followed by a small town and another 200 Kms to the next main town.

At this point I want to reveal my experiences with tent camping as an alternative to hotels and  motels. The first main advantage is the cost saving. I used powered sites and they ranged in price from $7 per night  to $20. The higher price reflects the much higher hotel prices for that area. It is also a security backup factor as I found in Port Augusta. Modern tents are surprisingly cheap, compact, weatherproof and quick to set up. I purchased a new 4 person tent with an enclosed veranda and room to stand upright in the middle for $125. I could get it set up with bed and cooking within half an hour and allowed the same time in the mornings. Being able to cook your own meals is an advantage, even in small towns.

The main disadvantage of tenting is the weather, so when it was bad I stayed in hotels. The tour was viable only because I saved so much on accommodation. I also had a larger, older Terka tent for stays longer than two days. I abandoned inflatable mattresses early in the tour; they take too long to inflate and can leak. A good stretcher bed and sleeping bag did the trick.

The south western part of Western Australia is a lovely place to tour . The audiences just loved the show which helped to overcome the feeling of being so far away from home. My only difficulty was when the van’s alternator died, so I was driving around between battery charges until getting an expensive emergency repair in Bunbury. Fortunately, I did not have to change any of the booking schedule for the entire tour due to car problems.

 Before heading north and after the first month on tour, I had the wonderful opportunity to stay for three days in Fremantle with Joanne Foley and her parents, Pat and Maurie. It was a great time to catch up with Joanne and Ian Tregonning and to see some of the puppetry work being done there.

As I went further north up the coast, caravan parks were the best places to stay. I met a lot of tourists and interesting contacts; it made the whole experience more like a holiday. Three days at Monkey Mia were magic and inspirational followed by an 80 km stretch to Carnarvon, dodging mob after mob of kangaroos alive and dead at 40 kph. The carnage was unbelievable and I narrowly avoided hitting them. The dream machine did not kill or injure any animal for the whole tour. Avoid night driving in the bush.

Tropical Australia is like another country. It was the dry season but some weird weather patterns popped up every now and then. One morning in Onslow, after the heaviest downpour in 25 years, I found the side floor of my tent bobbing up and down. I got out to see I was on the edge of a huge rain puddle with a neighbouring tent in the middle, flooded.

My partner, Julia, met me in Broome, two months into the tour. Broome is the only place I have performed a black light show outdoors in the daytime. It worked, but we bought a lot of extra black plastic. We travelled across to Kakadu where we did a bush tucker safari and she went back to Melbourne upon arriving in Darwin, where I spent two and a half weeks. Darwin is hot, even in winter and I felt very close to Asia and very far from Melbourne and Sydney.

From Darwin, it was straight down the Stuart Hwy performing in towns on the way. In the north and northwest, I performed to a lot of aboriginal audiences who really embraced the show. They picked up on the visual story telling brilliantly as if it were spoken to them. After the usual shyness at the start of question time one by one the hands would pop up until there was a virtual forest. Question times were quite long.

I met my daughter, Zoey, in Alice Springs and she traveled with me for the three weeks back to Melbourne, via Uluru. On the last leg from Darwin the dependence on the Dream Machine’s mechanical health was developing into a strange psychological phenomenon. I became almost obsessive compulsive about the number five ( remember the five leaf clover at the start?)  It is easy to see how mariners in the middle of the ocean develop superstitions when survival is a stake. This is my fifth year with School Performance Tours, the van needed 5,000 km services, I would take petrol from pump number five by design or accident and spend multiples of five on petrol. It stopped when I got back to Melbourne, without therapy you will be glad to know.

 After 20,000 Kms and nearly four months, we drove from Adelaide to Melbourne in one go, with controlled impatience. Before turning into the driveway, the surreal spectacle of a human body with a lion’s head emerged from the night dancing toward us. Had this epic journey driven me insane? No, it was Julia Davis wearing a very realistic lion head she had made for a roaring welcome home.