The Long Way UpOutback Adventures with a

compact camera

The Dirty Nomad

THE LONG WAY UP

In March 2009, Dave Turner and Tim Garrett set out to ride their mountain bikes unsupported across 2,600km of Australia’s harsh out-back to raise money for World Vision Australia.In the end they decided to leave their 35mm SLRs at home and go not only digital, but compact! , carrying a Ricoh GX200, two lenses and GX8 for back up. DAVE TURNER recalls the epic journey and explains how you can pack a photographic punch without packing the kitchen sink!

BeginningsI was first introduced to the idea of using a compact camera as an alternative to an SLR when I attended a talk by Eamonn McCabe, the former picture editor for the Guardian newspaper in the UK in 1987. I was 14 years old.I listened excitedly as Eamonn told the audience of amateur photographers in London that many of his best shots were not in fact taken with the latest all sing-ing, all dancing SLR, but were instead taken with his trusty compact camera. Compacts have come a long way since their point and shoot beginnings. These days, high-end ‘pro-sumer’ model compacts such as the Ricoh GX200 (the camera we chose for our trip) are feature rich and offer out-standing value for money. Where compacts come in to their own is in the price, size and weight departments. With Aperture priority, Programmed AE, Full Manual Override, Manual Focus, Custom Profile settings, ability to shoot RAW, lens kits, Flash f-stop adjustments (the list goes on), compacts are coming of age. As well as all of the above, compacts are really fun to use!

THE LONG WAY UP

Top:20km from Quorn, South Aus-tralia. Ricoh GX200 f/3.6 1/760s ISO64

Above:Sunrise in the Channel Country. Ricoh GX200 f/4.9 1/25s ISO64

Above right: With the camera on a minipod and set to fire a shot every 5 secs we were able to put ourselves in to frameGX200 f5.1 1/160ths ISO46

GULF2GULF RIDEOur challenge was to cross from one side

of the continent to the other using pedal power to cut across four of Australia’s largest deserts in one of the hottest months of the year.

Not only that, but we wanted to ride unsupported, carrying all our water, food, bike tools, and photography gear without vehicle backup.

Tim and I had a new found appreciation for just how precious water really is in this part of the world and how we take access to clean wa-ter for granted. World Vision Australia’s Water Health Life program aims to address the prob-lem of dirty water and poor sanitation among the worlds poorest communities.

OUR RIDEThe Gulf2Gulf starts at Port Augusta on

the Spencer Gulf, 322 km north-west of Ad-elaide. It would take us deep in to the Flinders Ranges, riding along the high peaks and deep

rugged gorges of Pound Range. We continue north to the gateway town of Marree and ride 211 km to one of Australia’s most remote pubs, the Mungerannie Hotel on the legendary Birdsville Track.

We will pass through the Strezelecki, Tirari, Sturt Stony and Simpson deserts before continuing through Queensland’s Channel Country north to the mining town of Mt Isa and onto the wetlands of Normanton with it’s migrating bird life and crocodiles! Finally, after 22 days and 2,600 km we should reach our destination of Karumba, a small fish-ing town on the Gulf of Carpenteria.

PREPERATIONThe week before any trip is always exciting for me. Equipment checklists are ticked, high-lighted, crossed out and last minute shopping is always hectic.

The Gulf2Gulf would take us to some very remote places. The last thing we needed

“Our challenge was to ride from one side of the continent to the other, cut-ting across four of Australia’s largest deserts in one of the hottest months of the year.

We would start in Port Augusta, South Australia, and finish in Karumba one month later - a journey of 2,600 km”

was to be scrambling around looking for SD cards at the last minute, which is exactly what happened! I found my self running around Sydney Domestic airport on the morning of our departure to Ad-elaide at 4 am trying to find a shop that sells SD cards as I left mine on kitchen table. I found two overpriced cards but really the money was neither here nor there, I had cards, I can take photos!

Like film used to be, the loss of cards are the main concern for me on my bike trips. I weighed up the pros and cons of backing my photos up en route using my iPod or an external hard drive. These additional devices take up more precious space and of course need to be powered – even more stuff to take! With the price of SD Cards get-ting lower all the time, I find it’s best just to pack a few more than backing up and re-using.

In 2007 I rode my bike over the Arkhan-gai Mountains in Mongolia – even in

the middle of the Mongolian Steppes I managed to find electricity to charge my batteries.

RAW vs JPG

I shoot mainly in jpeg format. When I return from a trip I usually have in the region of 1000 shots to pick through. Admittedly, a lot of these are repetitive shots that have been taken on interval mode (more on that later) or just plain rubbish. For the Gulf2Gulf trip, I came home with 600 shots after deletions.I had deadlines for a couple of mountain bike magazines that were due within 10 days of being back home. To process 600 RAW shots is out of the question for me, I am simply too slow with pho-toshop! JPEG seems to work just great for me. However, there are times when I wish I had shot in RAW, like when taking the Southern Cross shot on the legend-ary Birdsville Track.This was such an enjoyable shot to

“When I return from a trip I usually have in the region of 1000 shots to pick through”

Above: We had been cycling for a couple of hours in the Simpson Desert and were very tired. We stopped for a break and I noticed hor red the desert had become. All I could see was a lone log in the distance.

I grabbed the 21mm lens and started shooting.

take. The sun had gone down and Tim was happy burning our pasta with a flame the height of a small child. I was bored watching our pasta so I grabbed the camera, a 21 mm lens and trundled off to get a nice picture of the tent, the bikes and the amazingly clear Southern Cross over head.

I put the camera in to full manual mode and opened the aperture to F2.5, the widest I could. I set the focus to manual and pushed it to infinity. Then I got on the floor and composed the shot.

I played around with a 30 second exposure and worked my way up to 60 seconds where I felt I could do something with the shot. In order for me to get in the shot as well, I had to run as fast as I could back to the tent and sit down trying to look all relaxed as if I had been there for ages just enjoy-ing the gentle hum of the gas burner in the beautiful Australian outback.

I look relaxed sitting down, I actually slipped and fell down and had to then stay still for 60 sec-onds on a sharp rock digging into my side! The pain we go through to get a nice shot!

This is the one shot I wish I had taken in RAW. It could really have benefited from the flexibility that RAW would have given me when I got home to pol-ish the shot further.

INTERVAL SETTING

When travelling, I find the interval setting on my camera to be without doubt my most used function. Rather than rely on a default 5 or 10 second self timer where I’d have to guess where I will be in the

frame when the shutter goes off, I can use this handy feature to take a photo say every 5 seconds.That way I can compose the shot the way I want, get on my bike and ride in to the frame. I then return to the camera and delete the unwanted shots keeping the one or two that look good.We used this method a lot on the Gulf2Gulf. We wanted shots of us riding together. Every picture you see with a bike in it has been taking using the Interval mode.

“I set the camera up on the tripod, compose the shot, press the shutter and ride into frame. I then return to the camera and delete the un-wanted shots”

TRIPODS

A tripod is something of a double-edged sword when traveling on my bike. I have traveled with full-length tripods before and this trip was no different. However, the most used tripod I have is a mini-pod. These 3 inch high life savers fit in my pocket and can be used for just about every shot. The mini-pod is the most valuable piece of kit I have, I am truly lost without it. I have a tendency to break full size tripods for some reason.

Every trip I have done has resulted in a broken tripod and on the Gulf2Gulf the head snapped off. I

tend to run out of space in bags so I attach the tripods to the outside of my bags where stones, dust and sand play havoc with the joints.

Compacts these days are becoming very expandable. I chose two great lenses to take with me on the Gulf2Gulf, a 21 mm wide angle and a 135 mm telephoto. Between the two of them, these lenses were more than adequate for any sce-nario I would run into; whether it be get-ting close up and personal to the termite mounds in North Queensland or staying as far away as possible from an Eastern Taipan - I had it covered!

The 21 mm was particularly useful for landscapes. One thing I didn’t regret at all was buying a Pelican case to keep

the equipment safe from dust and water. Far North Queensland had suffered the worst floods in 60 years and we were heading straight for the storms so it really is a good idea to keep the gear together and safe.

For the long distance shots where I wanted to create a sense of remoteness and try to get across the feeling heat of the desert, I used the 135 mm lens. It gives a depth of field where I can really focus on the rider and throw the haze of the desert in to the background.

For me, this is where compacts have come of age. To be able to get this kind of creativity in a compact camera is truly amazing.

BATTERY LIFE

In the evenings the desert temperature can plummet, playing havoc with my camera’s battery life. To get around this problem I discovered the best idea is to either sleep with my camera in my sleeping bag or even better, stuff the batteries under my arm pits to keep them warm! I have been known to do this while riding in the Himalayas!

CAMERA BAGS

The north of Queensland had experienced the worst floods in 60 years in 2008/2009 and we were heading straight for the flooded north west of rural Queensland. Crocodiles were drifting further south and floating where they shouldn’t be floating so I needed a box to keep my gear in which would be both water proof and croc proof. I settled for the Pelican 1150 with built in Pres-sure Purge as it absolutely bullet proof and fits neatly in to my front pannier bag.

THE END IS IN SIGHT

On the 15th April, after 22 days and 2,600 km we left the town Normanton for our final days cycling to Karumba on the Gulf. Two Wedge Tail Eagles flying over head were guiding us to the coast personally. 70 km later, presented in front of us was a sign...Welcome to Karumba.

The camera was as much a part of the trip as the bike, the trailers, water and food. It is an essential piece of kit.

The days where compact cameras are being referred to as only good for point & shoot photographers are fast disappearing. Don’t get me wrong, that market will always be there and so it should be. After all, photography should be fun and compacts are REALLY great fun. But we now have fantastic, feature rich compacts that can swap lenses, focus manually for low light conditions, shoot RAW and are within everyone’s budget. They really do make the ideal travel companion.

As we pulled up outside the Karumba pub at 09:30am, the bar staff outside were curious of our bikes and asked what we were doing there - we told them with big smiles on our faces that we had just cycled from Gulf2Gulf.