No Angry Shots ...
END Ex
It’s been a few days in, we’ve seen the enemy once or twice and I have started craving pizza.
Every stop. Every hour. I am counting the minutes until we get to Alice Springs – for Pizza.
The Outback
Apart from patrolling in near 40 deg heat, being contacted by the enemy at ridiculous distances and my craving for pizza, the EX was memorable.
The countryside was spectacular, the wildlife different. At one point in a platoon position in the middle of nowhere a herd of brumbies decided to run through the platoon. It was picturesque but brutal. The temperature drop was huge, down to about 15 or 18 deg, which was freezing after sweltering all day. The spinifex was painful, through greens, splintering your shins as you patrolled. There was no way to not get spiked, and our shins were already pock marked. If you walked in the dead centre of a shrub, you might not get spiked, but kilometre after kilometre we got jabbed.
Sketty could now talk most breaks, and Chuck was getting sick of me talking about pizza. It was incessant and relentless - a bit like water boarding but more extreme and long lasting.
Every waking thought was Pizza, for nine days.
After the first week, the company started to patrol close to a main dirt road. We were getting ready for the finale - the Battalion attack. 700 highly trained infantrymen assaulting a position to secure ground and kill or capture the enemy.
Mick
We are to move the next day, so we finally get a few hours rest. It’s short lived though. Mick Lourie, one of diggers born in PNG, lights his Hexi stove – and there is a slight gust, a hint of wind - and next minute 9PL have all their gear packed and running to join us.
Mick accidentally started a fire. He'd done the right thing, cleared a metre around his stove, but a gust hit, and a spinifex exploded alight.
Nine platoon, in all round protection on the other side of the road, gathered their gear and sprinted to our side of the road as the fire caught pace. Needless to say, we spent the next 2 days firefighting and clearing trails and unfortunately missed the battalion attack. The reason we were in the Alice.
Mick was our hero.
I'd gone through Singo with Mick, whenever someone yelled snake, we all ran - and Mick ran towards the snake with a machete. He'd often be found cooking snake whilst we choked on Luncheon Meat type 1 or Corned Beef.
End EX
After the EX, we have a night off in town, we have brought our Poly uniforms in our Ech (Echelon) Bags, and after a memorable EX are being rewarded with a night in Alice Springs.
I am not reliant on Chuck to return my polys, they are secure in my Ech Bag. Bonus. First order of the day - I drag Chuck and Baz to a pizza joint. Walk a couple kilometres to the nearest Café. Look at the Board ... my favourite, Aussie - Ham and Pineapple.
Change my mind. Nah, I don't really want one. Let’s go get a drink.
Baz, Chuck and I headed in to find alcohol. We succeeded and found a quiet pub with 50 other diggers in Polyesters (our parade uniform). We enjoyed the town, food - not pizzas, and more Rums than we should've had. And spent the night at the Sports Ground, all making 0100 curfew.
A few seedy heads the next day and Baz is being treated to a drive back to Townsville with the RSM. Baz looks pretty bad. The RSM, Webber - infamous for his Guard Room Inspections, took one look at Baz and said - get in the back, and don't say a word until you've slept off that hangover. We saw Baz again a week later. I'm not sure he and the RSM exchange Xmas cards.