ExplorOz Podcast: Australian Overland Adventures and Mapping
Welcome to the ExplorOz Podcast: Australian Overland Adventures and Mapping. Michelle and David, the founders of ExplorOz and the developers of Australia's best offline mapset available in the ExplorOz Traveller app will take you on adventures and beyond. Tune in to hear how offline maps are made, and go on a virtual journey with the mapping survey team to hear how they find exciting new places and how they balance work, and holidays. You'll get expert advice, and insider tips on what's involved in long term travel including all the tech stuff, and featured locations that are being added and verified in the app content. You'll hear about the ExplorOz Team's adventures 4WDing, camping, hiking, and more across Australia, from Aussie national parks to the beaches West to East, the rainforests, gorges and islands. Fuel your passion for overlanding whether you're a camper, caravanner or motorhomer, and ignite plans for your next trip or tune in whilst you're on the road. Subscribe and never miss a new episode.
ExplorOz Podcast: Australian Overland Adventures and Mapping
The Basics of Responsible Travel
Let's reduce our impact on nature during our adventures. Today we're talking about our concern and desire for responsible travel. As fellow explorers with a keen respect for Mother Nature, we share our passion for travelling with care, and our experience with disheartening damage we've often found at pristine campsites and in the middle of hikes.
This episode delves into understanding the impacts of our casual actions on the environment. From misuse of campfires to glaring examples of littering, and even lack of basic sanitation care in camping areas and amongst nature, we discuss it all. We're stressing the importance of responsible disposal of waste, especially in remote areas. Kick back and tune in for a discussion on responsible travel and learn some new practical tips on how you can contribute positively to preserving our beautiful natural environments. Remember, leave no trace.
Alright, so welcome everybody onto the next edition of our podcast series. And for those of you that can see where we are, we're in like a little creek bed up near Lesnerty Falls in Western Australia. It's a lovely little place. For those of you that are listening, I'm sure you can possibly hear the babbling water, which is actually really quite loud. Luckily, we've got these fancy microphones so that we don't have to speak too loud and you should be able to hear us. So hopefully everything's going according to plan. So, in such a wonderful location as this, with the nice running water and the trees and everything, it's a perfect location for us to have a bit of a chat about the environment and protecting the environment and managing our impacts as we travel as tourists and trekkers and hikers and cyclists and things as we move around the country. We want to make sure that our experience isn't detrimental to the ongoing environment and that we're basically looking after ourselves as much as we're looking after the planet. It would be a shame for us to get ourselves into all these great spots and then be the last person to go because it was trashed out with fires or rubbish and the other bits and pieces.
Speaker 1:Now, in all of our years, michelle and I have been to some really fantastic places around the country and there's been so many of them and I recall a few out the back of New South Wales, going into Poonkari, and we were camping on the Darling River. I think is that in that area, yeah, and we did this backtrack out of Poonkari and we were just heading along the Darling River Run and we found a I don't know whether it was a paddock or something. It had been a campsite before and it was beautiful, a maculet spot, lovely river. The river had some water in it. This is about 20 odd years ago and we got to the campsite and literally there must have been four or 500 glass bottles and cans, all beer cans, all glass bottles. Honestly, it looked like it was probably, more than likely, a locals hangout space and they all just come and dump. But the issue with that is, you know, a pristine, wonderful location completely littered out with cans and bottles, and I remember that Michelle and I were a bit disgruntled about that and we actually spent a couple of hours collecting all that rubbish. Not that we could carry it, but at least we could put it into one spot out of the way so that we could enjoy our time in the location.
Speaker 1:And you know, every other time we go away even last weekend when we were at Stockton Lake or the other weekend when we were at Stockton Lake you go out the back of a little bush track, behind a campsite and there's toilet paper and shit, to be honest, with you scattered around in the bush. You know, people can't dig a hole and the worst part about the stuff at Stockton and things is that there's two sets of toilets within 100 metres of where this is and we don't get it. We don't understand how that happens. So you know it's really important. There's lots of aspects that we need to take into consideration fires, toilets, you know, parking, carrying things around, what you drive on, what you ride on, what you cycle on. So we'll go through a few of those bits and pieces. Where are we going to start? We've just had a bit of a story about rubbish. Do we want to start with rubbish?
Speaker 2:Yeah, let's talk about rubbish, because your story is true. I remember that one. But what I also remember is being in places that are very remote, like the Canning Stockeroot, which is far more remote than a place like that. That's just on the main thoroughfare. Really, you would not expect to come to a place in the Canning Stockeroot and come to a bush camp and find the same sort of thing left from the camper who's only left the morning before you and it's pretty obvious.
Speaker 2:You know, there's raw egg shells left exposed in the campfire. A lot of people think that by burning out their residue from the bottom of a baked tin baked bean tin, for example is a good way of cleaning the tin. Yeah, but take the tin with you. The tin doesn't break down. These steel pans or aluminium pans, whatever they're made of, they take many, many years to break down.
Speaker 1:Aluminium. Aluminium, however, will burn in a hot fire.
Speaker 2:so Well, why do we come across them?
Speaker 1:Well, you shouldn't do it anyway, because it is kind of environmental.
Speaker 2:but and other people you know might attempt to burn out these pans in their fire.
Speaker 1:It's got to be hot enough.
Speaker 2:They don't. That's right. They don't get it hot enough and wait for it to completely turn to ash. What they actually do is they cover up the fire in the morning, make it look like there's nothing there, but literally two hours later the next camper comes along, tries to reuse the same fire pit, and as soon as they start digging below the top surface layer, you just find rubbish and you can't really use it without a major plan up. There should not be any burrowing of rubbish in the same area that another person is about to use.
Speaker 1:But not only.
Speaker 2:If you can't actually take that rubbish with you, there's something wrong. You shouldn't be in a remote area.
Speaker 1:Not only burrowing it or burning it or whatever, it's just leaving it. It's unfathomable to come out into pristine environments and think about leaving rubbish. And you know we don't want to preach and we don't want to carry on about that, but it's disheartening. It happens. Everyone we speak to says it's not me, it's never anybody, but somehow or another it seems to be there all the time.
Speaker 2:Look it could well come from home. So there's a huge role that every one of us plays in making sure that we do educate the kids. So if you've got a young family and you're travelling, talk about this stuff openly. Make them involved in being a part of the solution. So if you do come across rubbish, get the kids involved in actually picking up some rubbish and letting them actually feel what it's like and talk about it.
Speaker 2:You need to carry rubbish bags with you, and it's not just plastic rubbish bags. What you're going to put that plastic rubbish bag into, for the liquid remains that inevitably come out of containers, so you've got to have like another canvas bag or a vinyl bag to put it in. And then, of course, you may not want that inside the body of your vehicle while you're travelling for a week or so, because it smells. And there are many times where you're going to be travelling where there's long distances between one bin and the next. So having something on the back of your vehicle, maybe over it, if you've got a spare wheel, like a spare wheel rubbish bag, there's plenty of ones that you available that you can go and pick up from the shop. That's one great tip.
Speaker 1:The simple rule is if you can carry it in, you can carry it out. It shouldn't be that difficult. And then that mindset should follow, not from just your vehicle, your four wheel drive that should carry down to your mountain biking, to your walking, to your helicopter. Your piloting and any particular way that you're travelling around and exploring is. You know, make a very conscious decision that whatever you take in, you should be able to take out. So you know, for various different trips and for different timelines, that can mean a whole rubbish plan or that can just mean a recycled plastic bag from the shops.
Speaker 1:It's all very determinant about how long you're going to be. If you're going to be several weeks, you know. If you're going to be doing a major journey for several weeks and you've got to, you know, basically, take a lot of supplies in. You've got to be able to work out how you're going to get all those supplies out. So it does also come down to your packing requirements. You know, do you take crushable aluminium cans or do you take plastic bottles or do you take glass bottles? They all have. They all have glasses and minuses out in the bush and you need to work out, you know how you're going to manage that. Your milk containers, your meat packaging, whatever bits and pieces you're going to take, you need to work out how you're going to carry it. Either burn it, carry it, burn it or carry it really, or dispose of it in a correct location. You know they're the only choices that you really have.
Speaker 2:One of the things that we've picked up along the way is that if you're a long-term traveller, where you're travelling for multiple weeks at a time, which means you're going to a resupply point, so you're going to the shopping centre and you're doing another big shop a few hundred dollars worth, you've used all your supplies, you're going in empty. When you get to the car and you're actually there at the time of putting all that shopping back into the car, this is the time to assess the double packaging. I mean, we all know that there's overpackaging just for marketing. So right there at the shopping centre you can actually peel back a little bit of cardboard.
Speaker 1:Oh, you can strip off a third of this packaging by just getting rid of the boxes.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean even cereal boxes, for example.
Speaker 1:Put it in a Tupperware container or a plastic container or something like that.
Speaker 2:Just start thinking about those things before you even leave home on the trip. Think about okay, am I going to need to refill? How am I going to go about that? So yeah, sometimes carrying a Tupperware container that you begin with, that you've got your flour in, that you're going to reuse, so that when you buy the next bag of flour you're tipping it in and you actually throw out that bag, that wrapper of flour before it even comes with you and you're going to use the commercial rubbish areas. So just a little bit of thinking along those lines makes a huge difference to how much actual excess packaging you've got with you when you're already in a difficult situation.
Speaker 1:Now, of course, mind you your cardboards and your papers.
Speaker 1:You can use them to start your fires if you're in a position where you can start fires If you're over in it. If it's summer you might be in fire restrictions, so fires might be completely out of the equation. So then you've got to carry this stuff. None of us want some manky, dirty, disgusting plastic bags and all this horrible stuff sticking around in your car. It stinks, it brings the bingos and the flies, so you have to manage that. You can't leave it, you have to manage it. So rubbish bags on your car or a rubbish plan.
Speaker 1:If you're going for a long trip, you need rubbish plans. If you're just going to go between caravan parks in towns or predefined camping areas where rubbish facilities are provided, that's great and make sure you do it. But make sure you don't just go to the toilet and leave your toilet paper because you couldn't be stuck walking 100 metres to the toilet. Those sorts of things. It's a blight and in the environment it's graceful, and no one else wants to walk up to somebody else's feces and have to deal with that. It's just not good.
Speaker 2:There's more than that, too. We're here to talk about the environment.
Speaker 1:That's kind of rubbish and that's kind of toileting and we're kind of cross because a lot of these aspects of your trip do cross.
Speaker 2:Can I say it?
Speaker 2:Yes, when I was talking about rubbish and the environment, one of the things that I think I've observed is that when a lot of people are travelling, they're not quite aware of what happens when the season changes.
Speaker 2:Quite often we're only travelling through an area when it's not the wet season, and if you're up in the tropics, your water line is a totally different level when you're driving through on the dry season for what it is in the wet season, and this has a huge impact on what actually happens with the movement of the rubbish through the waterways I mean they talk about.
Speaker 2:If you're going to dig a hole with rubbish, do it more than 50 meters back from a waterway, and that's for a very good reason, and hopefully you're not burying rubbish in an area that's prone to flooding to begin with, but it's as simple as even just going to the toilet. But, getting back to the rubbish issue, it's the fact that when a flood comes through, the volume of water that can rush down and it will follow the waterway, of course, but it won't just trickle like it is here. I mean, this is November. This area floods in summertime and you can see the high watermark is up a lot higher, and that's what happens in the tropics as well. So just think about and be mindful, when you're traveling in the dry season, how very different the area is going to be, and consider your impact in every way in that regard.
Speaker 1:Rubbish is a big problem, but really see, and it's up to all of us to manage it, and it's up to all of us to be responsible and not just turn around and say are those international travelers or whatever, or the locals.
Speaker 1:I mean, there's a lot of blammy and there's a lot of that stuff that happens, but we're all ultimately responsible for what goes out there in the environment and the microplastics and all those things. As they go down the riverways and out into the water they're killing the local fish. They're having impacts on the sustainability of our rivers. Enough toilet waste gets washed down the Darling River or something, as it killed the fish, I don't know. There's fish kills. There's all sorts of stuff that goes on in the environment and realistically we want to make sure that we're not part of that problem. So, rubbish, rubbish, big problems. Make sure you manage it, do it right, do it right for everybody and we'll all have a much better time. And I suppose while we've been talking about the rubbish, we've been talking about toilet rubbish, and toileting in the bush is a topic unto its own. It's contentious. There's lots of debates about how it shouldn't be done.
Speaker 1:At the end of the day, we all have to go to the toilet. We know that we can do a number one fairly easily pretty much anywhere. But if you're in a campsite, don't wake up at two o'clock every morning through that constitutional and go and pee in the same spot. It will stink. It does get bad, especially if you're in an area that's not going to have any rainfall for a number of months. You know there's nothing worse than pulling up to a campsite and going in and going oh, this is a toilet. You know you don't want to camp here a toilet.
Speaker 2:Yeah, look actually on that point. If you're in WA and you're camped on the sand at a beautiful beach spot, I think a lot of people don't realise we don't have any rain to wash it away for six months. It only rains in winter. We don't get summer rain at all, which is very different to overseas. So that is a really important point about not just peeing on the same spot. If you're just doing a quick one by the side of your tents, your swag, your caravan, your camper trailer and the idea is, if you're staying for multiple days, just walk around a little bit, go a little bit further each time, rather than using the same one, because it's just a concentration issue.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. And then obviously the one that's worse, the number two. We all have to do it. You don't want to do that near your camp. You don't want to do it too close to where everybody is One who wants to drop their strides and do a number two with everyone watching you. So you're going to obviously walk away and do something. If there's facilities within 100 metres walking, or a couple of 100 metres walking, then you should. It's a no-brainer Walk to the facilities that are provided.
Speaker 2:Do you remember at Karajini, where it not stores? And you know that height? We come all the way down all on the lovely rocky area like this, and then there's the pool and the kids are dropping like jumping from the height in and there's only sort of one way to stramble out. And do you remember our kids slipped on a piece of food. Literally there was fresh someone. I don't know why. Why would you do that I?
Speaker 1:don't know. I don't know it happened, so you know, be responsible, digging so our way, or whether the way that we know, the way that we travel, the way that we go to the toilet obviously other than the chemical toilets that we have to carry these days for a lot of places and then emptying one of those is another whole issue and we'll just touch on that as well.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah.
Speaker 1:You know if you're doing a solo, a solo number two on the drive or on the walk or whatever. Realistically, even in adventure racing days I used to carry a spade because you should always dig a hole to do your number two in. That's a given, and it should be deep enough to cover it so that the next animal that walks along doesn't dig it up. You should also burn your toilet paper as it goes in the hole, provided it's contention about fire restriction areas and fire and total firebands and all of that sort of stuff. I like to dig a hole, I like to make it deep enough, I like to do my thing in there, I like to wipe up, put it in the hole and set it on fire and then cover the hole.
Speaker 2:Okay, so about that?
Speaker 1:you've got to find an area or clear the area so that, so that you're not going to set fire to the surrounding area. Yeah, before you dig the hole, because the paper will go woof when it goes as well.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and the thing is you need to stand and monitor and wait for that toilet paper to completely burn away to ash, and it can take a lot of time. And you need to think about Okay, we're getting graphic here you need to think about how you actually use that toilet paper and where in the hole after your business it drops, because if you can keep it as dry as possible, then it's actually going to ignite. Obviously, the wet toilet paper won't burn as well, but you can burn it, and so you need to have a think about that and you've got to look at it and you've got to monitor it and wait till it's actually all turned to ash. The deeper you get the hole, the ash, with a bit of wind, won't blow up in your face or blow away and catch fire on nearby grasses, so that's why you want to have it cleared and dig it as deep as you can. Now, girls, this part is about what you do when you go for a bush wee.
Speaker 2:Now, some of us don't like to drip dry and instead take a small piece of toilet paper with us.
Speaker 2:Now, I have noticed, and so have many others, that occasionally it's these small little squares of paper that are just left where your business has been done and, unfortunately, those small little squares of paper are adding to the problem.
Speaker 2:Now, if that's something that you feel you need to do and it's sort of spur of the moment, the problem is you've got to take that square of paper back with you and you can put a little paper bag or maybe a plastic ziploc bag in your pocket and this is a handy tip just to always have on your body in your cargo, shorts pockets or the back pocket of your jeans or the pocket of your jacket, and just make it a daily thing that you have with you this little ziploc bag and throughout the day you can just pop in your used bit of waste in there. It's just a small square of paper or two. Then take that back to the nearest bin or save it all up for the day and pop it in the campfire at night after the cooking is done, when everything is away, at a quiet moment on your own. This is really really important. Every tiny piece of rubbish matters, so I hope you find these tips useful.
Speaker 1:So that's the sort of rules for a solo. You know. If you've got a group of people, it changed a little bit because you're probably gonna dig a group toilet and I've seen this done at a lot of campsites with lots of different groups. I've been on some trips where people bring in post-hole diggers to dig communal toilets.
Speaker 1:The big, you know the big but a thing where it spins around with a big auger bit on it and they drill a hole and then you put a seat on top of it and then they use that for a week. They're not necessarily gonna burn the paper in there because it's gonna go down, but the difference there is that the holes are gonna be significantly deep enough for that toilet paper to decompose before it either washes out from the rains coming through or from the dingos or the wildlife coming along and digging it up. And they do do this, and that obviously then, you know, brings that toilet paper to the surface. So if it's not burnt properly it'll run away. It can roll around on the ground and be blown around into the trees and that's unsightly and ungamely.
Speaker 1:The next one is you know we go out there with these chemical toilets. So we're all doing the right thing in our setups. We've got these chemical toilets. Some have harsher chemicals than others. I would suggest that you use an environmentally friendly toilet chemical if you possibly can. You would never empty it here in this lovely waterway. That would be stupid. You wouldn't we here, you wouldn't do a number two here. You just shouldn't do that. You should be 50 meters away, at least from the edges, even just to take a pee as you're walking down the bush here.
Speaker 1:If you're disposing of a chemical toilet in a campsite environment where there are no dump points Now, there's a lot of dump points these days You're going to go past them but invariably, like if you're doing a bush camp and you've been in one spot for a week or two and your toilet's full, you're going to have to empty it. Obviously don't do it right near your camp. But then the next trick is to go far and up away. Now the toilet chemicals should have done enough breakdown of the masses, the solids and to that extent most of the toilet paper gets consumed by those chemical systems as well, and it just comes out like a slurry.
Speaker 1:So there is no solid paper or things to blow around. How many times, how many times have I dug a hole and empty the toilet paper and had the thing slosh back up and you get covered in this wonderful cocktail of contaminant. It's not a great thing to have happen to you. So the deeper the hole, the less chance to blow back. So make your hole big enough, depending on, obviously, the size of your toilet. If you've got a 10 or 15, 20 liter, 10 liter waste pant.
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, and whether you let them wean it or not, yes, if there's wean it.
Speaker 1:It'll be a bit wetter, which makes it a bit easier to empty. If no one weas in it, it's only got number two and it'll be a little bit heavier. Look, I'd probably be better off doing a video to explain how we make a little channel that runs into the deeper hole, and it's quite a complicated thing. But just make sure yeah, not, maybe not, but just make sure that you're responsible about where you empty up those camtoilets, even with the environmental chemicals. Don't put it in the water, don't put it on the beach, don't put it, don't put it near people.
Speaker 1:Make sure you've gone out, cleared a decent area, dig a decent hole and make sure that when it goes in you can put enough layer, at least a foot, 30 centimeters Sorry, I'm doing that wrong conversion at least 30 centimeters of dirt on top of the top of the water. Obviously, when you dig a hole and you pour in 10 liters of solids, it's gonna add a bit, so you're gonna have a bit of soil left over. Try putting it in and stamping it down and making sure it goes flat as a tap. So, along with that kind of procedure with the toiletry, you know, that kind of leads itself straight into campfires, because campfires, we either build a campfire or dig a hole. Have we done toilets or are we done with a toilet? Do you think?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I guess so.
Speaker 1:Oh, the other thing, the other thing, obviously, when you go to the long drop or the provided toilets, pit toilets and long drops.
Speaker 2:You don't empty your toilet, don't empty your chem toilet in a pit toilet?
Speaker 1:Absolutely never. They have these signs in most of them and realistically I'm flabbergasted because people just must not understand English with these signs. The signage in most of these toilets that you go to is usually pretty good. Certainly in a lot of the national parks and things they've tried to put in all decent signage to tell you how to do it, but invariably it was under.
Speaker 1:The other day at Stockton again, you know, you go over to the long drop toilet. It was an immaculate facility that had just been pumped out. They were as clean, they had water buckets, they had toilet paper. It had everything you could possibly ask. And you walk in there and what is it? The dunny seats up. Now, for those of us that were brought up in a family with mixed male, female children, when we all thought to put the toilet seat down just as a matter of courtesy, out in the bush and in these bush toilets, it's not just courtesy, it's a requirement to keep the flies and the bugs out of the septic system. So make sure you put a lid on it. If it's clogged and full, don't use it, walk away, go 50 or more metres away and dig another one, or use your chem toilet or something else.
Speaker 1:Don't just put another layer of crap on the crap. I mean complain about it overflowing you can't pass the responsibility on If you are the one coming to the issue.
Speaker 2:The responsibility lies with you, Correct?
Speaker 2:And that's the key. I know and I've read reviews that people tend to expect that, oh, this is a public facility, they should know and they should be. You know the magic. They should be on top of it. A lot of these spaces are quite remote and, yeah, the facility is there, but it is up to you as a user. The buck stops with you and, look, I really want people listening today to just take away a little bit of self-responsibility from this discussion. That's all it's about. Let the buck stop with you. If it doesn't look right when you arrive, then you leave it as you found it or improve it and leave it better than you found it, please.
Speaker 1:And so that is exactly the same story with your campfire. Now, you know we all love to go out in the bush and have a campfire. It's one of the. For me, it's one of the bigger parts of camping. I love a campfire. I almost feel like I'm not camping unless I've got a campfire. Campfire is very important, but one of the things that you can be sure, one of the things that you can be sure that's going to spoil our campfire experience in their future generations, is what we see all the time when you go to these campsites where it's not a designated ring, or even sometimes where there is a designated ring, and all these smart people have to build their fire next to the designated ring or closer to the car. It's not in the right spot from the kitchen, or my tent is too, you know.
Speaker 2:Whatever the excuse. We don't know what goes through people's minds, but one thing's for sure every single campsite you come to, it's going to be dotted with more than one campfire pit. That's been manmade and it causes a big problem. Obviously, you know that the coals make the ground dirty, so if it's been lovely white sand, it won't stay white as soon as those black coals go on it. It's just going to be all black, and it makes it lovely white sand, meaning that your feet are going to get all dirty when you try and walk on it and over time that'll spread into a ring, you know, and you never then want to put your campfire on it.
Speaker 2:It's just ash stuff everywhere. It's terrible, it's terrible.
Speaker 1:So we've been to some campsites. What was that? What was that rock? You went to Garden of Rock, whatever it is. It was up near Cal Berry. I could relay a thousand million stories, but you're a little bit of campsite. It was Garden Rock. I'm sure it was called Garden Rock. We were mountain biking there. That's where we got all the flats on our last trip, oh yeah. Okay Garden Rock Garden.
Speaker 2:Rock Yep.
Speaker 1:And you drive it. I remember something I remember something I remember, a place, garden Rock. That's history.
Speaker 1:The back of Q the back of Q and we drive around and there's some really lovely little pool in Bays, right at the bottom of the rocks, and the site that we picked because there was a few people in some of the other sites the site we picked, we pulled up and we get out and you walk around and I kid you not, there must have been 20 recent and I don't mean like though last season 20 recent pits and in all different states of construction. Some had stones around the area, some were a hole, some had been attempted to be covered up.
Speaker 2:Some were just on the ground. Yeah, but you can tell this is for a space for one vehicle maybe two, maybe two vehicles could fit in this space, but there was 20 different campsites, so this is the thing that we're talking about here.
Speaker 1:So for the first maybe hour and a half to two hours of that campsite, I was removing campfires and consolidating the campfire situation, because the other thing is as a car driving into a campsite.
Speaker 2:You really want to avoid more vehicles, wheels, driving into a campfire.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because it could still be hot, Because it's dangerous it could be hot.
Speaker 2:It's going to damage your vehicle.
Speaker 1:You don't know what's in there.
Speaker 2:You don't know what's under it. Glass bottles, tin cans I mean who wants that sort of damage? When they come to a small campsite, it should be an obvious location for the campfire and that should be the obvious one that the next person comes to you.
Speaker 1:Don't get me wrong. I'm not amenable to having two or three right, so that you've got one over there for the person that sets up in that spot, one over there for the person that sets up in that spot, that's fine. But do we have to have 20 in between there and there? I don't think so. You heard me also mention that on that trip I spent an hour and a half clearing up these fires. So if it offends you, like it offends me, and you want to fix it up, what do you do? Dig out the fire hole, dig out the coals, dig it out, put it in a bucket, take it away, spread it around the trees, spread it around as far and up away as you possibly can, and then basically put fresh dirt, soil or whatever you can find in the nearest area back into those holes and clear it up as best you can. Make your one, make the fire in one of the pits that you want to use and then look after that fire pit.
Speaker 1:If you're in a pristine area and you've never and there hasn't been a fire pit, or you're in it, you know you're doing a roadside, somewhere where no one's camp before. Possibly One of the things you want to strive for is zero impact. You want to not see your camp by a location when you pull out the next morning. So dig a deep enough hole, have your big fire, let it burn down and in the morning, fill it in 100%, completely properly, when it's cold, not when it's hot. If it's hot, you've got to deal with that and, realistically, you should never leave a hot fire that's not in a contained fire pit when you drive away. You shouldn't leave a hot fire anyway. You should never, ever, leave a hot fire that's not in a properly constructed fire location. So make sure you put it out. So then you might need water, or you might. You know you might need water to help put it down, or you might need time to put it out.
Speaker 2:Put it nicely, pat it all down, stand on it a few times, make sure it's flat and clean it's up to all of us, but make sure that you're not burying with dirt over the top of a burning log. Oh yeah, no, because the next person to come along could be a child.
Speaker 1:That just goes and grabs the log.
Speaker 2:So make sure it's out so.
Speaker 1:Okay, Okay, Rubbish toilets fires.
Speaker 2:Yep, do you know what is my pet's hate Toothpaste.
Speaker 1:Oh, my God.
Speaker 2:It's spat on the ground, smearing this evidence of something that's come out of someone's mouth. When I come to a campsite and I see a bit of toothpaste and spat down a tree or near the log or a bit of dirt right where I want to set up my cat, I mean that just is revolting. So one of the things you surely are doing when you're cleaning your teeth is you've got a cup of water, maybe because you're rinsing your mouth afterwards.
Speaker 2:I always make sure I have a bit of water and pour it out over the top of where I've spat, or you know. Again, just use the heel of your boot, scrape it away.
Speaker 1:Smear your spit.
Speaker 2:yeah, yeah and make just a small divot to spit and then push. It doesn't take much, it doesn't take much.
Speaker 1:It doesn't take much to minimize what you have it doesn't take much and it's all so many small things. And if we all did it you know, it'd be a lot better. And you know you can look at these 20 fires and then the management people who have to manage these areas they come in and they look at this and they go. Oh you know what, let's just ban fires because it's just too quick and hard.
Speaker 2:We've got to keep the fires if we can. So this is a whole idea, these tips to try and encourage us to all, collectively, do the right thing to keep all these places still open. Yeah, not only is toothpaste my favorite, my least favorite evidence of the camper before, but when I go over to a tree and I see tipped out lentils or bits of spaghetti bolognese left as rubbish from scraping off someone's dinner that they've just tossed against the tree, now, maybe that person didn't have a campfire to put their dinner plate waste into. What do you think they should have done?
Speaker 1:You can put it in a bag or bury it out with you.
Speaker 2:So just a little rubbish bag. It's exactly the same, like you would at home. So in your home I'm sure you have a rubbish bin and you have a plastic bag. It's the same thing with your scraps. Don't put the scraps in the bush, because you know what native animals don't want your dinner scraps. That's not what native animals eat, no, and that can obviously have impacts on the native animals as well.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know, and of course, if there's lots of food left around at campsites or rubbish left around at campsites, it's going to bring in the birds and the dingoes and all of that native wildlife into that camp and some of those might be a problem and some of them may not be. But we want to be zero impact as much as we can. You know rubbish and we've talked about those bits, but there's things like throwing your fruit out the window as you're driving along.
Speaker 2:Mandarin.
Speaker 1:Your Mandarin screens or your bananas or your apple cores and that sort of stuff. What's the problem with doing that? Not so much the litter, it's actually the animals that's going to get bought up onto the main roads that are going to get hit when they come up to eat your apple core.
Speaker 1:And while they're there, they just happen to walk out on the road and get flattened. You know, that sort of stuff happens all the time. So keeping your litter away from the roadsides is also really, really important. And so just make sure, just make sure, if you're carrying it, that you keep carrying it until you dispose of it properly. It's as simple as that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So that really does go back to having a very large receptacle to put so OK, so one of these rear carrier rubbish bags is a great idea. But if you don't have a rear wheel carrier, you've got maybe got a roof rack or you've got a bay in your camper, trailer or somewhere that you can store something that's waterproof, like a canvas bag or a vinyl bag, and inside that bag you put your other plastic bags that are all knotted up. So ideally be able to carry three, four, five bags rubbish bags worth in this big waterproof bag.
Speaker 1:And there's no excuse. These days, you know we can go to lots of shops and get really, really cheap, decent, quality canvas bags to put your stuff in. So have a few extra bags for your laundry and your rubbish. It's so important.
Speaker 2:So that's all part of the trip planning, and if you've forgotten something along the way like that, then yeah, on the way, make sure that's what you buy at the supermarket for more rubbish bags.
Speaker 1:And like doing your laundry and buckets and that sort of stuff around your campsites. Don't come, certainly come and grab some water here and take it up to your camp and do your washing, but tip the water out away when you put the soaps and stuff in it, tip it away. Don't come back down here and tip it in here and then grab another bucket and go back up. That's not the right way. Just be responsible, be careful and be conscious of what you're doing.
Speaker 2:Look, I think it's not just people that are planning to go to remote areas for a few weeks on in. It is also people that are caravanning from park to park. But there's an inevitable overnight stay that you might have at a rest area along the way, and while some rest areas have some facilities and bins, these days you've just got a plan for the unexpected that that bin is overflowing, that bin is broken, or you've come to one where there is no bin and it's just being prepared ahead of time for the unexpected.
Speaker 1:And that's what we're getting at. Nothing is more annoying than being out in the bush for a long time and knowing you're coming up to a pee bay or a thing that has bins. Nothing annoys me more than getting to that pee bay and the bins are full and they're overflowing. Now, even if they're full, that annoys me because I can't dispose of my rubbish, because that's just annoying. But why would people leave piles of rubbish? Oh yeah, beside the bin, beside the bin. It's so smooth, it's just like the Salvation.
Speaker 1:Army where people leave their clothes on a weekend and you're not supposed to. It's the same sort of mentality that happens Now, just assuming that the council's going to come and take it away. The reason the thing's overflowing is that there's obviously a problem that they're not out there taking it away enough. And that could be anything If a local guy that collects the bins in the minor little town is sick or they can't keep up with demand because there's too many tourists.
Speaker 1:It just gets difficult. If it's full, don't leave your stuff next to it.
Speaker 2:The biggest problem with leaving a plastic bag beside a bin and, you'll know, most of these bins have a grid a metal grid, but the plastic bag is going to be pecked by a crow.
Speaker 2:And look, I've seen this also happen unexpectedly. Maybe backpackers, whatever. They don't understand that if you're trying to leave a table and chair at your campsite, because you're in a camper van and you've gone off for the day trip and you've got to take your house with you and you've left a few things to mind your camp, be really careful that you're not leaving your rubbish bag at that camp exposed as well, because I've seen this. You come driving around through the National Park Camp site and you'll see a site and there's rubbish strewn everywhere and it's purely because the birds have pecked open the rubbish bag. Look, some of you guys tuning in today. This is all common sense to you, but the reason we're talking about it is it's not common sense to somebody. You've all seen it.
Speaker 1:There's a lot of people that are massive.
Speaker 2:the dark umber are common we need to keep this dialogue open and we need to just ensure that everybody plays their part and we just keep doing our own little bit. And I think the thing is thankfully I do know that sometimes people will stop and pick up another person's rubbish. If you're able and you can, then I think that's what's going to have to be done, and as much as we want to perhaps do no action so that the authorities that be can observe there's a problem here, it doesn't actually fix the problem. Two wrongs don't make a right.
Speaker 1:No, because inevitably the authority turns around and says it's too expensive to maintain, let's close it or turn off camping, and that's the thing that we don't want to do.
Speaker 1:So as I started, you know, I said one of the things we want to make sure is that these places are always pristine for our kids and for our kids, kids and kids, kids, kids to come and hopefully be able to do the same sort of activity based on the way you know, society's moving. We might not do this forever, but while we have the ability to come out here and and enjoy the environment, make sure you're responsible, make sure you look after the place, be an ambassador for cleanliness and tidiness and the environment and, I'm sure, everyone out there camping and having a trip or enjoy it a whole lot more. So thanks, and hopefully we weren't preaching too much. Hopefully we've taught a few people some stuff. It doesn't take much, but it does take something. So just make sure you're responsible. Thanks for listening to this podcast and we look forward to catching up with you when next we have a chat.
Speaker 2:Thanks guys. Don't forget to subscribe and rate the podcast if you're listening on Spotify, and leave a comment on YouTube. Tell us anything that you want to add as a story, something you've seen. You can also write a comment to let us know what other topics you might like us to talk about in an upcoming podcast. Thanks guys.
