During the big storm of last weekend I took a walk down to my beloved Coogee to watch it being spanked by endless raging waves and winds that I’ve never seen the likes of before. The normally calm bay had turned into an angry beast, wiping away stone blocks and metal fences like they were made of balsa wood.
Continuing the quest to find the nation’s finest Dagwood Dog, I returned to the pits of Sydney’s Valvolene Raceway on the night of the annual Smash-up Derby. It turns out these legends yearn all racing season to hook up a Port-a-Loo to a caravan, then to the back of a clapped-out Commodore, a Ford or whatever moves when you stick petrol in it.
Sometimes you’ve just gotta get out of the humdrum and head to a place where the earth rumbles under a charging herd of high octane 950 horse-power engines, creating a nuclear-like dust storm that makes Mad Max feel like The Sound of Music.
Welcome to Slab City – the last free place in America (so some say). It’s a squatter’s camp of about 150 locals who reside off the grid in all kinds of makeshift houses, caravans, old buses and tents.
A lot can happen to a bloke out in the desert. And after a while, with enough sunshine, moonshine and time to think a man begins to see things and maybe even talk to himself a little bit.
I reckon everyone’s got some kind of super power. Some folks can do epic cards tricks that make you believe in sorcery, while others can fold fresh bed linen like a ninja… me, I’m a human homing beacon for the ragged characters and weirdos that roam around the places I love to photograph.