Outback Campfires: A Night in the Northern Territory, Australia
The flicker of a burning flame; the shadowy light of early evening; sitting around the firepit, striking matches to light sticks and paper. The air is cooler than earlier in the day, and the first pale stars shine in the fading sky. The campfire is a time to come together, swap stories, and bring out the guitar. Lit in the open endlessness of the Central Australian outback, it is one of the freedoms of living in the Territory. It builds community in the desert.
As the evening thickens and darkness falls, the fire is a brilliant flash of colour in the night. We live so far away from other people in such a unique landscape that we are drawn by the chance to come together and relax. Days can be long and challenging, but there is something special about lifting your gaze from the flames and staring cleanly at the distant horizon, the view unbroken by buildings and smog.
The Northern Territory is a huge expanse of land stretching from Australia’s centre to its northern coast. Despite yielding a fierce summer, the Central Desert experiences a chilly winter. The traditional homelands of First Nations people are marked out all over the Territory. Their connection stretches far back into the deep annals of history.
Before colonization, it was their fires that illuminated the night. This land has seen fire many times before; it has burned, but not been destroyed. It is resilient, like its people, who feel the heat but are not incinerated. All throughout human history, people have clustered around fires in the most populated and most isolated places on earth. Here in the Central Desert, the ground on which campfires take place cradles the memories and stories of the oldest continuous culture on earth. They continue to burn fires – in the riverbeds, on the red earth, on the desert soil - and newcomers have joined their practice with matches and camp chairs.
The Territory has an easy, relaxed lifestyle. In
other cities that are fraught with pressure and busyness, it is calming to know
that far away, in the heart of Australia, there is another place where the only
noise is the crackle of a campfire and the call of the birds. There is a
landscape as old as time that does not contain skyscrapers and gridlocked
roads. When I am away, I remember this; and when I return, I burn with the warmth of the knowledge that I am home.