There's a corrugated highway Leading north from Port Augusta

lined with ratted cars that didn't rate a tow

The Salt plains out of Pimba And your eyes begin to stream

On to Kingoonya huddled dusty by the road

Romantic notions shattered Like the tyres that didn't hack it

This has got to be the country's last frontier

Where a sports car's next to useless Running cattle grids and river beds

We drove a van from 1963



Someone mentioned walkabout And kiss your job goodbye

Just to see the country shimmer through the windscreen

Drinking beer, telling stories While laughter filled the night

And flexi-time's behind you like a bad dream



You got a flat on Anzac Highway And Lawson on your shelf

Its a Southern Comfort, air-conditioned rage

Where a homestead's more than just a cheap print Dangling from a wall

And mateship's more than lines upon a page



We went looking for Australia In between the TV lines

'Cause the ABC just couldn't make it real

Colour documentary From a beanbag on the floor:

Never shows as much as it conceals



A stark and blistered Alice Springs And a river runs with shame

And you wipe the sheets of bulldust from your eyes

Another country's uniform And the mirage it falls apart

To the open gap between the truth and lies



Go and see your country, mate The travel agents scream

Politicians sell it's hard to score a pasttime

Signs and high-wire fences Hold the land where I belong

It's as if I'm in the outback for the last time