The Camel Who Crossed Australia
The story of the famous Burke and Wills expedition ... as it has never been told before the humans called him 'Bell Sing', but to the other camels he is known as 'He Who Spits Further than the Wind'. transported from the mountains and deserts of the 'Northwest Frontier' (present-day Pakistan and Afghanistan), Bell Sing accompanies explorers Burke and Wills as they try to cross Australia from south to north. Bell Sing has never had a high opinion of humans - or horses. And this expedition is the worst managed caravan he's even been in. Camel handler Dost Mahomet and soldier John King are also beginning to wonder if their leader is competent, or crazy. Bell Sing can smell water over the sandhills on the horizon ... and freedom too. Can the expedition succeed? And who - if anyone - will survive? This is the gritty and true story about one of the most extraordinary and iconic events in Australia's history.​
More notes on the book
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The Burke and Wills Expedition should have been one of the greatest explorations ever… white men venturing where no other white man had gone before.
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Sure, you have probably heard about the Burke and Wills expedition… but have you ever heard it from the perspective of one of the camels on the journey? Or from one of the ‘Afghan cameleers’ hired from the Indian subcontinent to look after the camels?
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The humans called him ‘Bell Sing’, but to the other camels he is known as ‘He Who Spits Further Than the Wind’. And spitting is something Bell Sing is not ashamed to admit he is very good at. Transported from the mountains and deserts of the ‘Northwest Frontier’ (present-day Pakistan and Afghanistan), Bell Sing accompanies the explorers Burke and Wills as they try to cross Australia from south to north.
​
Bell Sing has never had a high opinion of humans – or horses. And this expedition is the worst managed caravan he’s ever been in. Cameleer Dost Mahomet and soldier John King are also beginning to wonder if their leader is incompetent or crazy.
​
Bell Sing can smell water over the sandhills on the horizon... and freedom too. Can the expedition succeed? And who – if anyone – will survive?
This is the gritty and true story about one of the most extraordinary and iconic events in Australia’s history.
PS And I had great fun with Bell Sing…