Alone Across the Outback

National Geographic Nostalgia

I’m feeling nostalgic for film and print this week, so I’ve dug out a favourite travel story:

Like many children in the 1980’s, I used to have a tower of National Geographic Magazines in my bedroom, given to me by various uncles, friends, and neighbours.

I would spend hours with these magazines, reading of the wonders that lay outside my little world in rural Shropshire, England.

This was when National Geographic Magazine was in its heyday - with 12 million subscribers in the USA alone.

One of the issues I kept is May 1978 – which features the story of Robyn Davidson’s 1,700-mile trek from Alice Springs to the Indian Ocean.

Davidson arrived in Alice Springs in 1975 with a “lunatic idea”: to trek across 1,700 miles of the Australian outback with only four skittish camels and a dog for company.

National Geographic got wind of her plan and sent photographer Rick Smolan to accompany her–which she only reluctantly agreed to. Can you imagine that nowadays?

The result was this wonderful photo story–juxtaposed with her journal notes.

The writing lacks the polish of her writing in Tracks – the book of her journey – which was published in 1980.

But this is the charm of this story for me, as it leaves a gap between Davidson’s thoughts and Smolan’s pictures.

What makes this story special is the way the photography captures the warmth between Davidson, her camels, and her dog. Something that is often missing from these types of adventure stories.

I’ve shared a few spreads from the story below.

From a photojournalistic point of view this is textbook–from the establishing shot through to the finale of Davidson and the camels in the ocean.

The ad’s in the magazine are priceless too.

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