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Camping in an abandoned stockmen's hut can be a rewarding experience. The hut's history lingers. A presence remains. An outback hut can have a warm, welcoming feeling or be frighteningly, cold.

Nicky and I planned a two night, three day motorbike and photography trip to Seven Gates Hut, overlooking Lake Eucumbene at the foot of the Snowy Mountains in New South Wales in the south east of Australia. Nicky is my 10 year old grandson.

Well, I reckon Andamooka, a small, opal mining town in outback South Australia, would have to be near on the roughest little town on Earth. Any kids that make it through childhood and adolescence, unscathed, are either pretty tough, lucky or destined to survive.