Forgive the Cheers reference, but this story was too good to pass up.

We spent one afternoon in Longreach about two months ago, and we stocked up on our meat at the local butcher during that stop. We have been bush camping a lot, so when we make our way to town, often a bit bedraggled and dirty, food shopping is the first order of business. Then showers and laundry. When we fist arrived in Longreach, I was quite enthusiastic to have found a local butcher. Somehow our previous week had not yielded one, and we had been forced into a few days of vegetarianism by accident.(No offense beloved vegetarians!)

I stocked up, got our meats cryo-vaced and had a friendly discussion with the man behind the counter about the area. He gave me a few suggestions on what to see, and I went on my merry way.

Longreach is a community of a little more than 3,000 people. It is also the regional service center for central western Queensland, so it has services making it feel like a much larger place. There are a few solid blocks of shops in this town.

We decided to stop back through Longreach on our way back from Cape York / Cairns on our way to Adelaide because we had such a nice experience at our last visit. The town is very welcoming to visitors.

When I walked into the same butcher on this stop I was greeted with a friendly welcome. But then, he surprised me and said “Hey, weren’t you in here before?” I was floored. One of the things about traveling — especially so far from home — is that we never come across people we know… We’re never recognized because at the point we become familiar, we are moving onto our next destination.

I was so surprised! I let him know that in fact our last stop through was a couple of months ago. We chatted a bit. In all honesty, I think I had four solid years of weekly visits to the Grand Army Plaza farmers market* in Brooklyn before a vendor even acknowledged seeing me previously. Now I know I can be a bit shy at times, but wow, Longreach really won me over on that one.

Thanks BF Savage & Co Butchery!

* Luckily we lived in Brooklyn for eleven years and had some great friends at the Farmer’s Market- yay Ray Bradley Farm!