Are you missing the days of cocktails and sunsets on a distant island? We can’t help with the distant island but we can certainly help with the travel cocktails!
We have a strange travel tradition we do with some travel buddies. Not sure how it started exactly, though I do remember when it started.
We were exploring the Bungles of Purnululu National Park and a guide explained about the flat bungles. We merged that into a flungle, which of course you do. Later that evening after being inspired, we were pouring our very own made-up cocktail – The Flungle. It consisted of cranberry juice, orange juice and vodka.
Later in the trip our chief cocktail maker, after more inspirational travel, had also created a cocktail called ‘The MudMap’ with Kahlua, Baileys and cream. Unfortunately, I don’t have photos of these two inaugural cocktails, but I can attest to their delicious flavours.
On our recent outback trip we reignited the tradition.
In order to fulfill and keep this tradition, we needed to pack:
- Cocktail glasses: Because we usually go 4WDing, they usually don’t survive the trip intact.
- Spirits: a range of spirits that stretch to multiple cocktails.
- Mixers: a range of juices, fizzy drinks, cream and coconut cream.
- Cocktail and 12 volt blenders
How can you join this tradition and make it your own you may ask? The next step is to get in tune with your location. Matching a cocktail means picking a feature of the day and noticing the colours and textures. Then we think about how we could recreate them in cocktail form. As simple as this may seem it can be a very fun, and messy, experience. Here are our cocktails from 2020-
Quartz line
Our first cocktail of this trip was a quartz line. On a walk trail in Mount Augustus, our amateur geologists were taken with the distinctive lines of white quartz in the red rock.
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Quartz line at Mount Augustus -
Coconut and Raspberry
The colours were red and white. We created that with frozen raspberries blitzed with vodka in our 12volt blender. The red mixture is then scooped onto a blend of lychee, coconut milk & gin.
Honeycomb Gorge
One of the highlights of the Kennedy Ranges is Honeycomb Gorge. Of course, we had to create something to emulate this unique rock formation. Just so happens we passed through a town, so we all bought violet crumbles and crunchies. That’s the easy part!
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Honeycomb Gorge, Kennedy Ranges -
Kahlua, Cream and Violet Crumble
The feature colours were creamy brown like the rock and as the name suggests honeycomb was added for texture. Our cocktail had Kahlua, Salted Caramel Country Cream, cream and Violet Crumble crushed on top. Yes it is as delicious as it sounds.
Blowholes, Quobba Station
Hitting the coast, we watched with awe as the Indian Ocean waves were smashing the Quobba Station coast. Over time, the force of the ocean eroded holes in the rock to form blowholes.
Our inspiration- Blue ocean with white spray over the rocks. We didn’t have any Blue Curacao so our chief cocktail maker became resourceful and found a blue icy pole at the Gnaraloo shop.
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Blowholes at Quobba Station, Coral Coast -
This was added to vodka, Cointreau, cream and a bounty bar dropped in at the end.
Wooramel Station, Gascoyne
One of our interesting experiences on the way south was at Wooramel Station where we relaxed in warm artesian pools. The water comes from underground and is a clear but rusty colour, and so was the inspo for the next cocktail.
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Artesian Pools at Wooramel Station -
Ginger inspired
The cocktail theme was ginger, so we crushed ginger biscuits and lined the glass edge. We had a shot of Kahlua and Butterscotch Schanpps and topped it up with ginger beer.
Now we just have to think up a cocktail for our weekend trip to Margaret River.
Please note: we make our cocktail back at our home camp and there is no driving that evening.