27,000 kilometres – One dog. Zero dollars. Meet the Queen of the Dust.
Some guests bring a story or two with them when they jump into the front seat for Shotgun. Edwina Robertson brought many… including one cracker involving a 1979 Toyota LandCruiser called Alice, a dog named Jordie, and the kind of trip most of us only daydream about from the comfort of a desk chair.
In this episode of the Shotgun Podcast, sixth-generation country girl and self-confessed “faux-tographer” Edwina Robertson jumped in the passenger seat for a yarn about the bush, the road, and the photographs that put rural Australia on the front page.
Who is Edwina Robertson?
You might know her as the Queen of the Dust, the title she earned shooting bush weddings across rural Australia for more than a decade. Or as the Queen of the Safari, her second life shooting [photos of] wildlife and safari portraits in Africa. Or as the Wanderer of the west who once drove around the entire continent for one hundred days, bartering photos for fuel, food and a bed.
Whatever you call her, she will modestly correct you and reiterate that she’s just Eddy, a passionate story-teller that believes that everyone needs to wake up with a purpose.
The big trip
In 2017 Edwina set off on what she called Wanderer of the West. The plan was simple in the sense that only a country kid could ever describe as simple. Drive 27,000 kilometres around Australia. Take the dog. Bring no money. Trade photographs for whatever you need along the way for food and accommodation.
She made it home. The Cruiser made it home, albeit worse for wear. The stories from those one hundred days still come up in interviews almost ten years later, and a few of them came up in this episode.
The moment that stopped a nation
In August 2018, mid drought campaign on her One Bucket tour, Eddy ended up face-to-face with then Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull in Trangie, NSW. He saw her in the crowd and called her over. She broke down, telling him about a family she had been with the day before who had just lost someone to suicide.
It made headlines around the country and ignited the conversation around all dinner tables, both city and country.
Why she’s on Shotgun
The Shotgun Podcast is built on a simple idea. Get unique Australians into the passenger seat of a rental car, hit the road, and find out what makes them tick. Edwina Robertson fits the brief better than almost anyone. She has lived more of her life on the road than off it. She knows this country in a way the rest of us only glimpse through a windscreen on the way to somewhere else.
This is a story about life on the road, the bush, the city/country divide, why she gave jillarooing a crack at thirty-four (and why it was nothing like the Instagram version), and why she will tell you that she is a “faux-tographer” rather than a photographer.
At the end of the day, Edwina has leveraged her voice to help communities all around the country, and we loved what she had to say.
Follow Edwina: edwinarobertson.com.au | Instagram @edwinarobertson
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