50 pages • 1-hour read
Tracks: A Woman's Solo Trek Across 1700 Miles of Australian Outback
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Part 1, Chapters 4-5Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussions of emotional abuse, the threat of violence, animal cruelty, substance use, and depression.
Part 1: “Alice Sprung”
Part 1, Chapter 4 Summary
Davidson continues recounting her time in Alice. Her life at Basso’s farm didn’t improve. She was still upset about Kate’s death and Kurt’s behavior became more and more intolerable. He was increasingly violent toward her, Gladdy, and the animals. Because of his cruelty, Davison started to feel that her life and endeavors were meaningless and spent more and more time alone, sleeping and eating. When Gladdy left Kurt, Davidson couldn’t sleep at all. She inherited Gladdy’s old dog Blue and grew attached to him. Later, Kurt impulsively sold the farm and disappeared. He told the new owners that Davidson came with the deal and would teach them about the camels. Davidson hoped to use the situation to her advantage so she could choose the camels she wanted.
Although upset and overwhelmed, Davidson started helping the new owners. They soon treated her like she was disposable. She knew she’d need to make them need her to get what she wanted. Then one day, Dookie had a fit that scared the owners. She convinced them that all camel bulls were this way. Worried, they agreed to let her take two bulls, Dookie and Bub.
Davidson’s friend Julie moved in with her. She still had trouble with the locals and with her camels, but she noticed herself softening. Julie, Jenny, and Toly’s company was especially helpful. Her house finally felt like a home. Then one day, she discovered that someone had poisoned Blue, and he died. Then the house was infested with cockroaches and snakes. To ward off despair, Davidson reminded herself she had her friends.
Just as things were improving, Davidson’s camels wandered off. She spent days searching for them on foot. Finally, she convinced someone with a bush plane to help her search the area aerially. On the plane, she realized the trip was over. If she gave up hunting the camels, she could give up on the entire trip and return home. Recalling a passage from Renata Adler’s Speedboat, she now recognizes this moment as a turning point. With Julie’s help, she spotted the camels from the sky. She immediately knew that she’d now go through with the trip.
Part 1, Chapter 5 Summary
Davidson continues her story about her lost camels. It was easier to find them from the air than on the ground. She and Julie spent seemingly endless hours searching on foot for the spot where they’d seen them from above. When they did locate them, the trip became real to Davidson once more. The primary obstacle now was money. Davidson didn’t want to ask for loans from her family or friends but didn’t know how she’d fund the trip alone.
Then one day, she met a young photographer named Rick who worked for National Geographic. She liked him well enough, but Rick had different opinions than Davidson, especially about “taking clichéd photographs of Aborigines” (83). He eventually convinced her to write to National Geographic about a sponsorship for her trip. Drunk one night, she wrote what she thought was a brilliant letter.
In the meantime, Davidson relied on Toly for help making her saddles and gear. When everything was ready, she set out for Utopia. The 150-mile walk was brutal in the summer heat and the saddles and packs needed adjustments. Jenny and Toly followed her in their car, giving her support and encouragement along the way.
In Utopia, Davidson spent a few weeks finalizing preparations for the remainder of her trip. She met a lot of criticism at this time. What bothered her most was a politician’s remark that she was “being a bourgeois individualist” (90). She obsessed over the comment, unsure if the politician was right. Not long later, National Geographic called a meeting with her about a sponsorship. They loved her letter. Davidson flew to New York for the meeting, feeling like a sell-out the whole way. The meeting went well and the magazine gave her $4,000 for the trip; in exchange, she and Rick would work on an article and Rick would photograph portions of the trip. Davidson was temporarily elated that she’d secured this arrangement, but her spirits quickly faded. She didn’t want Rick to join her. She didn’t want to be photographed, and she didn’t want the magazine’s help. Despite her trepidations, she pushed these anxieties aside and focused on leaving once and for all.
Before leaving, Davidson spent a few days with her family. She was close to her sister and had a hard time saying goodbye. She had good conversations with her dad during the visit, too. They were all still trying to heal from the past and Davidson’s mother’s death. A dream her father had and relayed to her before she left was particularly affecting for Davidson.
In the days just before the trip, Davidson’s spirits lifted. She marveled at the land and was thrilled to set out on her adventure. Then she remembered that Rick would be coming with her on this first leg, and despaired again. As they set off, Rick took countless photos. Davidson felt uncomfortable and unnatural. Finally, they reached Redbank Gorge, where they met up with Jenny and Toly and spent a day together. Afterward, Davidson set off on her own. She was thrilled to finally be by herself and believed her old self would soon disappear.
Part 1, Chapters 4-5 Analysis
In the latter chapters of Part 1, Davidson’s ongoing preparations for her venture across the Australian interior test both her emotional and psychological strength, emphasizing that taking risks can complicate an individual’s sense of self. Davidson depicts the obstacles she faces along the way as near-Biblical plagues, each challenge having an increasingly negative impact on her psyche. She lives with a “debilitating fear […] of the full potential of Kurt’s hatred;” she’s frequently overwhelmed by either fatigue or insomnia; her house is filled with cockroaches and snakes; her new dog is poisoned, and her camels run away (60). Each of these conflicts tests Davidson’s desire to assert her independence and exercise agency over her own life, pointing to her thematic exploration of Finding Empowerment Through Independence and Courage.
Davidson positions her journey within the historical, political, and cultural context of the period. As a young woman living through the aftermath of the 1960s cultural revolution and amid the 1970s feminist movement, Davidson wants to resist the canned female identity and future prescribed for her by her society. In Alice, violent men, hostile locals, physical debilitation, mental despair, vermin infestations, and unpredictable animal behaviors threaten her ability to claim this autonomy. Davidson details these harrowing aspects of her pre-trip experience to capture how modern society particularly disadvantages women in an attempt to limit their power and freedom.
Davidson’s recurring meditations on her various friendships establish her thematic interest in the Transformative Effects of Intimate Relationships across the memoir. For example, when Davidson faces some of her most dire circumstances in Alice, she finds solace in her friendships with Julie, Jenny, and Toly. Sharing time, space, and life with her friends quickly makes Davidson realize that “being alone got awfully boring sometimes, and that [she] needed people, wanted them” (68). Acknowledging this human need for connection and community opens Davidson’s heart in new ways. She feels herself softening, and gains perspective on her longtime “resistance to change” (69). In the context of her friendships, she can see herself differently than when she was alone. Evaluating her behaviors and beliefs, she begins to acknowledge how hardened she has become. The internal progress she makes during this era is fueled by her friends’ companionship, care, and loyalty. The scenes of Julie helping Davidson search for the cattle, Toly helping her prepare her gear, and Toly and Jenny driving behind her to Utopia, capture the stabilizing power of close relationships.
Thematically, the start of Davidson’s trip into the Australian interior on her own reiterates the Interplay Between Solitude and Self-Discovery. When Davidson secures the National Geographic sponsorship, she feels weighed down by guilt, self-loathing, and frustration. She worries she has tainted the ethos behind her trip and betrayed her integrity by accepting corporate sponsorship. To Davidson, the whole point of the trip is to be on her own, to test her strength and resolve, and to rid herself of societal strictures. Having the magazine’s funding and Rick as a travel companion compromises her solitude and her perceived self-discovery journey. Once she parts ways with Rick, she feels ready to cut all ties to her past self. Venturing out into the unknown is her attempt at remaking herself outside the confines of societal prescriptions and personal trauma.
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