On our first trip to Oz we took the Indian Pacific from Sydney to Broken Hill.It was early March and I wanna say it was hot...damn hot.Our trip there was also where we first learned to do the Aussie Salute! From what I've seen with my own eyes along with what I've have read (over and over) hot weather isn't really unknown on that continent and,unless I'm mistaken,that's been true for the last few million years at least.
You describe a journey that took you by train from the coast into the desert. Of course it was hot.
When I wrote 'the last hot year we had was 1998' I meant in comparison to previous summers I remember on the Gold Coast (Surfers Paradise, in Queensland)
We had ONE very hot day in the summer of 2013, which brought forth this convoluted garbage:
...These types of extreme summers will become even more frequent and more severe in the future," Dr Lewis said.
The next hottest summer on record occurred in 1998.
Dr Lewis said for the period of 2006 to 2020, modelling showed summers like 1998 would occur once every 16 years when only natural climate forces were at play.
However, when human influences such as greenhouse gases were introduced, they happened almost one every two years..."
But ONE HOT SUMMER DAY day doesn't make THE HOTTEST YEAR.