Free Republic

WAY OUT IN AUSTRALIA'S OUTBACK, where the lakes are salty and the beer is warm, men with big arms and funny hats cook kangaroo and crocodile. River races are run in bottomless boats by louts scurrying Flintstone-style over dry bedrock. One can easily grow jaded on the outback oddities, until arriving with a jolt in Coober Pedy, the underground town. Marlon Hodges, of Alice Springs, recalls passing through a decade ago. "It was right after they filmed the second Mad Max there. We stepped off the bus, and everyone in town had a huge mohawk. It was bizarre, all these...