In 1977, Robyn Davidson set off for the west coast of Australia from her starting point at Alice Springs. Her companions were her dog, and family of four camels that consisted of a larger male named Dookie, a smaller male named Dub, a wild female Zeleika and Zeleika's child, Goliath. Davidson intended the journey to be its own end and had never planned on writing a book about her odyssey, but thought that it might make an interesting read for subscribers to National Geographic, for whom she agreed to write an article.
The article predictably gathered a lot of traction very quickly; Davidson started to think that perhaps there was a book about her travels inside her after all. She did not write the book in Australia but in London, and lived with author Doris Lessing whilst she wrote it (another interesting exploit that would have made another captivating read.) The book was titled Tracks, and was the recipient of the Thomas Cook Travel Book Award, sponsored by the corporate travel agent of the same name.
Davidson had asked sometime-boyfriend Rick Smolan, a renowned photographer, to accompany her on part of the trek so that he could take photographs. Although some were included in the original book, the bulk of them were published in a collection of their own, in a book called From Alice to Ocean.
Popular with the general public as a whole, the book resonated particularly well with young women who were tired of reading about women who fulfilled as sort of "Girl Friday" role for their traveling menfolk, and welcomed the opportunity to read about an intrepid female traveller who had created a trek for herself. Just twenty-seven at the time of her cross-Australia journey, Davidson became known to the people she met along the way as The Camel Lady, and reached almost urban myth status amongst the Aboriginal folk with whom she enjoyed exchanging stories and spending her downtime.
Davidson devoted much of her writing career after the publication of Tracks to writing about the history and culture of the Aborigines. In 1987 she collaborated with Thomas Keneally to produce a book called Beyond Dreamtime about the way in which colonial settlers had displaced the indigenous people of the Australian bush. The book became an integral part of the aboriginal exhibition of the same name at Sydney's prestigious Museum of Art.
