Slow Post:
Letters Across the Desert
​Send Your Story across the world's largest
parallel sand-ridge desert
Simpson Desert ~ Munga-Thirri
Once, letters were carried across the Outback by camel.
They connected isolated pastoral stations, families, and desert communities, carrying news, love, and hope across vast distances.
This year, in our 50th Anniversary, we’re reviving something the Outback hasn’t seen in generations.
We’re bringing back camel mail.
On our Simpson Desert Expedition, handwritten letters will once again travel by camel: step by step over an ancient landscape, crossing massive red dunes, claypans, and gibber flats.
Our journeys have always embodied Slow Travel.
Now, in a world of instant messages and disappearing words, we’re adding Slow Words.
For 30 days, your letter will walk across the Simpson Desert the old way:
no engines,
no shortcuts,
no rush.
Just people, camels, and country.
This is more than mail.
It’s a revival of connection.
And an invitation to send your words on a journey they will never forget...
A camel team loaded with mail at the Alice Springs Telegraph Office, c 1901.
Source: OCC archives
Send a Letter Across the Desert
Your letter. Your story.
Carried by camel.
​Every letter we carry holds someone’s story.
Every letter represents trust: trust in us, in the journey, and in the power of words.
Your message will walk hundreds of kilometres through sand and silence; the old way:
Slowly.
In a world of instant messages, this is something different.
If you’ve ever wanted to send something with intention…
with heart…
with time…
This is your chance.
Who Would You Write To?
• A grandparent
• A child
• A loved one
• Someone you’ve lost
• Your future self
• The land itself
Every letter is welcome.
Every story matters.
Let your words walk.
What story will you send?
Meet Mayo, our youngest camel, about to embark on her very first season of desert trekking!
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In 2026 Mayo has been given a very special responsibility: carrying the mail across the Simpson Desert.
To mark this milestone, we have produced:
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Two personalised Australia Post stamps (only available on our website)
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Two commemorative envelopes
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One special postcard
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Together, these form Mayo Mail, a unique desert mail run, carried by camel across one of Australia’s most iconic landscapes.
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For 30 days, Mayo will carry the mail from the western edge of the Simpson Desert in the Northern Territory to Birdsville in Queensland. On arrival, the mail will be delivered to the Birdsville Post Office, officially postmarked, and sent on its way around Australia (and perhaps beyond).
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It’s our tribute to the spirit of early desert travel, to OCC founder Rex Ellis’ pioneering vision, Australian postal heritage, and to fifty years of walking with camels - slowly, simply, and with respect for Country.
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And for Mayo, it’s the beginning of a remarkable journey...
How it works
Step 1
Select your choice of C6 or DL commemorative envelope, or DL 50th Anniversary Postcard.
For either envelope or card you have the choice of selecting one of two official Australia Post stamps which cover standard letter/card postage to anywhere in Australia.
Camel Shadow
Mayo Mail
Step 2
Complete the purchase details and we will send you your envelope/s/card/s to your postal adress.
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Step 3
Write a letter/complete the postcard to a loved one or a grandchild or to yourself!
Pop your letter/card into the Reply Paid envelope and return to us.
Note that Mayo must receive Your Story at our base camp postal address before APRIL 10th 2026.
You may select as many envelopes or cards as you like!
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Step 4
May 11 2026 - Log onto this page to see where Mayo is camped among the dunes as she prepares to embark on her first Simpson Desert Expedition.
You’ll be able to follow her story across the desert, with regular photos posted via Starlink throughout the journey, sharing the day-to-day reality of walking with camels through this extraordinary landscape.
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June 10 2026 - Mayo will arrive with Your Story in Birdsville, Queensland at the conclusion of the Simpson Desert Expedition.
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June 11 2026 - Mayo delivers her mail to the Birdsville Post Office from where Your Story is forwarded to its final destination.
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Background - Australian Postal History & Camels
Did You Know...that the first time a camel appeared on an Australian postage stamp was in 1896?​
​In 1895 the Coolgardie Cycle Express Company provided local mail services in the Western Australian goldfields, and in 1896 the six pence, two shillings, and five shillings were issued.​
Camels in Bayley Street Coolgardie 1890s.
National Library of Australia number nla.pic-an24613175
Camel buggy in Coolgardie 1898.
State Library of Western Australia
Camels were used to deliver mail in the more remote parts of Outback Australia where water points for horses were scarce (or non existent), and this continued until the mid 1920s when motor vehicles took over.
Changing the mail from the camel-drawn coach to a motor lorry, at Actalunna Creek, Strzelecki Track. This coach travelled from Cordillo Downs Station further north. Cordillo Downs had it's own Post Office.
This photo is dated 1931 and the original caption reads:
"At Actalunna Creek : Transferring the mails to go over the sandhills on the trip out to Cordillo Downs station.
This was "the last coach trip made by this type of coach, with camels instead of horses, to Cordillo Downs" - ready to cross the Cobbler Sandhills."
Source: SLSA [B 25220]
Mob of camels outside the Birdsville Post Office, 1926. Jack Gaffney pictured in the second image.
State Library Qld 2 151263
The last camel mail on its way from Oodnadatta in South Australia to Alice Springs in the Northern Territory in 1872. The overland telegraph, which replaced the camel mail, came into operation in August 1872. National Archives of Australia: A1200, L26071
Since 1896, camels have featured on Australian stamps numerous times, celebrating explorers such as Burke & Wills (who used camels for the first time on an Australian expedition), and Christmas nativity scenes. Most recently, camels featured in the Afghan cameleers of the Outback issue of 2016.
And once again in 2026, mail will be carried by camel across the Outback!
Image shows the Mayo Mail route across the Simpson Desert. Note that this image is for illustrative purposes only and is not the actual route Mayo will walk. But nevertheless, she has over 400 dunes and 430kms to navigate in this epic 30 day journey...
Envelope & stamp design by Yasmin Shevki and Andrew Harper