Tick! Anthea and Van Morrison have crossed the Nullarbor (oh! and Maggie as well). It took three long but fascinating days and I enjoyed almost all of it. And after a few close encounters, the road trains and I came to an agreement ... if they were coming up behind me, I would GET OFF THE ROAD! I don't think they appreciated the fact that Van Morrison is most comfortable traveling at 90 km/hr.
The Nullarbor is home to the world's longest golfcourse; the 18 hole par 72 golf course spans 1365 kms with one hole in each participating town or roadhouse. Bizarre!
Didn't see camels. Didn't see kangaroos. Saw A LOT of dead wombats!
Sign at the general store in Penong
The windmill museum in Penong features Bruce, Australia's biggest windmill (that's him, just to the left of Van Morrison)
On the second day of travel across the Nullarbor, we started getting the amazing views of the Bight. Unfortunately (or fortunately) you're not permitted to camp on the edge of the cliffs. Evidently, there's a big crack and sometime soon (?) an entire section is going to slide into the sea. I was now travelling across the 'treeless plain' (not really accurate ... there were trees but they weren't very big) and I was amazed how many small flowering plants I found.
This delicate little pigface had a flower about the size of a thumbnail.
I saw a few wedgetail eagles, some willie wagtails and honeyeaters but ravens were definitely the most common bird to be seen.
The first night out from Ceduna, we stayed at the Nullarbor Roadhouse. I hadn't realised but the roadhouses are everything ... a tiny little village providing everything that you could need. Each had a 'caravan park' with powered and unpowered sites set out on the gravel and dust. There's a shop, restaurant and a bar. Hot showers cost anything from a dollar to $4 and each roadhouse provides all this using diesel generators that run 24/7 and bores for the water, with their own desalination plants. Then there's the fuel (expensive!), a hole for the golf course and some weird and wacky giant thing ... whales seemed popular. All in all, they were quite entertaining places to hang out.
Big whale at Eucla
Bigger whale at the Nullarbor Roadhouse
Weird mural in the bar at the Nullarbor Roadhouse - we had a bit of a disagreement about who was who. I said the main singer looked like James Reyne but others said it was Jimmy Barnes. I was wrong.
I had to laugh at this guy's vest. We kept meeting up with him - he was riding his postie bike from Brisbane to Perth! The road trains must have REALLY hated him!
Big kangaroo at the WA border
Space junk at the Balladonia roadhouse
And before I knew it, I was in WA. And it's green. In fact, I've found most of the Nullarbor to appear quite lush, thanks to the flooding rains of a month or two ago. The nights are cool and the days have been generally glorious. So I've really enjoyed driving along on these straight long roads, bopping away to music, dodging road trains and raising a laconic finger to the travellers going east.
Sunrise outside of Cocklebiddy roadhouse
Simon said to watch out for this ... the only time zone in Australia that doesn't appear on the maps. The CWTZ applies to the roadhouses between Border Village in SA to Caiguna in WA. It's not officially recognised but there are official signs about it. No-one could explain WHY! Why have it at all?
Entering WA ... goodbye apples, potatoes and honey.
Finally, I was across the Nullarbor. It was a long three days but it was fun! After a brief stop at Norseman, we made our way to a lovely free camp just south of there called Bromus Dam. All of a sudden, we were in bush ... trees ... and what trees they were. Beautiful smooth bark salmon gums, all orange and russet, with coppiced bases. Hakeas and wattles, banksias and gums all lined the roads, and every so often there would be a salt-encrusted lake or dry red clay pan. So different.
Pincushion hakea (I think)
Salmon gums in the morning light
And now we're in Esperance. What a beautiful place! We're staying in the VERY comfortable RAC caravan park (its camp kitchen is amazing!) and we're enjoying the amazing scenery and beautiful weather. There's a beach just over the road and Maggie was delighted to try it out. I was not so happy ... the sand is very fine and just wouldn't come out of her fur ... off to the dog wash again! The beaches here are gorgeous - all fine, white sand and turquoise water. It's a pity the water's so cold!
Twilight Bay
