Stanley, a charming and exuberant young Jack Russell, was my bedfellow for my last night in Melbourne. His Mummy and Daddy, dear friends Matt and Jim, warned me he might whore himself between our respective chambers during the night, but he stayed curled up at my knees under the doona till 8.30 am, at which point I softly enquired, “Is there a certain little fellow called Stanley down there?” He immediately wriggled his way up for a hello lick and found his spikey orange ball within a minute. The energy was unleashed.
I was on Melbourne’s suburban fringes by mid-morning and dialling up the speed for, as it turned out, God only knew. The aim was to simply drive till I dropped, or drive until the roos decided to wake up. Adelaide was beyond reach. Bordertown seemed a good place to stop and Google motel choices.
Bordertown SA
It was more than a good place, as it turned out. The Woolshed Inn was such a comfortable haven for one night, I decided to book a second. Booking two nights of solitude meant I could start to get my head around Dad’s passing, and I could get a little bit of client work done as well. The room comforts made up for a seventies bathroom with tiles finished in a crushed cockroach colour. Immersing myself in it only made me more paranoid of the dratted things. But the nice lady on reception did say, “That one’s $115 a night, because we haven’t done the bathroom in that one yet”. The room comfort, the heartwarming lamb shanks with mashed potato, and the glass of Clare Valley shiraz all made up for it.
Bordertown is a relaxed, unpretentious place where you can get a jelly topped slice of cheesecake and a flat white at one of several local bakeries and cafes. It’s also the birth town of Bob Hawke. One local bakery has built itself entirely around the original Police Station, which still stands within the new building. The Manning Index of South Australian History states, “With the opening of the gold route from the Victorian diggings to Adelaide in 1852 and the establishment of a police camp at Scott’s woolshed, with a permanent officer in charge, at a resting place on the banks of Tatiara Creek, the time was ripe for a settlement and, accordingly, the town of Border Town was surveyed in July 1852″. My cafe lady knew her stuff: the building I was looking at was a safe harbour for the transport of gold during the goldrush years.
Adelaide
I’m rather charmed by Adelaide, I’ve decided. It’s a compact, restful city. My unstrenuous road journey into Adelaide mirrored my rail journey from Melbourne 4 years ago, through now familiar names Horsham, Nhill, Murray Bridge, Tailem Bend, to name a few. Being winter helps, but the greenery and undulating hills were clearly not of Western Australia, and it was a simple pleasure seeing it all roll past the driver’s window. My hosts at the Fullarton Motor Lodge were Peugeot and Citroen nuts like me, which was nice. All the rooms are hilariously pastel. It was like drowning in a vat of Nestle Banana Quik, but a hearty slab of lasagne down the hill at Fasta Pasta provided some essential retinal relief for an hour or two.
My remaining stops simply mirrored the trip going across. I stopped at the pink Lake Bumbunga, not to be confused with Silvio Berluscone’s infamous Bunga Bunga sex parties of the 1990s. He’d be chuffed to know of the place, I chuckled at the time. I’m sure he’d call it Lago di Bunga Bunga.
Snowtown beckoned for some more outrageoulsy scurrilous and macabre photography at the old bank of ill repute, and I applied my best Photoshop skills by way of placing a Commonwealth Bank banner atop the facade. I asked myself, “Which bank deserves this the most?” Ha! Which Bank! This is some of my finest work. Ever. On anything.
Streaky Bay
Next morning, the serene beauty of Streaky Bay and Smoky Bay absolutely blew me away. Some serious solo motoring lay ahead, although I did have the slight advantage of chasing the sun in the opposite direction to the drive east. By lunchtime, the prettiness had given way to the stark seriousness of industry, the industry of keeping South Australia afloat, and powered. It’s fascinating. Driving toward Port Augusta, a bright light can be seen on the horizon from perhaps 50 kilometres away. At first, I thought it was the sun glinting off the back of a sign, or something. Then, I realised it was still there and concluded it was a flame from a gas stack. It’s not. It’s a solar lamp, and its sighting heralds the entering of South Australia’s renewable energy field. The 59 wind turbines are one thing, the solar panel array quite another. It’s 4 years old, but this ABC article explains the future (which is now) quite well.
By early afternoon, I was once again ‘On The Nullarbor!’ For a while, I turned the music off, wound all windows down, and went psychologically deep. I knew I was going to anyway, but Dad’s passing made this even more meaningful, and I made this leg of the journey entirely devotional. I told him so, when I switched the motor off and got out of the car in a completely treeless and eerily quiet mid-afternoon. I didn’t wallow. I got my bowls out! I placed them on the Eyre Highway, on Australia’s Nullarbor Plain, in the midst of nowhere… and I took the photo.
At the Nullarbor Roadhouse, the mammoth industry of keeping Australia moving, fuelled and supplied was in full swing and on full display, more so than on the first cross. I was awed. For travellers, there is a myriad roadhouse along the route, but there are only two where you can count on a dash of civilisation – here and Balladonia. The rest are a skanky grab-bag of ordinary loos, hateful staff and no coffee, unless you mix a Blend 43 yourself and pay five bucks for it.
Without any doubt, I’d had one of the most unforgettable days of my life. I sealed it by discovering one of the Bunda Cliffs turnoffs we’d missed coming across. There was no point in getting the bowling jacket and shirt out for this one. All I needed to do was see it, and see it for as long as I wanted.
The home stretch: Eucla and Norseman
My growing confidence of turning the Pug into the magical 1100 kilometre per tank car was dashed at Eucla the next morning. A fellow journeyman told me there was no 98, 95 or ULP at Madura or Mundrabilla. They were both waiting for ‘the truck’. Driving solo, and with the climate control turned off, the Pug’s readout was telling me I’d averaged 5.4 l/100 km. There was no time to be the mileage hero. I refilled, and it was to get me to Coolgardie.
I was happy to set the cruise lower for this drive. There was a car a little way in front of me doing 95-100, which I had no desire to pass. I still got a stone chip or two, albeit not on the windscreen, thankfully. The road is narrow, hemmed in by gun-totin’ roo-harbouring shrubbery on both sides. Upping the ante means you could die, or leave the car on the side of the road for good.
Coolgardie was an easy stretch on the fuel gauge. Little servos at little settlements on the way were a sign I was getting closer to Perth, and meant I could have tried for the 1100 km per tank benchmark. But no, Josephine.
Conditions were tough enough as they were. A cold front lashed the wheatbelt for 3 blinding hours. Plenty of opportunity to die here. The same for impatient overtakers coming the other way. If any of us popped our noses out in the 50 metre visibility at that speed, we could have been goners.
It made for a long day, but there was a big smile at the front door at 6.02 pm. I was home.