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Published: March 14th 2011
The Gascoyne
All four of us at the local pubSo Carnarvon ended up being the last stop of the road trip. The other girls decided they needed a job for a bit and so found work in this town at a pub called the Gascoyne. We had found a good camp site to stay at that had a pool so I spent a lot of time there working on my tan! I tried looking for work as well but found it hard to find somewhere. It soon became clear that the other girls were wanting to stay in Carnarvon for quite a while and that wasn't what I wanted. The town was ok but I didn't really want to stay there for a long period. I eventually found work in a bar/nightclub called the Tropicana that paid well, but still wasn't that happy living in the town. I warned the girls that I wanted out of the car and that they needed to decide whether we should sell it or they buy me out.
During this time I was still in touch with Gary in Meeka. We decided that I would go back to Meeka for Christmas and New Year. He was going to drive to Carnarvon to pick
Our flooded campsite!
This was when we were still staying at the site! The floods got worse and we were then evacuated. me up. Unfortunately, this plan did have problems as the area that Carnarvon was in had 2 years worth of rainfall in 24 hours! The town was put on alert as the river started to overflow. Carnarvon became completely cut off by the floods and we were eventually evacuated from the camp site by the police as the floods became worse. Luckily, me and Hazel were offered a spare room in a friend's house that we had met in Carnarvon. His house was on higher ground so wasn't affected by the water. So.. these floods meant Gary couldn't pick me up. In the end he paid for me to fly to Geraldton, where he then met me. We stayed one night in Geraldton and drove to Meeka the next day. The weather was lovely in Meeka, very hot and sunny.
Christmas day was an experience! My old manager at the pub I worked at persuaded me to dress up as an elf to help him give out sweets on Christmas morning. So Gary drove the fire truck, with me as an elf and Meacho as santa on the back! I did get a bit sunburnt, but it was a
More Floods!
To try to give an idea of how high the waters got, you can kind of see a sign here that is usually on bone dry land! nice morning driving around. I spent the rest of the day at Paddy's Flats (where Gary lives), where Chris (the chef at the pub) had made all the food for christmas dinner. All the food was cold as they tend not to eat hot food when it's so hot outside. It was all very good. A lot of seafood, cold roast chicken, ham, salads etc. There were about 15 of us for Christmas day. After we had eaten, some of us went for a swim in the pool and then we spent the night drinking and partying basically! New Years was about the same thing - a big party!
So, I loved being back in Meeka as the place really felt like a home now. I knew I needed to work and save more money for New Zealand and Fiji so thought I would try to find work in Meeka. I had a free place to stay with Gary so I could save more money. I knew the girls were staying a lot longer in Carnarvon and they were staying a second year in Australia so they didn't have the rush to see everything else that I had. I
asked around and managed to find a very good paying job in the local supermarket, Farmer Jacks. It paid $21 per hour (brilliant compared to the $12 per hour at the pub!), you got evenings off and sundays off. I got on so well with the other girls who worked there and although the job was a bit tedious, it was a real laugh with the girls!
Now some of you know the drama that occurred with the girls in Carnarvon over the car. I had told them before Christmas that I wanted out and called them as soon as I knew I was staying in Meeka for a while. I asked them to decide what they were doing and let me know as soon as possible. The car was in my name so I wanted that changed as soon as possible because if they do anything bad in the car, I'm responsible for it! The girls were really dragging their feet and not answering my phone calls and texts and refusing to make a decision. I didn't want to leave Australia with a vehicle still registered to me so in the end I had to just transfer the
The Commie
The pub I used to work at car over to them. To this day, I still have not received any money for the car. The worst thing is is that I paid for half of the car because they didn't have as much money as I did. So I have lost out on $1100. A hard lesson learnt - don't trust people with anything, even those you have been travelling with for 8 months!
I managed to save enough money during the time I was in Meeka for the rest of my travels. It was very hard to say goodbye to everyone and especially to Gary for the second time. We had lived together for two months now and had grown very close. I know mum was worried that I was going to stay, but me and Gary had already discussed the future and for very good reasons we had decided that it wouldn't work as we both wanted different things. Anyway, we will stay in touch as friends. So on February 28th I left Meekatharra for Perth and started my last travels around Australia!
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