Nullarbor to Balladonia

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It is going to be HOT today although we will be travelling towards a cool change. The forecast for Nullarbor is 42°C, but not until 4.00pm when we will be long gone and hundreds of kilometres away. The forecast for Balladonia, our destination for tonight is similar but it is expected to be much cooler there by the afternoon. What will we encounter along the way? Regardless of the heat we need to cover 687 kilometres today, so we headed off early again departing the roadhouse at 8.06am.

Although the sun had risen it was hiding behind a cloud bank, so the light conditions were dull. It was dark enough for the truck to decide that it should have the headlights on. Hmmn, is it light enough for all the nocturnal wildlife to have gone to bed for the day or not? It is all well and good to plan an early start to avoid the heat of the day, but we definitely don’t want to be sharing the road with the kangaroos, wombats and camels.

We spied a dog-like creature venturing out onto the road well ahead of us, so Bernie started to slow down. About the same time the animal, perhaps a dingo, maybe a fox? clocked us motoring up the slope towards it and it skedaddled. Not a hair to be seen by the time we crested the hill.

Next we encountered the roadkill team clearing dead roos from the road. What a revolting job? We didn’t stop to watch, but imagine they probably chuck the carcasses into the saltbush for the crows to feed on? Or do they take them somewhere to be processed into blood and bone fertilizer or to a roadkill café to be made into burgers, ha, ha. I hate to see the roadkill, but you have to employ a bit of dark humour … or cry.

There are crows everywhere so plenty of them to pick the carcasses clean! Sometimes they are obviously taking advantage of a tasty bit of roadkill on or near the road but at other times they are just sitting around on the road … What is with that? Are they waiting for roadkill?? The clearing team does explain why we have seen relatively few dead animals on the road. Waaaay less roadkill than we saw in Tasmania in 2016. In our experience, Tasmania is the roadkill capital of Australia. It is a fact that cars and wildlife do not mix, but never has it been more confronting than in Tassie.

At this point we were driving along a long straight section of road designated as the RFDS emergency runway, but it was littered with the greatest number of dead roos we have seen to date, well, we were now ahead of the clearing team. And then we saw two small roos jump across the road in front of us. A good distance in front of us thank goodness so no close call. The number or roos – dead and alive – made it seem like a wildlife corridor?? We wondered how that works with the RFDS emergency landing strip?

Yay, the first Bunda Cliffs viewing point was well marked with a brown photo opportunity sign. The highway is very close to the cliffs in this section between Nullarbor and the border, so it was only a short distance into the parking and viewing area. The view was spectacular, but looking east, straight into the sun. Timing?! Ideally it is probably best to photograph this section with some lovely golden light … in the mid to late afternoon. Something to note for any future crossings of the Nullarbor Plain and/or to recommended to others.

Bunda Cliffs Viewing Area 2 was also well signposted. The view at this point was looking westward so much more compatible with a morning visit. With the sun higher in the sky and all of the cloud cover burnt off the day the day was definitely warming up quickly and blowing a gale. I was trying to be sun smart and have a broad brimmed hat on, but that meant having the chin strap done up under my chin. What a dorky look! Is that why the other three were consistently several paces ahead of me, ha, ha.

Damn, every time we are stopping at a viewpoint the roadkill team overtakes us again!

It was a longer section of highway to drive between viewpoints No 2 and No 3. We found at the third viewpoint that the landscape was quite different from what we observed at the first two lookouts. The cliffs were not quite so sheer at this viewpoint with a more graduated transition from the land to the ocean.

Viewpoint No 4 was different geography again this time with dunes visible in the transitional zone between the viewing area and the sea. The disappointing thing about this viewpoint is that it is home to a disgraceful monument to humanity. It has the LARGEST rock cairn that I have ever seen. It is nearly as tall as me and littered with old shoes and fake flowers (why?) and it adds absolutely NOTHING to the landscape. Why can’t tourists abide by the wilderness area mantra to TAKE ONLY MEMORIES, LEAVE ONLY FOOTPRINTS.

Why are human beings so compelled to leave their mark? I suppose many would argue that all they did was move a rock that was already there. It still departs from the concept of leaving nothing more than a footprint though because a stupid human has changed the natural environment … and then another and another until you have a huge ugly cairn spoiling the viewpoint. Ugh, people frustrate me so much.

It is only 20 kilometres from Viewpoint No 4 to the border between South Australia and Western Australia. At this crossing quarantine is taken very seriously to prevent (mainly) agricultural pests and diseases from being taken into WA. The checking point is staffed, and they do inspect your car rather than just take you at your word that you don’t have any prohibited food on board … and to make sure that you don’t have your parrot in the car with you. In addition to livestock, birds are not permitted to cross the border.

Formalities completed we pulled around into the car park beside the SA/WA sign. It is a very sad affair at the moment surrounded by temporary fencing with an Unsafe Area sign attached. Not a very glamorous border crossing at all. But we took photos anyway! First time across and all, you have to do the cheesy tourist things.

We made a petrol stop at Eucla for Cathy and Steve just 12 kilometres west of the border. The motel and restaurant here looked lovely from the outside. We’re not sure if it’s a bad thing that we are not booked in here on the return trip but at the Border Village Roadhouse. Of course we shouldn’t be judging on external appearances alone, the rooms might be horrible once you get inside?!

We stimulated the local economy when we decided to purchase sandwiches for lunch and some morning tea. We do have food items to make lunch on the road, but it was so windy today we didn’t fancy mucking around with crackers and fillings for a picnic lunch. Much, much easier to buy sandwiches already assembled and ready to eat. Bernie couldn’t resist a sausage roll for morning tea and I was tempted by an apple scroll.

The time zones were really messing with our heads … and our stomachs. We left the Nullarbor Roadhouse three hours ago but here at Eucla it is almost a case of arriving here before we left this morning?? Nullarbor is on Australian Central Daylight Time, Eucla is on Australian Central Western Standard Time time which is 1’45” behind ACDT (it’s only a 45 minute difference when it’s not daylight-saving time in SA) so we have gained 1’45” crossing the border and it’s only 9.30am.

However, some of our watches have decided to update us to Australian Western Standard Time already (technically that’s not until Caiguna) and that makes the time 2’30” earlier than it is in Nullarbor. It’s going to be a long day?! With two and a half hours gained we have to try to work out when to eat – when we’re hungry or when it’s an appropriate mealtime Australian Western Standard Time? Maybe we’ll just have to snack to get us through to dinner time!!

Tracey jumped behind the wheel to drive from Eucla. The plan was to try to find a nice picnic stop for brunch/lunch. Unfortunately, it’s not going to be a lovely beachside stop today. We would settle for a bit of shade, but so many rest stops are featureless, shadeless dustbowls. We pulled in at the Mundrabilla Roadhouse and even it did not have a shaded place to eat. We decided to continue and to check out the rest stops for a ‘nice’ one.

As luck would have it the next rest stop west was actually treed. Even better it had some shade and actually ticked ALL the boxes with a picnic table and bench seat in the shade. It was HOT though – mid-30s and we had to keep or hands constantly flapping to keep the flies from our food. So glad we bought the packaged sangas, it would have been horrible trying to make up food from our supplies with all the flies about.

Bernie resumed the driver’s role after lunch. Definitely for the best. Even typing and chewing Tracey was struggling to stay awake after lunch. Even though our watches said that it was still before noon, Tracey’s body clock knew that it was well into the afternoon and time for a siesta!

We didn’t pull off to the left for the Madura Roadhouse but, after climbing the Madura Pass, we did take the right hand turn for the lookout. Well, that was less obvious than it could have been!!? There was a very indistinct pull-out area that looked like it ‘might’ have a view over the plain BUT the road continued. We followed the road a bit further into the tundra before deciding that it was looking like much less of a viewing opportunity the further we went.

Bernie executed a U-turn, and we proceeded back to the first pullout area where there were a couple of big yellow bins. That must be the right place as most of the designated rest areas have these big yellow drums with a hinged mesh lid over the top. The lookout shows the treed flanks of the Hampton Tablelands merging into the (relatively) treeless plain below. Worth a look to see the contrast in the landscape.

Another rant! The yellow bins are provided at all the rest stops and they have meshed lids to keep the litter in. The councils provide this infrastructure in the rest areas to deal with the rubbish BUT that system still relies on stupid humans putting their rubbish into the bin rather than just dropping it where they stand. It would be reasonable to expect people to take their litter with them, but bins are provided so they don’t have to do that but still they can’t take two steps to a bin to dispose of their rubbish thoughtfully and responsibly. On the positive side, the viewpoints we visited this morning were clean AND the sides of the highway generally are much cleaner than we expected. The main litter problem is in the rest areas.

We have had a hot northerly wind all day and it was still blowing hot and dusty from the north at the lookout. As we drove closer to Cocklebiddy the wind strengthened and moved around to the south, south-west and the temperature gauge in the car started to drop with the temperature under 30°C by the time we pulled in at the Cocklebiddy Roadhouse.

Diesel was pumped into the truck here at Cocklebiddy. She took 55.34 litres at $262.0/litre. That’s still expensive but nowhere near as pricey as it was at the Nullarbor Roadhouse. It pays to check! With the cars refuelled it was time for the rest of us to have an afternoon snack … just to ensure that we are not ravenously hungry by dinner time in Balladonia when our stomachs will be thinking it’s bedtime. They had Splices in the freezer again, yum! So much smaller than when we were young though!

And our watches continue to confuse things even further with some showing AWST and some on the weird intermediate time for Eucla. Sitting in the car right now tying this, both with Apple Watches and iPhones on the Telstra network Tracey’s watch and phone say it is 1.46pm and Bernie’s say it’s only 1.02pm. Time zones are confusing anyway, but this is ridiculous. After Caiguna we are on AWST for the next four weeks. We won’t really have to worry about time zones again until then … unless we decide to call someone in Victoria … and they’ll be three hours ahead of us!!

From Caiguna we set out on the 90 Mile Straight, Australia’s Longest Straight Road at 146.6 kilometres in length. Hmmn, this is a dead straight and very boring section of highway, so Tracey dozed off. No surprises there! Tracey didn’t miss much and managed to be wakeful to witness the first bend in 146.6 kilometres. Yay.

We were now down to the last 153 kilometres into Balladonia. We were wondering when we would see evidence of last week’s bushfire. We couldn’t even see a plume of smoke billowing up into the sky so wondered if the fire is out? At the very least is must be well under control. It turns out the fire was very close to the settlement of Balladonia because we didn’t see the burnt trees along the side of the highway until we were at about 12 kilometres out of town. After a few kilometres of recently burnt bush, we passed into an area that must’ve burnt earlier and is now regenerating. A check on Google indicates that the area last experienced a bushfire in January 2020.

We arrived in Balladonia mid-afternoon which felt weird because we had been on the road for eight hours plus stops and it felt much later in the day for us. We refuelled, checked in and unloaded our gear into our small, but perfectly formed rooms. The rooms here are definitely on the small side, but they are clean and well-appointed and are perfectly alright for a place to lay our heads for one night.

Chatted with the couple in the room next door who are returning to Perth after three weeks in Adelaide meeting their brand-new granddaughter. They left Ceduna this morning and drove nearly 1,000 kilometres today! We just spent the last two days travelling the same distance but then we were doing a bit of sightseeing on the way. When you’ve made the trip between Adelaide and Perth multiple times you don’t need the border crossing photographs anymore and can keep on pushing for home.

To keep us going until dinner times we snacked on Twisties! Going through multiple time zones messes with your mind and your metabolism. The restaurant opened at 5.00pm, but we held out until 6.00pm before having dinner. We didn’t want to be awake feeling hungry in the middle of the night.

Oh, dear, even though it’s been a long day it’s been a bad one for exercise and move goals. With the heat and the wind and the hours in the car, not to mention the sun setting at 6.15pm! move and exercise goals have not been reached today.



Steps: 5,723 (3.85kms)

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