Tue 25th of August 2009 Port Hedland to Newman via Karijini National Park ~ 500km After two nights in Port Hedland, in a way I cannot explain, I felt like I was leaving a place I had been in much longer. Maybe I have this desire to live in places of heavy industry, which would explain the attachment to Sheffield UK, the former steel capital of the UK, where I spent two years. The Great Northern Road to the Auski Roadhouse from Port Hedland was 250km and pretty much the typical arid country for this part of the world. While enjoying a meat pie at the roadhouse (I love Aussie meat pies even though rumor has it that horse sales to the meat packers and the football season, where pies are traditionally devoured, are highly correlated) ... read more

Mon 24th of August 2009 Port Hedland to Cape Keraudren to Port Hedland 350km Today was a day of stark contrast - from industrial mayhem to natural beauty beyond words. Last evening after consultation with my friend Steve in Perth I made a fundamental travel decision. I would give Broome and points farther east a miss. Part was timing, and part was a change of intent, that is, not to just cover as many miles as possible, but to travel less and enjoy what I was seeing. Steve felt that the beaches at the beginning of Eighty Mile Beach (only Australia could have a place of such a name) were as good as anything Broome had to offer and I could cut 900 km off the trip this way if I did not care for the ... read more

Sat 22 of Aug 2009 Carnarvon to Karratha 650km Today was a motorcycle enthusiasts dream - a ride with every possible experience. With my longest ride ahead of me today I left Carnarvon early. The air was fresh and crisp, but already the fabled radio telescope, perhaps Canarvon’s most famous attraction, was beginning to shimmer in the early morning light. I read that it was this telescope that received Neil Armstrong’s first and fabled words from the moon. I had known that Australia had received the transmission since it was the middle of the night in the US and hence American receivers were not well positioned. My main source of information was the movie “The Dish” a great account of Australia’s perspective on the event. There is a classic scene of Sam Neil playing cricket in ... read more

Dongara to Denham (Sharks Bay) via Geraldton and the Stomatolites I woke to the sound of crashing waves and the drip, drip of water off the corregated iron roof of the cabin I had rented. From the puddles it was clear it had rained hard over night and the sky was just starting to look a little brighter. I later discovered that rain over night was the norm as the fronts pass through. Without the benefit fo coffee I made the short ride to Geraldton and got to walk the main street abd harbor before the town woke up. Staying in Dongara was definitely the way to have gone. Geraldton tried to look like an up market seaside town but failed. The swank pavements, parks and shelters could not disguise the view of a working port. ... read more

Tue 18th of August 2009 Well my computer says today is the 17th of August; computers are not yet smart enough to know where I am (approaching Sydney) and that a day, at least in calendar time, has been taken away, only to be returned as I leave Australia to return home. After so many years of travelling the emotions as one leaves home remain mixed. There is the sadness tinged with guilt, well more than tinged, at leaving loved ones behind, particularly on a trip like this which is purely for pleasure and your family is left running the household, preparing for the new school year and so on. Then there is the slight sense of uneasiness in flying, yes even after over a million miles of flying. Especially across the Pacific, which goes without ... read more