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Published: February 11th 2008
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Hannan Street, Kalgoorlie
The main street is so wide - so the camel trains could turn around in the old days - great for driving through in 2008! Since our last blog, we have been having fun finding out more about how our caravan works, we have crossed the Nullarbor, and we are now in South Australia! We ended up spending 4 nights in Kalgoorlie, loved it, it’s a real frontier outback town, and the centre of the Goldfields. There is a lot of history there from the Gold Rush, and we spent some time trying to find out what happened to Blu’s great grandfather Maurice who reportedly had the largest salt water distillation plant in Kalgoorlie at one time, until he went broke, probably when the water pipeline from Perth reached Kal in 1903. Anyway, we found his grave (or we think it is his) at the cemetery but unfortunately no headstone! Never mind we did some interesting research at the local town hall and checked out some of the electoral rolls of the time - found out that Nana Lang lived in Kalgoorlie in 1914, we didn’t know that.
Visited the Royal Flying Doctor Service which was amazing, what a service it is - 5 bases cover the whole of Western Australia, and are required to fly 5 or 6 hours at times to meet demand. The
local museum was interesting and we also popped into the School of Mines to see if cousin Robert was about, but he was out of town which was a shame.
Kalgoorlie is famous for its Hay Street bordellos, there are now 3 in town, I guess in the heyday of the gold rush there would have been a few more! With a population of around 6,000 women and 26,000 men, they do provide an important service even today! Anyway, why I mention this is because we did a tour of Langtrees 181 - in “non-working” hours they conduct guided tours - it was a really interesting and funny tour and we had a great time! Our group was Blu, myself and 4 “Grey Nomad” ladies who giggled the whole way through.
Our trip across the Nullarbor was very long - it is a dry and arid part of the country - but a real sense of achievement when you get to the other side- it seems to go on for ever - it is so vast you start to really appreciate how distant Western Australia is from the rest! We spoke to a truckie who said they do the trip
The longest straight road in Oz!
Actually most of it is pretty straight, but this stretch is 90 MILES without a curve! in 19 hours. We stopped 2 nights on the Nullarbor - free camped our first night, and tried out our caravan shower. Had a head wind all the way across which chewed up the fuel. Some fab scenery around the Great Australian Bight and the Bunda Cliffs, and at Eucla with its vast sand dunes.
Fowlers Bay was cold and windy, just like home really - we wore sweatshirts for the 1st time since leaving NZ. So we moved down the Eyre Peninsula, and are now camped at Streaky Bay, which is a lovely little seaside town. Having some R and R here after the long trip east. The camp is right on the foreshore, and we have bought a crab net to see if we can catch some blue swimmers off the jetty. The $8 lunch special at the S B Hotel today was great value - might be the only local fish we eat, but you never know!
We are enjoying the caravanning side of the trip, it has been quite a steep learning curve for newbies like us, but people are so helpful and friendly - there is always someone to give you advice on how to
On the Nullarbor
the word means "no trees" do things. We’ve met lots of people who have been on the road for 5+ years - amazing!
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Alison (your niece)
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Hi Blue and Kate
Hi guys Looks like you guys are really getting around and seeing the place - good one you! Take care and keep the blog going as it is very interesting. Bye Alison XX