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Published: August 20th 2006
Number 22
A room that will live in infamyThe journey to Broome consumed all the remaining daylight hours, with the only interesting scenery being some controlled bush burning that looked atmospheric with the smoke swirling in the sunset.
We had tried to book beds in Broome from Port Hedland, and the only one of the 4 Broome hostels that had had any availability was the Last Resort. I'm assuming this place was named ironically, but unfortunately it proved to be a 100% accurate description. I wasn't keen on it from the minute we checked in, with loud music blaring out from a jukebox, and rather offhand treatment from the girl on reception. However the dorm that Daniel and I ended up in seemed fine, apart from the polyester sheets.
Broome's origins lie in the pearl industry, initially more for the mother-of-pearl shell lining, but latterly for the gems themselves. Japanese divers predominated in the early days, with a support staff drawn from many other Asian nations, and the dangers they encountered in those pre-scuba times are reflected in the number of divers' graves in the town's cemeteries. In the modern era, the production of cultured pearls has also required Japanese expertise. This Asian heritage can still be
seen around Broome, but more in the names of restaurants and bars than in any large Asian population.
The town itself is no great shakes, with the many tourism-related shops showing where Broome's priorities seem to lie. I can only assume that there is plenty of backpacker work in the area too, given the complete lack of bed availability in any of the hostels - certainly Broome isn't exciting enough to warrant staying here for tourist reasons only. I was also a little frustrated to find that the tour that I wanted to do from Kununurra to the Bungle Bungles was already fully booked for the next 2 departures - after my spate of cancellations just days ago due to lack of numbers, it's annoying that I now can't get on tours for completely the opposite reason.
I paid a visit to Town Beach, which isn't really a swimming beach due to the large mud flats between the beach and the sea. Further inland I went through the Japanese and Chinese cemeteries. I did some laundry back at the hostel but it proved woefully inept at removing the many Karijini-related stains on my clothes. I also noted that
the same set of people who had been playinjg pool in the hostel when I was eating breakfast were the same group still playing pool at dinner.
We were all interested in watching the World Cup final but, due to some timing confusion, managed to miss the first half an hour, by which time the score was already 1-1. At half-time we headed over the Kimberley Klub (another hostel) where there was a large TV, and watched the second half there. A game that France deserved to win ended up going to penalties, where Italy reversed their shoot-out form of the last few years and became champions. Elena was obviously pleased by this, but (from a neutral point of view) it was a rubbish end to a tournament in which Italy certainly didn't play the sort of football that I would expect from World Cup winners, and (from a biased point of view) if an unworthy team was going to win it then surely fate could have thrown a bone England's way?
Daniel and I had to move to a different room the following morning, courtesy of the hostel being one (of many) that has such an antiquated
booking system that it's easier for them to move existing residents around than to assign yet-to-arrive residents to another room. Things didn't get off to a good start when I lost my key within seconds of getting it (which is something I just never do and I began to wonder whether I'd been given it in the first place). The room was a real mess, with the luggage from one bunk taking up half the floor. A couple of British (not a term I'd normally use, but one was Irish and one was Welsh, so it was the shortest way of describing this if I hadn't subsequently decided to explain it) girls were already in residence, and they immediately warned me off one of the available lower bunks, advising that the guy in the bunk above it was extremely smelly. An enquiry into what they meant resulted in them reeling off a litany of odorous activities perpetrated by this chap - excessive farting, possessing a pair of stinky feet, possessing (possibly as a result of the former) several pairs of honking shoes, owning skidmark-emblazoned undies, etc. He was also the owner of the messy luggage. I thanked them for the
warning and commandeered another bunk.
After moving in, Daniel and I headed over to Cable Beach, one of Broome's most famous sights. Though it was long and had an impressive width of powdery sand, it was separated from the water by a large expanse of wet sand, and the patrolled swimming section was rather narrow. With a fair crowd there too, in my mind it was vastly inferior to Paradise Beach at Coral Bay (which is at the top of my lifetime list of Best Beach Ever). The sea was warmer than at Coral Bay but rather murky, and the small onshore break meant that it was impossible to slowly immerse yourself in the water. I saw a jellyfish, a guy with a snorkel saw a stingray, and Daniel overheard someone later saying they'd seen a sea snake, so we were sharing the ocean with some interesting wildlife.
There's a famous webcam at Cable Beach that we moseyed along to so that Daniel could attempt to wave at his parents in Germany, but unfortunately the sun was directly behind him so they said they couldn't see him. While we were there, eating fish and chips and fighting off
some squawking seagulls, we bumped into Kat and some other Sleazyriders, who were on their way to the Kimberley Klub (interestingly, when we'd been in the Kimberley Klub for the World Cup final, we'd seen the hostel's chalkboard advertising the activities for the coming week - for the Easyrider arrival night, it had said "You might meet your future wife", which summed up the firm's reputation nicely.)
Back at the hostel I was unamused to find the latest resident of the dorm - a dirty, scruffy old guy, sprawled on his bunk scratching his pot belly which protruded from under a tatty vest. There was an unpleasant smell in the room, which I fancifully thought was urine - it was only when I saw the stains down the front of the guy's shorts that I was unable to avoid that conclusion. And this wasn't even the smelly guy that I was warned about this morning.
After dinner and discussions about the various problems that Elena (couldn't find a job) and Daniel (couldn't find a suitable tour across the Kimberley) had encountered today, it was time for bed. The dorm reeked of urine. There were urine splatters outside the
dorm and along the walkway, presumably from when the old guy had been heading for the loo but had been unable to make it in time. The other allegedly smelly guy was also in bed, but I think his contributions to the overall aroma in the room were minimal by comparison. I tried breathing more shallowly and through my mouth only, as it was disgusting.
I had a broken night's sleep, partly due to the smell and partly due to the old guy's regular toilet visits. It was clear that he was very unsteady on his feet and I concluded from all the available evidence that he must be an alcoholic. The young smelly guy got up at 4:15AM, presumably for work, and the old one had a protracted dressing session from 5AM, during which he left the door open and an electric light on the other side of the courtyard shone unblinkingly on my face. I got up at 6AM, did my ablutions in the skanky showers, then presented myself at reception to complain. I was told that other people had already complained, and that the guy would be dealt with today, which sounded fine.
A lazy
day ensued, with most of my time spent at Town Beach reading. I also discovered that the "Staircase to the Moon" will be happening later this week. This is a natural phenomenon involving the full(ish) moon, low tide, and mud flats, which together give the appearance of a glowing staircase leading up to the moon. You can see it in other places along this coast too, though Broome tends to make more of a thing of it, with night markets coinciding with the Staircase.
Something I don't think I've mentioned up until now is the price rounding that happens in Australia. The lowest denomation coin is the 5c, however many items are priced at values not divisible by 5c, hence you end up paying less if your final bill has an odd 1c or 2c, but more if it's 3c or 4c. I'm assuming this is to preserve the psychological effect of buying something at a bargain 99c instead of an expensive $1, even though they may well be the same thing at the cash register. It also means that if you want to buy 2 items that cost, say, 52c each, it's cheaper to make 2 visits to
Broome's Last Resort hostel
If you see this sign, keep on walking the checkout at 50c a pop than just 1 at $1.05, though you'd have to be a fairly serious Scrooge to go through that rigmarole on a regular basis. On a similar money-related theme, the banknotes here are excellent, with different colours and sizes for each denomination and a sturdy construction that meant I didn't see a tatty note the entire time I was there.
In the evening I paid a visit to another of Broome's landmarks, namely the open-air Sun Cinema which is apparently the oldest continually-operating one in the world. They were showing "March of the Penguins", which I'd been planning on seeing for quite a while as it combined two of my favourite subjects - penguins and the Antarctic. The cinema was partly a museum, with a collection of old projectors as well as movie posters from various eras. Sitting in a deckchair, with a few stars twinkling around the edge of the screen, and the occasional light aircraft zooming in low to one side on the approach to the airport (the engine noise appearing to be some incongruous part of the soundtrack), it was a very different experience to, say, the Odeon in Leicester Square.
The film itself was a little disappointing, as it was nothing more than a glorified documentary with some cloying anthropomorphisation of penguins. Morgan Freeman should be ashamed of abusing his great voice in such a fashion.
The day had been successful for the other two members of the Fellowship of the Greyhound, with Elena having scooped a job at a hotel in Halls Creek, and Daniel having found a tour to Darwin that met his expectations. Both would be leaving tomorrow, meaning the Fellowship would soon be breaking up. We toasted this with a few Carlton Mids.
Unfortunately, back in the dorm, we discovered that the smelly old guy was still in residence, but in a lower bunk. He said that he'd asked reception if he could move to it, and they'd said yes - clearly indicating that they'd done nothing to get rid of him. Worse, there was another new guest in the dorm, i.e. management were still putting new people in here even though they knew it smelled like a urinal.
I was up at 5:15AM the next morning, and visited the other hostels and motels in Broome to try to find a room. There
was nothing available except a double room in the Roebuck for $120, which didn't appeal. I thus decided that I too would be leaving Broome today. I saw Daniel off on his tour - he commented that he'd been able to smell the original smelly guy this morning, and his main whiff had been cooking fat, which is definitely preferable to urine. Reception could give no answer as to why the old guy hadn't been ejected from the hostel yesterday, as the guy on duty was not the same person who I'd spoken to yesterday - a great demonstration of non-accountability.
The evening coach heading north was almost full (a first), and the driver was apparently imposing some sort of unofficial apartheid with all the Aborigines at the back and the white people at the front. Ian (from Kalbarri) was a fellow passenger, and I was pleased to hear that he was going to be staying at Kununurra too. Less welcomingly, the old guy from the hostel was also on board but fortunately he sat far enough away that I couldn't smell him.
I was glad to be moving on, as the Last Resort had established a new
low in customer service. Even without that experience, I think I would have found Broome wanting as a destination. I was also getting a little worried about how I would be able to fit in all the things I still wanted to see, with my remaining days in Australia dwindling rapidly.
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