Kalgoorlie and across the Nullabor to Port Augusta, Only 1666km's to travel

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February 16th 2010

Published: February 18th 2010

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Gemma and Stephen

Crossing the Nullabor

Sunset in the Nullabor desert

We left Esperance behind us and started our drive up to Kalgoorlie and arrived thankfully just before a huge thunderstorm front rolled in. We found ourselves a handy campsite just on the outskirts of town and the following morning we started a very busy day at the tourist information centre. Kalgoorlie was different than other towns we had visited; it was a gold mining town. Everything was just a little rough around the edges, and while tourism was very well set up there was a big contrast with sightseers and the workers of the town. In addition Kalgoorlie is in the middle of nowhere, in a semi-arid climate, and nothing but bush all around with a few smaller towns dotted in between.

While we were here we took in a tour of the mining hall of fame and a tour of an old underground mine. We got squeezed into a small lift to take us down a small mine shaft and at the bottom we were 36 metres below ground and spent an hour exploring with our guide all aspects of gold mining. It was also a cool 20 degrees which was a nice respite from the 35

Crossing The Nullabor

If you are eating your dinner while viewing this, then i am VERY sorry!!!

degrees above ground. While in Kalgoorlie we also visited the site above the old disused gold mine which had been developed into a mining village as it would have been when gold was first discovered in the 1880’s. We saw a demonstration where they showed the technique of how to pour gold into a cast. It was only a mixture of silver and bronze though so actual gold.

The super pit was high on our list of things to do, and the open cast gold mine was huge, it could rival parts of the Grand Canyon for sure. It was on the edge of town and the viewing platform gave us a great view. The trucks looked so small in reality, like dinky toy trucks but they were massive. The tires alone were easily bigger than our campervan. We timed our trip with a scheduled blast which was great to see. It happened so quickly and was so loud. It was awesome!

Next it was to the town hall for a free guided tour, we weren’t expecting much but it was actually very interesting, our guide had a great sense of humour which definitely helped.

Kalgoorlie

Lightning during storm over the city

Our penultimate stop of the day (boy- did we pack in a lot!) was a little different. So many places jump on the tourism band wagon nowadays and brothels offering tours to the general public are definitely one of them. It was unlike any sightseeing tour we we’ve ever done or will do again. It actually was quite educational; the brothel was very ordinary and not as seedy as we assumed it would be. It is open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year with 15 working girls there. And as only one of three left in Kalgoorlie we reckon it does a pretty good business too. During the goldrush there was 18 Brothels in Kalgoorlie and when the pubs closed at 6pm, with nothing else to do the miners all made a bee line for Hay St. for 'something' to do!

Our final stop was late into the evening were we visited the super pit gold mine again, we had been told that a night it was just as amazing so we had to check it out. In the end only spent about 30 seconds looking down into the pit but a further hour watching the

Nullabor Links

gemma putting for par....

most fantastic lightning storm that was slowly moving towards us. Stephen even managed to get some really good pictures on our camera (we also had 329 shots of a black sky, waiting on those lightning strikes).

We only stayed 2 nights in Kalgoorlie in total and on the morning of our second day we started The Nullabor Links Golf Course, the longest golf course in the world. It stretches a massive 1365km's from Kalgoorlie in WA to Ceduna in South Australia. We played our first to hole in Kalgoorlie, one on the way down to Norseman, and two the following morning in Norseman before turning left and onto the highway that would take us across the Nullabor. There is a hole of golf every 80 kilometres or so and things were really going well until we reached the 12th hole, called Dingo's den.

We had the place to ourselves and had just teed off when crows started swooping in and taking our balls of the fairway. We kid you not; the crows were nicking our balls! Stephen lost two and spent about half an hour looking for them in the scrub and I lost just

Kalgoorlie

Lightning storm over the city lights up two stationed trucks

the one and it happened to be on one of the best shots I had hit all day. The crow was sitting on a post on the edge of the fairway watching and waiting. He followed my ball and as soon as it landed he swooped in, picked it up and flew of. So there I was, indignant that a bird had nicked my ball, running after the crow down the fairway golf club in the air shaking it at the bird and shouting at it. What a sight I must have been. We followed the crow to where he dropped it but we couldn't find it. Did he bury it? Eat it? Who knows? It was one of the more interesting and less accurate holes we've played. And in the words of Father Jack from Father Ted, 'Feckin' birds again!'

It took us three days to cross the Nullabor and it was a long and tiring drive. Nullabor is an aboriginal word and means ‘no tree’, and the Nullabor plain definitely lacking any significant vegetation, not much grows here except hardy scrub bushes. It is sandwiched between the Great Victoria Desert to the north and the Great

Nullabor Links

The professional golfer....

Australian Bight to the south where there is no land until Antarctica so it is pretty exposed to the elements, the cold from the south and the heat from the desert to the north. Prior to the 1950’s it was quite an achievement to cross the Nullabor as it was just dirt track, now though it is all bitumen and we were lucky to cross in the comfort of our camper. The road even doubles up as a runway for aeroplanes in certain spots. We camped in free camping spots along the way, usually attached to roadhouses where a morning tea & coffee was much appreciated. It was at one of these free rest stops that we witnessed the most amazing sunset we have ever seen, being in the middle of nowhere with nothing but bush around us we had uninterrupted views. It was magical, just as the thunderstorm was which followed. Before the storm hit the air around us crackled, everything as dead still and calm and then the lightning and thunder began, it was amazing, deafening. Nothing but us, two other vans, the low lying scrub, no buildings, no traffic on the road, hardly another sole for miles

Kalgoorlie

the two of us in the mouth of a huge digger.

and miles around us. I don’t think we will experience anything like it ever again.

We finally arrived into Ceduna in South Australia no worse for wear after a final night in Eucla. The national park in Eucla was interesting, just sand dunes that seemed to go on forever. We learn that they were created after a population of rabbits invaded the area and destroyed all the vegetation that held the dunes in place. Once the vegetation had gone the dunes slowly encroached on the town which had to then relocate 4km north of where it originally was.

We climbed over them to reach the original telegraph station which was fun to explore; the sand has reclaimed a lot of the ruins, only parts of the buildings are exposed now. We were still playing our round of golf when we arrived in Ceduna and completed the final hole here. We even have a certificate each noting our completion of the Nullabor links course from the Ceduna tourism office. After a few nights of roughing it on the road we checked ourselves into a nice campsite and treated ourselves to a long hot shower. We

Kalgoorlie

Lightning storm over the city

were moving on the next day and with another decent day of driving ahead we crashed early.

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Aboriginal settlers arrived on the continent from Southeast Asia about 40,000 years before the first Europeans began exploration in the 17th century. No formal territorial claims were made until 1770, when Capt. James COOK took possession in the name...more history