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Published: June 15th 2010
Wave Rock
Amazing rock formation.We have been very lucky with the weather. Although quite cold in the morning, we still continue to have pleasant days with temperatures in the low twenties and occasional eighteen or nineteen degrees.
Added to that, we have had ideal towing conditions with little wind and no rain.
As has been our experience in the past, we continue to meet nice people along the way.
NORSEMAN
We had planned to spend three nights in Norseman. Luckily, we took note of advice from a number of people and bypassed it going to Esperance and back again to Kalgoorlie. It is a good fuel spot and has a nice feature of camel statues on the central roundabout. These are its only features as far as we could see. So the trick is to go to Fraser Range Station .
KALGOORLIE-BOULDER
We noted on the way to Kalgoorlie that the outlook was more semi-desert than the Nullarbor. Once there, it became evident that it was a thriving town with lots of bustling activity. Big wide streets and many historical buildings give it charm. Two towns joined together to form the City of Kalgoorlie-Boulder. Boulder
York Hotel
Beautiful inside and nice lunch as well! shopping strip is situated about 5klm down the road but the two areas about each other and it is really a single city now.
Boulder During late April this year, there was an earthquake in Boulder and the shopping strip is currently lined with scaffolding to prop up buildings that were damaged. Many businesses are currently unable to trade because of damage waiting for repair. The extent of damage was not fully evident from the footpath but clearly the quiet town got a real shake up! Some of the buildings had partially collapsed or were badly cracked.
Coolgardie The original gold mining hub in the area was Coolgardie. It was from here that Kalgoorlie was discovered. Now, however, it is the poor neighbor. We were surprised to find that the town was very small and activity levels were minimal even though it is only 38klm from Kalgoorlie. From our early schooling, we had always seen Coolgardie and Kalgoorlie as twin towns of similar size. A misconception!
Questa Casa Brothel ‘You can’t go to Kalgoorlie without visiting the famous brothels ‘ is often heard. So off we went to do the
The Super Pit
Kalgoorlie showpiece. 2pm tour of the oldest working brothel in town the Questa Casa. Talk about seedy! The madam conducted the tour and to begin with she was intent on shocking everyone by passing dildos around and spending copious time describing faults of the ‘girls’ and the ‘gentlemen’.
In fairness though, the history was interesting and clearly in a male environment, there is a need to assist some men meet their physical desires. At $18 , it was worth a look.
The Super Pit Undoubtedly the highlight of our stay in Kalgoorlie, the Super Pit is the open cut gold mine run by Kalgoorlie Consolidated Gold Mines . We opted to do the Super Pit tour that lasted two and a half hours. It was mind boggling to see the size of the mine, the processing plant and the vehicles moving the gold bearing rock around.
It is difficult to describe the immensity of the project and even photos don’t give a full perspective of the enormity of the mine . Up close a 240 ton truck is massive and the crushing plants are amazing. The mine operates 24/7.
Earthquake!
A Boulder Hotel in [t]rubble. After the tour we went up to the public viewing platform to watch a blast. They happen most days around 1pm. You feel it first, hear it second and see it last. Visually, it consists of clouds of dust rising a few meters above the blast area surface. Obviously they don’t want rock being blasted into the air so it is not really spectacular.
MERREDIN
Merredin is a wheat belt area town of around 3000 individuals. There is a nice little shopping strip just off the highway. Being about half way to the coast, it suited us as an easy one night stopover on the way to the coast. The Park was very friendly but being right on the Highway, it was a bit noisy over night with a number of road trains passing through. We would stay here again on transition to the coast.
Hyden - Wave Rock We had a dilemma. Many people had told us to go to Wave Rock and then at the Super Pit blast a chap told us not to bother. On the strength of that we thought we wouldn’t bother. Having mentioned our plan to the park manager at
Camel
A feature in Norseman Merredin, she howled the advice down and said we ‘must’ see it. So instead of detouring, we jumped in the car and drove the 165 klm to see it. The verdict? A worthwhile drive. Like most tourist attractions, there is something about it that needs you to be there. Photos do not give the full impact of the rock formation of the ‘wave’ and the area in general.
The next stop will be Guilderton that is 90klm north of Perth. We have friends at Yanchep we want to catch up with and from there we can visit a number of attractions.
Don’t forget that we want to know what you are doing too!
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