Day 66 - 71 Crossing the Nullarbor & the Great Australian Bight

So, we stopped and join company with a couple of bush graves on our way north, out of Cape Arid, for one night.  We are now truly approaching the western end of the Nullarbor and the Great Australian Bight, well, if you consider 750 Km is close enough.

By my initial understanding, this part of the trip would be quite boring and plain sailing.....

How boring can it be? A treeless Nullarbor Plain, which boasts the longest stretch of dead-straight highway in Australia, 146.6 Km worth of it, to be exact.  Probably the most interesting thing would be the shear cliff that line the Great Australia Bight coast.

How wrong was I? The trip was filled with interesting signs, stories, rabbit warren riddled golf fairways, thunderstorm, and a mini disaster....a shredded tyre.

I'll let the pictures speak for themselves, and add a bit more explanations below.

You are invited to view David Tam's photo album: 2011 4x4 Outback Trip ( Crossing the Bight ) 2011 4x4 Outback Trip ( Crossing the Bight ) Oct 17, 2011 by David Tam View Album Play slideshow If you are having problems viewing this email, copy and paste the following into your browser: https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/sredir?uname=104007193885500314495&target=ALBUM&id=5964173249595316673&authkey=Gv1sRgCP2pueTIuoLyWA&feat=email To share your photos or receive notification when your friends share photos, get your own free Picasa Web Albums account.

Out from Cape Arid, by mid-morning, we reached Eyre Highway, which runs east-west, we'd be following this boring grade A highway for a good 1500 Km into South Australia, yawn..!

We went searching for a piece of Skylab at Balladonia Roadhouse, I thought all those holes on fairway of Hole # 7 (The Nullarbor Link Golf Course, remember !) were the results of Skylab fallen through in 1979.  No, they are rabbit warrens.  I think the chance for finding your ball if you failed to tee it onto this Par 3 green is next to, well, nil...

As soon as we got on the road after fueling up at Balladonia, we were alerted to watch out for stray camels, emus and of course, 'roos, for the next 150 Km. It is the same story for the entire length, followed by another of 340 Km and then others...never ending.  

What is most interesting, is, there are also signs to alert us to watch out for aeroplanes.  

The highway also doubles as a runway, for emergency uses, especially for the Royal Australian Flying Doctors services.  And we also share the road with many road trains carrying freights between Western Australia and the eastern States.  And then, there is the longest straight stretch of highway of Australia, with absolutely not a bend of any degree.

You'll have a hearty laugh at the sign outside Cocklbiddy Roadhouse, at the sense of bush humor, highlighting the isolation of these places, 

second to only the other one I encountered during my recent trip through the Gulf of Carpentaria, which says,

We were nowhere near the coast for another day, until we reached South Australia. Here we have to clear out all our fruits & vegetables, ready for the quarantine station at Ceduna, still another 500 Km from the border.

As soon as we crossed the border, the beautiful coastal features of the Great Australian Bight were beginning to appear. 

The cliff are really shear and rugged, a magnificent sight they are.  It is the lure of these cliff, that caused me an expensive tyre.. a $400 pop.  Without going into the details, let's say, I was too eager to get close to the cliff, and strayed onto somewhere I shouldn't be traveling on....resulted in a fully shredded tyre.  The amazing thing was, I still couldn't understand where I gathered the strength to lift the heavy tyre from ground to chest level, all in one go, and had to hold it, in order to slot it onto the carrier, through 3 bolt holes, co-ordinated....what an adrenalin rush !!

As soon as we got out of the trouble with the tyre and back on the highway, through the rear mirrors, I can see a big storm was gathering fast, but the front view was still bright blue sky.  When I mentioned to Julia that we have to find a motel quick, she was protesting why, until I ask her to look back. By now, she's so used to the tent, after nearly 70 days.

When we checked into the motel at Nullarbor Roadhouse, the storm just hit us right in the middle of offloading...thunders all around, and it was water all over the place.  30 minutes later, we had a most calm and bright red sunset.  That night, we slept in a bed for the first time in 67 days, kind of a strange feeling.

We went through the quarantine check at Ceduna without any issues, as we had just about emptied our fridge.  After checking out the final hole ( of the Nullarbor Link ) at Ceduna Golf Course, we raided the local Foodland Supermarket, and continued on.

The plan to spend sometime in Port Lincoln, the York Peninsula ( Port Lincoln etc.) and possibly Adelaide to visit another old schoolmate had to be ditched, because of the wet weather on forecast.  After all, we were beginning to feel trip-weary anyway. We crossed into Victoria and reached Mildura after another 2 days.