WA - South East Feb/Mar 2024
- Ken Fredric
- Feb 15, 2024
- 26 min read
Updated: Mar 12, 2024
Day 15 - WA Border - Madura, WA 12 February, 2024
We woke to another cool morning, with everything outside once again covered in condensation.
This was another one of those days where we didn’t have a clear destination in mind, but badly needing showers, it would have to be one of the roadhouse campsites dotted every 100 km or so along the highway.
The road out of our beautiful campsite wasn’t quite as challenging as getting into it, but it was still very slow going to back out to the A1, where it was only 5 km to the border quarantine station.
Just before the border we stopped at a dump point, and got rid of our rubbish that may have had fruit or vegetable matter in it, as well as throwing away an open honey container, that also was not allowed across the border.
At the quarantine station an inspector checked out the motorhome, where we had to confess to having a full jar of honey, and a lime to go with the Coronas. They were both confiscated before we were allowed to continue across the border in WA.
We went into the border town of Eucla to see if there was any chance of restocking some of the supplies we’d lost in the border crossing. Because it was still very early, with changing to the local time, it was only 7:00 A.M., so we took a drive out towards the coast to check out an old telegraph station, but at the end of the road there was no sign of it.
Back at the little township of Eucla we called into the lookout, that had expansive views of the Nullarbor Plain, and also had a monument to Edward Eyre, the early explorer.
With all the tourist activities exhausted, we went to the motel café for a bacon and egg roll and coffee.
It was still way too early to stop for the night anywhere, so we continued driving slowly along the A1 to the Mundrabilla Roadhouse, to fill up with diesel, and to consider staying the night.
It still seemed way too early to stop for the night, so we got back out onto the A1, with Madura as the next destination.
At Madura we decided we’d had enough of boring roads for the day and booked into an unpowered site for one night.
After we got setup, we discovered that there wasn’t any internet – very disappointing when our camping app indicated there was internet.
That severely restricted our activities for the remainder of the day, and there wasn’t anything else to do in Madura, being primarily a roadhouse, so we had no choice but to chill.
The afternoon was nice enough, warm and not too windy, and the flies not too rabid, so it was quite pleasant sitting and dining outside. We managed to stay up long enough to get a good look at the night sky too, for the first time in ages.
Day 16 - Madura - Caiguna Free Camp, WA 13 February, 2024
The day before and today were mostly about killing time until it was time to drive up to Rawlinna to start our station housesitting experience.
What we hadn’t considered, was that there would be no more internet coverage from the border town of Eucla, as we’d assumed that all the roadhouses along the Eyre Highway would have at least basic internet. How badly wrong we were!
Today was mostly about finding a place to stay for the night that provided internet coverage. All the roadhouses in our camping app noted that they had Telstra reception, which to us would normally mean that we would have internet. However, we discovered that “Telstra Reception” really meant just the phone service, and no data.
After leaving the Madura Roadhouse, there was a lookout a short distance along the road that provided sweeping views of the plains looking out east towards the coast, and to the west where we were headed.
The next stop along the highway was at the Cocklebiddy Roadhouse, where we’d read that we could buy fresh water to replenish our tank, for a price of $2 per 10 litres. That information was correct, so we bought 50 litres which seemed to almost fill the tank. As there was no internet coverage there, we carried on, on our search for some elusive interwebs.
Another 90 km along the road we stopped at the last place that might possibly have internet, the Caiguna Roadhouse, but once more we were disappointed. We drowned our sorrows with coffee and a sticky bun, and deliberated about whether to stay at the roadhouse campground for the night, even thought it was only 10:00 A.M., with another time zone change to WST.
We decided there was no point spending money to stay there when there was no internet, so we carried along the highway a little more to a large off-road area, where the Caiguna Blowhole was located, and found a camping spot away from the road.
With no internet, and not much else to do, we had another forced relaxation day.
Day 17 - Caiguna Free Camp - Rawlinna, WA 14 February, 2024
In front of us today we had a 120+ km drive, primarily through Rawlinna Station, on a "road" that didn't exist on Google Maps. Sounds like fun!
About 30 km further along the Eyre Highway we turned off north onto the Rawlinna Station Wool Road, which would take us all the way through Rawlinna Station south-north, and most of the way to Rawlinna itself.
After a short time we realised the road wasn't in very good condition, which meant we had to stop and reduce our tyre pressures to cope with the rough rocky road surface.
To give some indication of big this station is, 2.5 million acres, from leaving the highway the first paddock started as we drove north. The first gate we came to that marked the end of that paddock, was 30 km from the highway.
The going was very rocky at times, which forced us to slow right down to save the tyres from damage, to under 30 km/h for long stretches.
Apart from brief morning tea and lunch stops we ploughed on through the morning and early afternoon, making very slow progress. To make matters worse, the road was extremely dry so, with the slow speeds and wind direction, the whole motorhome slowly filled with a thick layer of red dust. Eventually it go so bad in the cab we had to point the air vents at the encroaching dust to blow it backwards to stop it choking us.
After a few hours of hard driving we made it the Rawlinna woolshed, where they were in the process of shearing 30,000 sheep in the their 16-stand shed. Once we found Jimmy the manager, he gave us a couple of maps of how to get up to the Trans Access Road about another 30 km north.
That last stretch was just as bad, if not worse, than the preceding sections of road, even though the route took us through the homestead.
We eventually made it out onto the Trans Access Road, which runs alongside the Indian Pacific Railway, so was well maintained for the last 10 km of our day's journey.
For perspective, Rawlinna has only two permanently-populated houses, the one we'd be looking after and the 'roo shooter's house. There is an unmanned train station that the Indian Pacific stops at every Friday night (more on that later) and power is supplied by diesel generators. Water comes from rainwater tanks (not very much) or desalinated bore water that isn't recommended for drinking.
Rawlinna is tiny so it didn't take us long to find our hosts Nicole and Greg, and start to get settled in for the 3-week housesit.
We also started to meet our charges, Lulu the horse, Nellie and Ellie the dogs, 3 huge Merino Sheep, 4 poddy calves and a feral cat.
The rest of the day was spent setting up, showering off the layers of dust, chatting with Nicole, Greg and a couple of BHP guys who were also staying there, while enjoying some drinks to wash away the internal dust.
Nicole and Greg's planned departure to cart wool for Rawlinna Station had a setback when they both became ill after a recent trip to Kalgoorlie.
Unfortunately overnight Meg also became, sick vomiting in the middle of the night a couple of times, and a headache in the morning to make it worse.
Day 18 - Rawlinna, WA 15 February, 2024
We were up early, even though Meg wasn't feeling very well.
Lou the horse was at our door early being noisy and leaving large, smelly deposits. One of the dogs was barking too and also, with the time changes the sun was up a lot earlier than we had been used to for the past couple of weeks.
We pottered around tidying up the yard of calf, sheep and dog poo for a while until Nicole and Greg appeared.
Nicole showed us how to feed milk to the calves, and they seemed to be really hungry guzzling at least two bottles each.
Nicole also showed us how to look after Lou with hay and water, and also how to chop up firewood with a power saw if we had enough time and could be bothered.
Later in the morning I went with Greg so he could show me how the generators that supply power to Rawlinna operate. It was a bit complex, switching from one generator to another if necessary, and I hoped I wouldn't have to do anything with them while he was away.
While out we also checked out the water treatment plant for the local bore water, and also where to find fresh water if we needed it.
We spent the rest of the day learning where we could, and relaxing for Meg, who still wasn't feeing very well.
Day 19 - Rawlinna, WA 16 February, 2024
Today started the same as yesterday, with Lulu the horse bumping her nose on the motorhome door, strong enough to rock the boat, at 5:30 A.M. We ignored her for long enough that she eventually went away, but that was really the end of sleeping.
One of the BHP workers staying in the next-door house needed fuel before leaving, so I learnt how to do that in case anybody coming through needed fuel.
We did our first solo feed of the four calves this morning - messy little devils! Slobbering milk all over us and themselves, fighting over the bottles and using the feeding area as a toilet. I don't know how Nicole manages to do it by herself.
After feeding time at the zoo we did some poo collection on the lawn, and tidying up under the veranda, but that was mostly in vain as the sheep were still locked in the yard and pooing everywhere.
We'd uncovered the e-bikes on the back of the motorhome the day before, and they were absolutely covered in dust. With our other chores done we took the opportunity to wash them down, leaving them looking a lot more respectable.
Nicole had been over to the railway station while we were doing our chores and reported that she'd seen a small snake on the platform, and thought it should be removed because the Indian Pacific train was stopping at the station tonight, as it does every Friday evening.
We went back over to the station with a couple of spades and removed what we thought was probably a baby brown snake, one of the worst types to have around.
As mentioned, every Friday, the Indian Pacific train stops at Rawlinna Station for the passengers to get off, to have some drinks and a meal sitting on tables outside the station. There could be up to 250 people on the train, and the meal is pre-prepared on the train before arrival at Rawlinna. The train arrives in Rawlinna around 5:30 - 6:00 P.M.
To help with this weekly ritual, Nicole puts out lights along the tracks before and after Rawlinna, sets up some music, mingles with the passengers while they eat and drink, then tidies everything up when they're gone, with Greg's help when he's there. So, as long as we were going to be housesitting, this will be our job.
We held off until late afternoon to go over to the station to set up for the train, waiting until the temperature dropped a bit from 38 degrees.
To setup we put lights on every table, lights along the track each end of the station to guide the passengers as they walked from the ends of the train to the seating area, setup bar areas at each end of the station, organised the music system, cleaned the tables and seats, and picked up any rubbish from the previous week.
The Indian Pacific arrived before 6:00 P.M., about 32 carriages carrying around 250 passengers, and a myriad of staff. It took some time for the staff, running around like ants, to setup the tables with entrees, plates, cutlery, condiments, the bars and other table areas, before the passengers started to pour off the train. We helped where we could, but were a bit limited since it was our first time doing this. Nicole had been doing this for over 7 years and knew many of the train staff.
Once most people were seated we relaxed at one end of the platform, where the entertainment was setup, a country singer who mostly sang songs with a train theme. We were invited to have a drink by some staff members so we took them up on that because we were absolutely parched after setting up.
Once entrees, mains and dessert were done with passengers started moving back to the train and we began the clean up. That consisted of moving bags of rubbish from the station area, on the ute, to a carriage further along the train, helping staff by moving some luggage from one end of the train to the other, collecting all the lights, packing away everything in a container and putting away the music system.
With that all done we headed home, getting back around 9:00 P.M. absolutely exhausted and hoping we would remember everything we would have to do by ourselves next week.
Day 20 - 23 - Rawlinna Housesit, WA 17 - 20 February, 2024
Nicole left today to meet up with Greg and help with the wool carting, so we were left to manage things by ourselves.
After some debate about whether they should take one or both dogs with them to make life easier for us, they eventually decided it wouldn't be feasible to take either of them, and left them in our care, along with the horse, sheep, poddy calves, feral cat and the Indian Pacific train on Friday nights.
We settled into a routine quickly, which started with getting up earlier than normal, because sunrise was before 5:30 A.M.
Once sufficiently awake the first chore for the day was to feed the hungry poddy calves bottles of milk. They were usually ravenous after a hard night's sleep, and would drink either two larger bottles each, or three or more smaller bottles each, depending on the calf.
That was the main job in the mornings but there was always something else to do like doing the poo patrol (calf, sheep, dog and horse if Lou had left us a present outside the motorhome), filling up water containers, sweeping, tidying and playing fetch with the dogs. Ellie the Kelpie cross was insatiable when it came to 'fetch the chew rope', and would be happy doing that all day long.
In the late afternoon/early evening we would sit outside in the undercover area by the pool and have a drink, play some more with the dogs, water the grass, fill up containers of pellets for the calves and sheep, check hay and straw and bring the three sheep back into the yard after them having been out all day, where they would usually hang around with Lou the horse.
That daily routine left us a large part of the day to find other things to do. There were a couple of other jobs we could do, like watering the grass over at the train station early/late in the day, and for me sawing firewood with a large trailer-mounted circular saw. The firewood was used in the cooler months, in firepits, at the train station for the Indian Pacific outback experience.
After a few days of settling in we finally cleaned off the filthy e-bikes and made good use of them for the duration of the housesit. It was so much easier to jump on the bike to do things like go over to the station to water grass, rather than taking the Landcruiser or walking a few hundred metres in 40-degree heat.
Because we had so much free time during the day, we also used this time to explore the local area on the e-bikes. Apart from regularly riding all around the train station area, on our first bike ride we rode a short distance to the Rawlinna Airport, which is nothing more than a rough airstrip.
Our next ride was out to the Nullarbor Muster gymkhana facility, which we thought was quite well appointed for a town of two people. We rode the long way around to get there, that participants in muster events would have to take, but took a shortcut across the airstrip to get back home.
Day 24 - Rawlinna Housesit, WA 21 February, 2024
The Day We Survived Hell
Wednesday 21st February, 2024, a day we'll never forget!
We'd been keeping an eye on the weather forecast since we arrived in Rawlinna, and we were well aware of the possibility of very high temperatures on this day. The temperature had been climbing over the previous few days, up to 42 degrees the previous day.
We were woken early by our equine alarm clock, Lou the horse headbutting our door at her usual 5:30 A.M., so we got up and set about our chores before the sun rose too high.
We didn't have too much to do and were back inside Mata nice and early.
The temperature was well into the 30s by 9:00 A.M. and over 40 by late morning.
Because there wasn't much we could practically do in that heat we just had to relax inside with the air conditioning on to battle the heat. Apart from regular checks on the animals we tried to entertain ourselves in the motorhome for most of the day.
We had a nagging feeling for most of the day that our cool comfort could be snatched cruelly from us at anytime if the generator supplying power to run the air cons suddenly stopped.
That happened at the worst possible time, 3:30 P.M. when the temperature was 47 degrees on my phone widget, and was reading 50 degrees on the home weather station.
The running generator had overheated in the extreme conditions. I switched over to the backup generator, but it also stopped five minutes later with an under current error. It turns out that an ARTC (Australian Railway Track Corporation) employee had turned on a few air cons at their depot in Rawlinna in advance of a work crew arriving later in the day, which caused the second generator to trip.
For the next few hours it was a juggle to keep one of the generators going by reducing the load and keeping them as cool as possible until the sun went down and the temperature started to drop down closer to 30 degrees.
After the initial generator shutdown we decided that we might as well not bother with the air con, if the generators were going to keep failing, and open up the motorhome to get as much air in as possible.
We sat outside in a covered area with a portable USB fan blowing oven-hot air at us to keep as cool as we could manage in 47 degrees.
The temperature fell quite quickly after sundown and we thankfully managed to keep one of the generators running for the rest of the night.
Days 25 - 40 Rawlinna Housesit, WA 22 Feb - 08 Mar, 2024
After the hottest day we've ever experienced, we settled back into the usual daily routine, doing most of our chores early in the day, then having most of the rest of the day to ourselves.
On one of these days when the temperature wasn't as high, and the wind wasn't a howling gale, we took the opportunity to ride our e-bikes out to a disused lime mine, about 2 km away.
The ride there was over sometimes rough gravel roads but, despite the small wheels on the bikes, they handled it easily.
All the machinery was still there and we'd read that the mine would probably start up again in the future.
After checking out the ground level operations we rode up to the top of what could have been the raw material, or could have been tailings, to get a good view of the surrounding area from the highest point around for hundreds of kilometres.
There were deep pits that had been blasted and excavated around the mine, but apart from that and Rawlinna it was flat and featureless to the horizon in every direction.
We were thankful for the e-bikes, not just for exploring, but for daily trips over to the train station to do odd jobs, watering the sparse amount of grass and for checking that the water treatment plant just across the tracks was operating.
Once the temperatures cooled down below 40 degrees, the generators behaved themselves, however in our second week of housesitting, the water treatment plant that supplies water to Rawlinna stopped working.
All we had to work with was a badly written operating manual (I think I'm entitled to pass judgement here after 25 years working as a technical writer!) and a mobile phone number handwritten in the control panel. Another challenging experience for us to overcome!
Thankfully the man in SA whose mobile number we had was very helpful, even though it was a Saturday, and we had the plant back online soon after.
That was great until the next day when it was stopped again on our daily check. Once again the man in SA was very helpful, even though this time it was a Sunday. We discovered that the tank the treated water goes into was full, so the plant automatically shut down.
To help fill in the days we started to take the dogs for a daily walk around the immediate area, which they seemed to appreciate. On the first day we did this, not far from the house, we passed a Shingleback Lizard on the road, and we'd also seen others around the house.
Before we bought the motorhome we purchased fly nets to go over our hats in areas where the flies were really bad. We'd hardly had to use them in the 2.5 years of travelling, before coming to Rawlinna, but we were really thankful to have them, and we used them all day every day to keep the flies at bay.
Two weeks into our housesitting gig, and 400 km from the nearest shops, our supplies were getting low.
We were economising as much as possible, reducing meal sizes, sharing tea bags, scrounging what we could from our absent hosts without leaving them short, etc.
So, my very resourceful and talented wife baked a loaf of bread to help with the food situation. Oh, that's easy you may think, but we don't have an oven.
We sat a Weber casserole dish with a lid inside a Weber frypan to simulate an oven and so the bottom didn't get burnt. Yum!
On one of the cooler and less windy mornings we jumped on the e-bikes and headed across the railway line then along an access road until we came to the Connie Sue Highway, which runs 635 km through the Great Victorian Desert, between Rawlinna and Warburton, and is one of the most remote tracks in Australia.
The road was named by the famous surveyor Len Beadell, after his daughter. He was also responsible for other roads like the Gunbarrel Highway and the roads into Woomera and Maralinga (for nuclear testing). In all he oversaw the construction of over 6,000 km of roads.
I suppose back in the 60s when it was constructed it may have identified as a highway, but it certainly wouldn't cut the asphalt these days. The road/track is only a single lane with a surface of hard dirt, embedded rocks and a lot of stones of varying shapes and sizes that didn't really lend itself to riding over on our small-wheeled bikes. Needless to say we didn't travel very far along the highway before turning back for home.
Eventually Friday came around again, as it does, meaning we would be doing the setting up for the Indian Pacific outback experience ourselves, something we admitted to ourselves that could be a bit scary.
We had no need to worry though because we are super organised with any task like that, and we got everything ready during the day, to the point that we were sitting around waiting for ages for the train to come in. The train eventually arrived about half an hour late, which led to a lot of pushing staff to hurry to setup the drinks and meals, to try and make up some time.
Once we helped the entertainment get setup and checked in with the people doing the organising to see if we could help, it was just a matter of sitting back and watching it all happen.
All the train staff were very friendly and generously offered us as much food and drink as we wanted. We passed on the food but did take them up on some drinks to pass the time while waiting for the passengers to be fed and watered, and to get back on the train so we could clean up. after them.
I'd spoken to the head person organising the experience during the evening to see if we could scrounge a couple of beers and a bottle of red and white wine, as our supplies were almost depleted. He said not to worry and that he'd organise that for us. We were surprised once they were all gone to find about a dozen bottles of different beers, a dozen bottles of red and white wine and a whole bunch of cans of soft drinks left for us. That was the alcohol problem sorted, which just left the dwindling food supplies to consider.
In our last few days of the housesit it was pretty much business as usual looking after animals, taking the dogs for walks, tending to the generators and water plant, eking out the food, and relaxing in between times.
At the start of the housesit the flies were annoying, but didn't bother us too much. After a few days though they became bothersome enough for us to use flynets to cover our heads every time we went outside. And by the end of our housesitting tenure the flies were way worse, swarming on us any time we ventured outside.
Our departure from Rawlinna was delayed when the owners had some family issues, and couldn’t back from Kalgoorlie, and after some recent heavy rain the road between Kalgoorlie and Rawlinna was inaccessible to trucks, which was the only transport they had.
Thinking we would be leaving on a Monday morning, it wasn’t until the following Friday that we finally got away. In that last week the weather turned colder and windier, and we had quite a lot of rain, which made us nervous because with too much rain there would be no means of leaving if the roads were closed.
So that was the end of our first housesitting experience.
Day 41 Rawlinna - Kalgoorlie, WA 08 Mar, 2024
With the owners not yet back, but with arrangements made for all the animals, we finally got back on the road on a sunny Friday morning, once again hoping the rain would hold off until we’d travelled the 350 km of the Trans Access Road to Kalgoorlie.
As with many times in the past on such unsealed roads, which is actually owned by the ARTC (Australian Railway Track Corporation) and is used as an access road to maintain the railway line between the SA border and Kalgoorlie, the condition started off reasonable, but soon deteriorated.
Apart from the usual corrugations, there were a few sections where water covered the entire road, leaving us no choice but to drive through the water, on the slippery, red-dirt surface. For the first one of these sections we drove through, we attempted to do it in high range 4WD, but quickly discovered that wouldn’t cut it and we had to resort to low range 4WD, driving very carefully to avoid sliding from side-to-side.
There was nothing to see along the way, no towns or people, just a few railway sidings that are sometimes temporarily populated by ARTC workers. Apart from a few kangaroos and a family of emus running across the road that we had to brake hard for to avoid running them over, the only other wildlife we saw were a few herds of wild camels.
The total drive for the day was only about 370 km but, despite leaving around 8:00 A.M., it took until 3:00 P.M. to get to Kalgoorlie, with only a brief lunch stop along the way.
On the way into Kalgoorlie we stopped at the Consolidated Gold Mines (KCGM) Operation Super Pit viewing area for some photos. The extent of the pit is absolutely mind-boggling and it’s very hard to get a photo that captures the enormity of it.
In Kalgoorlie the first stop was the supermarket to stock up on all the supplies we’d exhausted at Rawlinna. $400 later we were good for food again, but we also needed to stop off at the bottle shop and pharmacy. With all that and the fuel the next day, we managed to blow over $800 in a very short period of time.
The last stop for the day was one of the campgrounds for a one-night stay, on an unpowered site, that still cost $41 for the night. We were enjoying sitting outside for a change without being carried away by rabid flies when the rain started and drove us inside. It continued to rain for most of the night, making us thing about the next day’s plan to drive north to Leonora/Gwalia, where apparently the roads can become flooded and close frequently.
Day 42 Kalgoorlie - Leonora, WA 09 Mar, 2024
After a bit of discussion, we decided to stick to our original plan and drive 240 km north to check out Leonora and Gwalia, mining towns that started in the late 1880s.
On the way out of town we stopped to reinflate the tyres and fill up with diesel, which whacked another $250 on the long-suffering credit card.
Because there are mine sites all the way from Kalgoorlie to Leonora, the road was excellent for most of the journey. The majority of traffic was road trains and mine vehicles, and very few other vehicles.
We stopped briefly in Menzies to take a couple of photos, but there was nothing happening in the small town, so we carried on towards Leonora, aiming to be there for a nice pub lunch.
The only dodgy bits on the road were a few sections that had water right across the road, which wasn’t enough to bother us apart from having to slow right down to go through them. Some cars were sitting on the side of the road at these places, obviously contemplating if they should attempt driving through.
In Leonora by lunchtime, we headed straight to the Central Hotel, ordered food and sat down with a drink, a rare treat after Rawlinna.
Well fed and watered we drove the short distance to Gwalia, an old mining town that was the reason we made this journey. We checked out the old State Hotel and the miner's camp across the road, where many of the mainly Italian and Balkan miners lived.
The Gwalia Museum sits on a small hill overlooking the Sons of Gwalia mine, which started life as an underground mine, changed to a huge open cut mine, and is now underground again below the opencut pit. The mine is the deepest in Australia, currently at 1,660 metres and by 2031 it is planned to be 2,300 metres deep. It is also the deepest underground trucking mine in the world.
The museum was very impressive for such a small town. The reception area provided some information on the people behind the building of the museum, and some history of the mine.
The main parts of the museum were housed in mine buildings, primarily the mine manager’s office and the assay office, which contained a very thorough history of the mine and of Gwalia and Leonora and the local people.
One notable mine manager from the early days was Herbert Hoover, the future US president, who commissioned a large, well-appointed house to be built close to the mine, but which he never actually lived in.
After completing our tour of the museum, we decided that it was far too cold and windy to camp up there beside the museum, so we headed back down to the Leonora campground and checked in for the night. It was a bit less cold and windy in Leonora, but still too unpleasant to sit outside, so we were confined to quarters for the night.
After settling in we checked the state of the local roads and discovered that the road we travelled into Leonora on was closed between Leonora and Menzies. That didn’t bode well for our planned return to Kalgoorlie the next day.
Day 43 Leonora - Lake Ballard, WA 10 Mar, 2024
The rain held off overnight, but the road to Kalgoorlie was still closed at 7:00 A.M., with a further update due at 9:00 A.M. Most other roads in the area were either closed or had warnings about water over the road, so there were no other good options to get out of Leonora without driving an extra 800 km or so, which we weren’t keen to do.
Thankfully the 9:00 A.M. road closures update, which came through about 9:45 A.M., brought good news, with the road to Kalgoorlie reopened. We packed up as quickly as possible and got out onto the Goldfields Highway, before anybody decided to change their mind and close the road again.
We initially intended to drive back to Kalgoorlie and do some more touristy stuff there.
However, on the way to Menzies we were checking out the possibility of diverting at Menzies and heading out to Lake Ballard for the night. We’d read varying reports on the road conditions to the lake, with some saying that only half the 50 km was sealed, and other more recent reports indicating it was now fully sealed for the entire 50 km. With the recent rain we didn’t want to be driving on red dirt roads, but it sounded like the road would be ok, so we did turn off at Menzies towards the lake.
Turns out the Menzies council had wanted to encourage tourists to travel out to the lake so they had sealed the remainder of the unsealed sections of road recently, making it a smooth-surfaced, mostly flat and straight road all the way to the lake. It was a very easy half hour drive there.
Lake Ballard is a large, currently dry, salt lake, that is about 50 km long. There are free campsites on the edge of the lake, and with nobody else there we chose our preferred spot for the night. It was only about 20 degrees, and quite windy, so we didn’t bother setting up outside, instead having lunch inside.
After lunch it was time to explore the lake, including the 51 metal sculptures scattered around the huge area out from the campsite, that were designed and made by the internationally renowned artist Anthony Gormley. The sculptures are all derived from laser scans of Menzies inhabitants and the whole installation is known as “Inside Australia”. All the female sculptures have strangely-shaped breasts, the men sculptures have odd-looking genitals, and the child sculptures are androgynous in that you can’t identify male and female children.
We wandered around the mostly dry lake bed, checking out some of the sculptures and marvelling at the huge, flat expanse of the lake, dotted occasionally with small hills.
Just out from our campsite there was a small hill that we climbed to get a better view of the lake and surrounding area, hoping to get some drone footage, but the persistent wind foiled that plan.
With not even a hint of any interwebs we spent the afternoon amusing ourselves as best as we could and relaxing.
Day 44 Lake Ballard - Woodjimooltha, WA 11 Mar, 2024
Our backup plan for getting some drone footage of Lake Ballard this morning was once again foiled by the wind that didn’t abate overnight as we’d expected.
The drive back to the Goldfields Highway turnoff at Menzies was unremarkable, as was the rest of the journey into Kalgoorlie, where we planned to do some touristy stuff.
Our first stop, which was on the road into Kalgoorlie, was the Hannan’s North Tourist Mine, a non-working goldmine founded by an Irishman, Paddy Hannan, in the 1890s. We chose to do the self-guided tour, which was primarily based outside the reception building, and included exhibits outside and in many buildings scattered around the museum area. The buildings included the Mine Manager’s office, winder room, engine room, bank, first aid, and many more.
The number of exhibits and accompanying information was almost overwhelming, but we took our time to try and digest most of it. Meg’s favourites were the huge dump truck and loader, which we both climbed up and marvelled at how massive they are. We’d seem them from a distance before, and on TV, but it’s not until you actually stand beside them that you realise how big they really are. There was a display of a mine vehicle that had been deliberately run over by a dump truck that was really scary, if you’ve ever seen the movie Duel.
Leaving Hannan’s Mine we drove into Kalgoorlie and parked up to have lunch, before going into the second attraction for the day, the Goldfields Museum. Hannan’s Mine was reasonably cheap for 2 adults, but the Goldfields Museum was only a $5 donation for both of us, and I think for value-for-money, this was one of the better museums we’ve visited.
Our self-guided tour started on the bottom level, where huge safes contained half of WA’s gold reserves, and displays on types of gold-bearing rock, gold jewellery, huge nuggets that had been found in the area etc.
Next up we took the lift up to the top level, where you can walk 360 degrees around the head shaft for views of Kalgoorlie.
Back down on ground level we went outside to view more displays, which had a different focus to the Hannan’s mine displays. One building was the Claude De Bernales building, which was recreated from his opulent Kalgoorlie and Perth offices. Claude De Bernales was a mining entrepreneur who made his fortune on the goldfields.
Other buildings included the British Arms, thought to be the narrowest pub in the southern hemisphere, a 1930s miner’s cottage and an impressive display of trade union banners.
All touristed out, we drove about 120 km to Woodjimooltha, on the road to Norseman, where we camped behind the roadhouse for $15, which included nice hot showers.
Day 45 Woodjimooltha - Esperance, WA 12 Mar, 2024
Camped beside a busy and noisy highway, we were awake and on the road early, with Esperance as our destination, about 300 km south.
As with the previous few days we had rain for most of the journey, and cooler temp’s than we’d been used to, with only 18 degrees for most of the morning.
We had a brief stop in Norseman for fuel, where we had to navigate our way around many road trains that were parked up, waiting for the Eyre Highway to reopen after flooding.
The landscape was similar to recent days until we got closer to Esperance, when grain farms took over from heavily vegetated land, interspersed with hundreds of salt lakes of varying sizes.
We arrived in Esperance just in time for lunch, and a hot pie from a bakery fit the bill perfectly on a cool, wet day.
After lunch we stocked up on a few supplies before driving to our first choice of camp for the night, only to find it was fully booked. So, onto plan B we phoned our second choice of camp, only to find it was also fully booked! Third time lucky, we called the Pink Lake Tourist Park who managed to squeeze us in on a small unpowered site.
Once settled in we got our spare gas bottle filled, did a load of washing and caught up with all things online after being starved of interwebs for the previous couple of days.
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