The Red Gooey Centre

Another week of exciting Australian tourism. We baked in the heat on the weekend of "Black Saturday"- the weekend of the terrible brush fires that have killed over 200 people and wiped out over a thousand homes. Crazy to believe they were only a couple hundred kilometers away. It was the perfect storm of low humidity, high winds, super dry fuels and extreme heat. When we opened our windows or walked outside a building it felt like you opened the door to an oven or someone was holding a blow dryer to your face. The Australians have banned together and have raised over 100 million dollars in fundraisers all over the country to help the Victorian bush fire victims. It is good to see their country coming together in such a tragedy.

We hung up the keys for a few days and headed north to the red centre for a quick trip to see a rock. We parked our car in Adelaide and took the historic Ghan railway on an overnight 24 hour train ride. It was great having someone else drive for a change and just sit back and read and watch the miles of nothing pass by. We were just in the budget seat section but it wasn't too full so we could stretch out and get some z's. The landscape turned from coastline, to salt bush, to the red sands and arid center. We pulled into Alice Springs in early afternoon, found a campsite and rented bikes to cruise the town. We saw more aboriginals in Alice Springs than we had in any other area. The town's population is around 25,000 and is surprising considering it is in the middle of nowhere. At our camp we met up with 2 Canadians we met about a week ago at the end of the Nullarbor, small world. We had dinner with them and heard about their exciting shark diving adventure. The next morning we went to go pick up our new ride. We first heard about campervan relocation's while working at the restaurant where one girls said she had done one and it was a good cheap way to get from one location to another if you were flexible on your dates. We called and reserved one. There are so many camper van companies and well off tourist that pick up a camper/car/van/motorhome and take it from one spot to another and leave it and then the company needs to get the vehicle back for another rental. They offer sweet deals of 1 to 5 dollars per day and perks like gas money. We found one for 5$ per day and $160 in fuel money. The only catch is that you have to pick it up on certain days, get a limited amount of kilometers and get 4 days to deliver it. Ok for us. We didn't even know what we were getting until we got to the shop in the morning.

It was a full on motor home, complete with fridge, shower, toilet, and beds. More than we needed and quite the change from the swing. We took off on the 5 hour drive to the big red rock in style. The motorhome had ice cold A/C, cruise control and the ability to make peanut butter and jelly sandwiches on the run. We pulled into Yalara (the small tourist community on the edge of the national park) found our site, went for a swim and headed off for a view of the rock at sunset. It was amazing to see something you have seen countless times in books and TV and now for real. It was huge and red just like we suspected. Sunset lit up the rock and continually changed until it turned to a charcoal color. The next morning we got up early and looked at the other side for sunrise. Just as spectacular through sleepy eyes and sharing it with hundreds of other people- mainly busloads of asian tourists, retireds, unwashed backpackers- all with their fly nets and varying levels of photography equipment. We took a very insightful Ranger guided walk that explained the native people's beliefs on how it was created and how they use the land. We spent a good part of the day walking around and looking at the rock but needed to keep moving. We still had a long way to go. After about 700 kilometers and near dark we pulled off at rest area and slept for the night- no set up required. The next morning we were off early and happened upon a dingo snacking on some fresh kanga-road kill. After repeating "a dingo's got your baby" in terrible Aussie accents and snapping a few photos we left the tan domestic looking dog to his breakfast.

We stopped in Coober Pedy- a dry dusty town that is the Opal capital of Australia and maybe the world. It is famous for its opals, underground houses and of course the back drops for great movies like Mad Max. We visited an underground museum and home - with limited time we got everything done in one stop and it was pretty interesting. The town even had a public noodling area- (noodling is looking through piles of rocks for opals). We felt a bit awkward noodling in public so after a few minutes and finding some small colorful rocks we hit the road. We returned our temporary home to Adelaide with 40 minutes to spare and 8 kilometers left. Another 2082 kilomiters of Aussie highway driving down. We left Adelaide in our little car- sitting low to the ground and missing the A/C and diesel power. After a stop in the German town of Hahndorf for some kransky's and kraut we are now heading towards Melbourne via the coast.

The Little Engine that Could

Hey everyone...we are back with some new adventures to report. We spent most of January working the Xanadu and I picked up another job in the evenings for two weeks at a local seafood restaurant. A girl from Xanadu went on vacation and needed someone to fill in for a bit. We enjoyed the month of comfortable living with trips to the beach, barbies and a nice concert. Our landlord Mark took us out for some surfing lessons and had a good time and made some progress on standing up. We eventually borrowed some boards and made it out a couple times a week. Our last few days in Margaret River were good, we worked the Sunday the 25th a pretty busy day during Australia day weekend and that night we went to an outdoor concert at a local winery. It was a nice send off because most of our co-workers and people we met during our stay were at the concert. It was a great setting with the vineyards all around, grassy amphitheatre filled with lounging families and drunken spectators, and the stage was back lit by large Karri trees. The bands playing were the Waifs, Annie Di Franco, and Mama Kin. We didn't know much about them but it was a great night and a good send off. The next day was Aussie day, the national day- no Independence to celebrate yet but it was cool to see a lot of the Aussies draped in flags and national colors, flags on vehicles and all the barbies going around. We met some friends at the Lions community breakfast- baked beans, eggs, toast, bacon, snags(sausages) and hash browns. The plans for the day included watching "The Tennis" or "The Cricket" and a barbecue to be worked in there somewhere. We celebrated Aussie day with a barbie consisting of 2 Americans, 2 Chileans, a German, and a Swede. We had another day to get things organized, change the oil in the Swingo and get some supplies. We drove out of town early on Wednesday the 28th. Sad to be leaving a nice place, good friends and a comfortable way of life but we are excited about our new adventures...

We looked into a lot of different options for getting across to the other side of the country but ultimately settled on the big road trip with the ultimate destination of Sydney. We have airplane tickets from Sydney to New Zealand on the 4th of March and from New Zealand to Argentina on the 19th of March. When we told people we were crossing the Nullarbor in the swing dingo, they looked confused and worried and followed it up with comments like, why? just fly or take the train. We liked the idea of the freedom and being able to camp where we liked and had/have faith in it. Our drive was going great with our new selection of books on tape and various 80's tapes we were crossing through wheat and sheep country when about 350kms into the day the car just died. Crikie- Melica and I looked at each other like this can't be, popped the bonnet(hood) and stared at the engine. We were 30km outside of the nearest town. Not more than 5 minutes later we were offered a ride by two shire council members headed to a meeting. We discussed our travels and our jobs. They said they were looking for planners and offered me a job. I wasn't in the mood to discuss work and was wondering what we would do next. They dropped us off in Gnowangerup pop. less than 300. We asked at the local hardware store if there was a repair shop in town, and the guys just happened to be leaving the shop. We jumped in the back of their car with two dogs and were off. They towed the car back to the shop. The good ole' aussie blokes Beven and Gordon assessed the car, and with their aussie humor used phases like "Bugga" and "it might have told you to get stuffed". Its not that bad, just a timing belt and water pump that would have to be shipped from Perth. They ordered it and it arrive in the morning. Beven offered up a room in his house to stay- as his girls were off at university and the only other options were pitching the tent at the shop or the local Roadhouse. We had tea (dinner) with Beven, swapped traveler stories, learned a bit about Australia, watched "The Tennis" and had a nice evening. By 3 the next afternoon the Swing was back. We felt pretty fortunate the car broke down where it did and that we got to meet some friendly, funny, and helpful true aussies while supporting the local economy. We headed off towards Esperance. It was raining hard and we couldn't make it as far as we wanted and ended up sleeping in the car. We eventually made it to Esperance, where they claim to have the best beaches in Australia. We splurged on a new dome tent and air mattress and are now living in style- it sure beats the 1/4 inch foam mat we used when we first got to Oz. The beaches were great, white sands and super fine like powdered sugar. At Cape La Grande National park we tried some sand sledding and chilled on the white sand beaches. There were even camp Kangaroos that jumped around the tents and hung out on the beach. When we were packing up we met another couple-an Australian guy Jason and his American Fiance Anna who were also heading across the Nullarbor in their newer Nissan X-trail. We headed out a bit ahead of them and commented it would be nice if they see us on the side of the road if they could pick us up and that we would see them down the road. We had a nice time in the area and overall it was a good esperance.

Mark our former landlord is also a weather guru and helped us "pick our run" and texted us when would be a good time to head across the Nullarbor-Sunday and Monday were good and provided some clouds and a break from the heat. We headed off with an ominous start almost nailing a kangaroo and finding an Emu that wouldn't get out of the road, running down the center of the road in front of us. I finally decided to pass it at 40km an hour and will never forget looking past Melica in the passenger seat and seeing an Emu looking back at us.

The Nullarbor is one of the great Aussie road trips and it turned out to be different than we thought. Nullarbor comes from the latin Nullus Arboris or no trees and we figured it to be desert and nothing. There were trees for most of it, scragly bush, some gently rolling hills, roadhouses every couple hundred kms, and the traffic consisted mostly of Road trains which are huge semis some with 3 trailers and 44 wheels that keep you awake by almost blowing you off the road, camper vans, suvs and the occasional car. We were probably the smallest car on the road. We took a couple breaks in the shade at road houses and overheard a trucker stating that he almost hit a camel last night. After a long day of driving and almost 700Kms we pulled into the Madura over look on the only pass on the road. We decided to free camp at the spot and not more than 10 mins later Jason and Anna pulled up and decided to camp with us. We threw up our tents and enjoyed the evening with a good sunset over a whole lotta nothing, some Uno and chatting. We got an early start the next day and were armed with a walkie talkie from Jason and Anna and planned to meet up at the end of the Nullarbor in Ceduna. The stops on the second day were much better as the road followed the coast. There were some amazing lookouts over the great Australian bight- cliffs that drop straight into clear water and the only thing to the south of you is Antarctica. Pretty amazing that you can go from nothing on the arid nullarbor to the vivid blue of the ocean- it made it feel like you were at the end of the world. At one of the overlooks we saw some dolphins playing in the clear surf below. At the right time of the year you can see the southern right whales hanging out in one bay and at times there could be up to 70 whales there at a time! Pretty amazing country. Another long day of driving(~700Kms) left us at Ceduna in Southern Australia. We were glad to be off the nullarbor but happy we did it. We camped with Jason and Anna again. It was nice to share the experience with someone and know that someone would be there to give you a tow or get help if you needed it. All was good and we were now on the Eyre peninsula and with no real plans we decided to explore it with Jason and Anna. We hit up a couple good beaches on our way to Elliston. At Elliston we had a great dinner of supa fresh snappa. The next day we all piled into the X-trail for some more exploring. At the Coffin Bay national park we found an amazing beach with great sand and some good waves. We used Jason's surf board and had a good time when Jason and I were out in the surf but still able to stand- he says "what do you think that is?" pointing to a dark area in the surf, I thought it was a big chunk of seaweed but as a wave crashed over it we could see that they were good sized fish (salmon) and Jason told me to get out of the water. No need to tell me twice, even though I didn't know why. But where there are big schools of fish there are also sharks. Back on shore we saw some fins but they ended up being a big group of dolphins. Only 150kms south in Port Lincoln you can go out in chummed up water and hang out in a shark cage while the great whites swim by, so it was probably a good idea to get out when we did. We kept driving south and checked out Port Lincoln - a large fishing port and the place where the boats head out in search of the pricey blue fin tuna.

We had a great time exploring the peninsula with Jason and Anna and on Thursday we took a ferry from Lucky bay to Wallaroo which is about 150km from Adelaide. We went our separate ways as Jason has some work to do in Adelaide and we have a few days to kill before we take the train to Alice Springs on the Sunday the 8th. We are now in the Barossa valley, another picturesque wine region and currently in a major heat wave as it may reach 43 (109.4) today. We are currently in an air conditioned library waiting out the heat of the day- a time where the Swing dingos heat gauge acts like a tachometer(not really). Yesterday we hit up the local public pool- where it is OK to bring your own tractor tire, mesh shirt and mullet. Everything is good and we are ecstatic that we made it this far, met some great people, saw some amazing things and now looking forward to our journey to the red center.