Installment 5 Karlgoorlie to Freemantle

Right o, instalment number 5…
Having spent another day in Kalgoorlie trying to overcome technical difficulties with websites and the like we took a quick look at the Super Pit.
Originally I’d thought the whole of Kalgoorlie had an enormous highway passing through it's centre that led to the constant ambient hum, similar to living inside the M25. It turns out the largest open cut mine is about 2 blocks off the high street. It’s a bit like when you see the Grand Canyon for the first time, you sort of know it's there, but on reaching the view point the sheer scale of the thing is breath-taking. It looked like little tonka trucks were slowly going in and out, but then an enormous Landcruiser went past one, or indeed underneath it. They had a couple of spare wheels lying about and they were in diameter about the length of our car.














We figured we should probably get down to the south coast and work our way up to Perth, so we cut across country. The Tigers were playing Geelong and the narrow but (an) historic victory caused me to turn off the radio a few times with nerves, and swerves.
Saw a Mallee Fowl sauntering about as well.
The plan was to get near to the Stirling Ranges, but just before it got dark we passed Wave Rock, so we dived in to have a quick look. It does indeed look like a wave in the same way that the beach defences in Portsmouth look like a wave, and it is my belief that the same contractors constructed both. Took the customary “surfing the wave” photo and carried on.














We rolled into a campsite about 8.00pm into a small agricultural town and the owners kindly turned on the kitchen camp light for us. Bit of a feed and a couple of glasses of box monster and the owners came out and asked us to turn the light off as it was getting late. Though I suspect our heated debate about some rubbish or other was probably the reason, and once more we were in bed asleep by 9pm.
Fuelled up the next morning, and the theme of going into a servo in the middle of “Butt F***” continued, as once again I was served by a young girl with a welsh accent.
Drove down to the Stirling Ranges and climbed Bluff Knoll, about 1,000 metres, but amongst the completely flat pastures provided a marvellous view. As usual a middle-aged bloke on his mobile phone was calling his disinterested family to tell them where he was. West Coast were playing – what was he expecting?














Drove on to Albany, a cute port/ holiday town, climbed the look out and then spent around 4 hours on the phone.
We scuttled north in the dark and found a bush campsite by the sea, and then it started to rain.
Next day – more rain, and more rain, and more rain. Looked at the giant Tingle and Karri trees and had a coffee in Denmark. As is my way I took a quick squizz at the notice board in Denmark, to try and get a feel for the town, and its fair to say that if you wanted to learn the mouth organ, Denmark is the place.
Once again our aged guide book ( You know, lonely planet that I bought on the way home from V2000 to plan the adventure that calls itself the Sydney Olympic addition) provided entirely conflicting information about backpackers in Pemberton. Ended up in a freezing “log cabin” , with a couple of welsh blokes and 2 East German Girls that were working in the rain to cut vines without any wet weather gear. I’m not sure it was what they had signed up for when they came to Australia. Also a mother daughter combo were the daughter stayed in bed the whole time whilst mum told us loudly that normally her husband paid for her to be in the Hilton, but this was O.K. She then kept borrowing our coffee and milk and sauce pan, despite there being a shop next door.
Next day we struggled with the internet again, and bought ourselves up to date with news on Rooney's foot.
We approached a couple of the fire look-out trees and attempted to climb them with varying success.


















Time for some luxury, so we got to Margaret River and got a self contained unit for a couple of nights, turned the heating up high and watched tv.
The next day was the “Wine Tour” with bush tucker tours.
I believe we led the charge and were suitably smashed about 11:30 am. We were then fed bush tomatoes, kangaroo and emu. The group was made up with 2 other couples like ourselves and 3 couples of retirees, and mysteriously a couple that consisted of:
Bill – a dinky dye Aussie in his 70’s who swigged from his bottle of wine on the coach, and was happy to impart his opinion on all and sundry.
Laura – an 19/20 year old French girl.
No one French has elderly Aussie relatives, and it appeared they had met in Sydney and were touring around together.
Siobhan tried asking Laura what the deal was, but got deflected.
We continued to ponder with the others that evening in the pub.














Open-mike at the local pub, and Ned one of the guys on the tour got up and banged out 4/5 numbers very impressively, and it turns out that its what he does for a living in Edinburgh. We must have been drunk because we promised to look him and Kimberly his girlfriend up when we go to Vicki's wedding in November. Stumbled back to the campsite with Dan and Louise. Good way to make albeit brief friends I reckon.
And my beard continues to grow.
Back to bush camping as we headed up towards Perth, with Siobhan nursing a hangover.
So we’ve just spent a couple of nights in Fremantle, seeing museums and got to the Subiaco last night to see Richmond make a mess of things in the last quarter against the Dockers. Still losing was probably safer as we got in the train with my Richmond Gurney a yellow island in a sea of Purple.














So, where next?
The end for now………