Our WA Trip - Part One

Well hello again! I'm getting to write to you a little sooner than I'd expected... the hostel we're in tonight had pretty good rates for Internet, so Jen and I have a blessed hour in which to catch up with the rest of the world. So I'll tell you as much of our travels as I can before my time runs out, and then you'll have to wait until the next installment!

I am writing to you from Geraldton, a town about 450kms up the coast from Perth. It's a sizable place and the heart of the west coast rock lobster fishery, so there are lots of boats and a big processing plant. Today we shook hands with real royalty and Jen managed to get bitten by a pink lake. No, that's not mis-spelled. She got bitten by a lake. But all good stories have to begin at the beginning, so let's go way back to Jan 5th, when we got on Metlink to start this adventure... you'll have to wait for a while for the pink lake story...

So. On Jan 5th we headed out for this, the longest and likely craziest of our Australian adventures. We needed to get to Southern Cross railway station (Melbourne's equivalent of Union Station) to catch the Overland train to Adelaide. This should have been an easy task... get on the Upfields train, like we usually do, and get off at Southern Cross. Well, wouldn't you know it, they were doing track repairs, and none of the trains from our sector of the city were stopping at Southern Cross! Yikes! The train conductor came over the PA and told us that anyone going to Southern Cross had to get off at North Melbourne and catch the train from there.

So, dutifully we got off the train at North Melbourne and puffed our way up the ramp to figure out what platform we needed to be on to get to Southern Cross. And of course, all throughout the station were posters saying that to get to Southern Cross, we had to catch a train to Flinders Station and then backtrack! What? We could have done that by staying on the train we had originally been on! GAH! So we ran back down to the train platform, caught the next train that came in, made it to Flinders, hopped two platforms over, and finally caught a train that actually STOPPED at Southern Cross. All of this dragging our suitcases behind us and clutching our boogie boards under our arms. Needless to say we were a little tired by the time we got to the right station.

Next, we had to figure out where to check our luggage. We found the Overland train on platform 2 and hoofed it all the way to the front of the train, where the workers were loading luggage. They were kind enough to check our boogie boards (which aren't strictly allowed, but we smiled nicely and batted our eyelashes) and our small suitcases for the trip. We got on the train with about 20 minutes to spare before departure, which was stressful for me because they basically closed and locked the train doors behind us once we got on. Stupid bloody Metlink, making us late!

Anyway, we were finally on the train. The Overland has recently undergone a complete overhaul, and the train cars were very nice. The seats were roomy, the arm rests were actually comfortable, and the little fold out tables were actually of a useful size. Our seats were at the very back of the car, and for whatever reason, we had a ton of extra legroom - I couldn't even touch the seats in front of us with my legs stretched all the way out. It was great.

We were on the Overland for about 10 hours, as it wound its way towards Adelaide. For the first little while, we passed through rolling farmland with endless herds of sheep, random scattered gum trees, and pretty much nothing else. Then the land flattened out and we passed through an endless plain of wheat and other grasses, with mountains showing only vaguely on the horizons. I was surprised that this part of the country was so flat! I knew that the Nullarbor plain would be flat, but we weren't going to go through that for another couple of days. Anyway, the terrain didn't really get interesting again until we were almost at Adelaide, when we suddenly found ourselves travelling through big steep hills which were thickly forested.

Ten hours is a long, long time to be on a train, and even with regular stretching, we were both getting antsy and were ready to get off. So wouldn't you know it, about an hour outside Adelaide, the conductor came on the PA to tell us that the train was under slow orders because of the heat, and that we would likely be arriving into Adelaide about a half an hour late. No problem, I thought, that'd put us in around 6pm. In the end, we didn't arrive until after 7pm, and Jen and I were both annoyed and HUNGRY! About the only good thing from the last hour of that trip was the funny announcements the conductor made as the train was preparing to enter Adelaide, such as, "Please make sure you check your seats and ensure you take all your belongings with you. Should you feel the need to leave anything on the train, please make sure it is something we will enjoy." And our favourite, "When the train arrives at the station, please do not stand up until the train personnel tell you it is safe to do so. We occasionally jostle the train slightly in order to gently wake up our first class passengers." Ha ha!

The next step was to get to the hostel and check ourselves in. After a brief scramble with all the other passengers to get our luggage, we were ready to get our bearings and head to the main street, where we should have been able to catch a free bus which would drop us right off at the hostel. Only problem? Apparently there are two train stations in Adelaide (who knew?) and I had written down the directions for the wrong one! There was NO main street anywhere near where we were! There was a shuttle bus loading near the entrance to the train station, so Jen went over and asked him if he knew how to get to Backpack Oz... and the guy offered to take us there for $4 each. We took him up on his offer.

Ten minutes later we were signed in at the hostel, had booked our shuttle to return us to the RIGHT train station the next day, and were ready to go looking for dinner. Adelaide, like pretty much every Aussie city/town/hamlet we've been in, seems to roll up its streets at 6pm. There was no traffic and nobody walking about! We wandered northward for a few blocks, towards the city centre, and happened upon a nice little Thai restaurant, where we enjoyed a fabulous dinner. It was also at the restaurant that we realized something funny was going on with the time. Apparently, like Newfoundland, South Australia is on its own time zone - a half an hour different from the rest of the country! This explained why the train seemed to be SO late... we had lost a half hour somewhere along the way. Strange! Good thing we figured that out before we went to get our shuttle back to the train station!

Phewph! And that was only the first day of the trip! However, my time is slowly running out and I really need to check my email, so I'm going to sign off for now. More another day! Tomorrow Jen and I are heading to Monkey Mia, on Shark Bay. They're famous for the dolphins which come to visit their beach every morning. Oh, and the stromatolites. Can't wait!