Our WA Trip - Part Two - Westward Ho!

So here I am once again, sitting in an Internet cafe in Adelaide, on the last day of this 21-day adventure. We've got to be up at 6am tomorrow morning so we can catch the train back to Melbourne. We've spent a good chunk of the day wandering around the city just enjoying the glorious weather, and my feet are more than sore. So it seems only fitting that now I get to finally tell you a little more about this big, crazy adventure we've been having!

I last left off the story on Jan 5th, and our trip to Adelaide. So let's continue from there. (I will try to not get distracted by the guy sitting at the computer next to me, who appears to be researching... um... female body builders. But if I start to ramble, blame him.) :-) We woke up on Jan 6th having enjoyed a good night's sleep at the hostel, but knowing that we also had to be checked out of the room by 10am. Since our train to Perth wasn't going to be leaving until around 6pm, this left us with a bit of a luggage problem. Backpacker Oz is a cool place and very laid back - they let us just leave our bags in the front lobby, where they could be watched over by a staff member during the day. So that's what we did - after locking our suitcases, of course!

We spent the morning at the South Australian Museum, just a few blocks from the hostel. Like all the museums we've been to so far, this one was pretty cool. It was also FREE. (I like free.) It was a confusing building though - it looked like they'd cobbled together three or four older buildings with some new, modern hallways, and the site map was uncharacteristically unhelpful, so we actually managed to get lost a couple of times! I really, really liked the giant squid display. It wasn't a real specimen, but a life-size casting of one, set in a simulation of its natural environment in the ocean depths. The display was set up in one of the stairwells, vertically - so on the 4th floor you were standing on a see-through plexiglass, looking down at the tail of the squid. On the 3rd floor you were at eye level. On the 2nd floor you saw nothing but tentacles, and on the 1st floor there was the ends of the squid's grasping arms and the ocean floor. Very cool.

Another display the museum is famous for is its opalized fossils. Australia is the only place in the world where fossils have formed in this manner. The centrepiece of their display were portions of a plesiosaur's opalized skeleton. I couldn't even begin to guess how valuable such a find is! The museum also had a fantastic gallery displaying artifacts from various Pacific cultures. What was really cool about this gallery was that it had been preserved pretty much in the state that it was in when the museum first opened in the late 1800's. How cool is that? A museum preserving its history as a museum!

We headed back to the hostel for a quick lunch and got changed into our swimsuits, then grabbed our boogie boards and headed for the beachside suburb of Glenelg. We'd decided to try and tire ourselves out as much as possible so that when we got on the train in the evening, we might have a fighting chance of falling asleep. When we arrived at Glenelg, we were met by hurricane-force winds! Walking onto the beach felt somewhat like being sandblasted. Not so much fun, but the waves were huge! So was the current, as we discovered very quickly upon entering the water. We had to walk up-current quite a ways, then wade out into the surf and try to boogie, all the while keeping an eye on the beach for our bag... so when we'd drifted past it, we knew we needed to get out and repeat the whole process over again. Lots of fun but definitely tiring!

With only a little time to spare, we hoofed it back to the hostel for a quick shower and change, then it was off to the train station to catch the Indian Pacific. What a huge train! I couldn't count all the cars, it was so long, but I think we had at least 28 cars on the train (almost 800m long). Unfortunately, as "3rd" class passengers, we were pretty much confined to the day-nighter seats, our own lounge car, and our own buffet car, so I never got to see how the other passengers spent the journey. I can tell you that the day-nighter seats on this train were not nearly as comfy as those we'd experienced on the Overlander the day before. There were no arm rests between the seats (thank God for Jen's pillow, or we might have actually killed each other) and the train was absolutely packed, so finding space on the racks for our luggage was quite the challenge. There was also not nearly as much leg room as on the Overlander train.

I was having a hard time hiding my disappointment. I wasn't sure how we were going to survive two nights in these cramped conditions! Even the TV screens, which were positioned along the train car like we have on some coach buses back home, weren't a help. They showed a movie that first night but we couldn't watch it... our seat was right at the front of the car and the only TV screen in front of us was broken! Jen tried watching the movie through the reflection in the train windows, and I tried the same by watching the reflection in the door to the next car, but that didn't exactly work. Gah.

That first day we rode through endless kilometers of flat farmland, and pretty much nothing else. We passed through the town of Port Augusta around 11pm, and after that, it was time for us to try and sleep. NOT SO MUCH. I couldn't stretch my legs out all the way because of the seat in front of me. I couldn't keep my knees bent because it cramped my back, not to mention the pain in my knees. Even leaning towards the window didn't help because of the gap between the seat and the window. To put it mildly, it was a horrible night. Jen, in the aisle seat, didn't fare any better. We woke the next morning (or rather, opened our eyes with the rising sun and gave up the pretense that we'd had any sleep) both feeling grumpy and tired.

The landscape had completely changed overnight. We woke up to a scene of vivid red sand dunes covered in short, scrubby trees. They slowly gave way to flatter and flatter land, with few trees and then none, and before we knew it we were on the famous Nullarbor Plain. (Some of our Aussie friends call this place the GAFA - the Great Australian F*** All. Now I understand why.) This place is HUGE... twice the size of Britain and apparently the largest single piece of limestone found anywhere on Earth. There are absolutely no trees (hence the name "Nullarbor")... just endless, low scrub and sand forever and ever. There is no surface water at all across this stretch of Australia, for something like 2000kms. How they ever managed to build a train line across this landscape is completely beyond me. Makes the challenge of building the railway through the Rockies look easy by comparison!

We stopped mid-morning in Cook, which is one of the most isolated settlements in Australia. The population of Cook is currently 4 people, whose job it is to maintain and refuel the trains that pass through. Apparently something like 50 trains cross the Nullarbor every week, including the Indian Pacific. Cook used to be a much larger place but now it is a ghost town. It was eerie walking through it... we had about a half hour where we could get off the train and stretch our legs, and we were glad to do so! But all too soon we had to climb back on and keep on going.

The next town we passed was Forrest, with a grand total population of 2 people. The only reason Forrest still exists is because it has an airstrip long enough to land a jumbo jet on - so it's an emergency landing site for planes as they cross the continent. Apparently the couple who live in Forrest also run a bed and breakfast, as occasionally light aircraft land and the folks want to spend the night. You need to understand just how vast and empty the Nullarbor is... there were no other towns, no roads, no sign at all of any human habitation other than the railway... and that's what we passed through for the rest of the day. We saw wild camels, wedge-tailed eagles, and a few other birds from the train, but that was about it.

They played a second movie on the train that evening. Jen and I tried a new strategy for watching it, 'cause by this time we were both sick of reading and just staring out the window. Some of the TV screens in the train car were pointed backwards, so if we swiveled ourselves completely around in our seats, we could watch the screen behind us. Jen ended up on the floor in our footspace, and I ended up stretched out on the chairs. This worked relatively well and we decided we'd try sleeping that way when night came.

First, though, we had one more stopover at Kalgoorlie. We arrived in Kalgoorlie around 8pm, and it was HOT. The train would be refueled etc. for about 2 hours, so we had ample time to get out, stretch our legs, find something to eat that wasn't microwaved, and psych ourselves up for another uncomfortable night. The town was basically completely closed except for the pubs, so that's where we ended up eating. It was creepy walking around Kalgoorlie... this is a huge mining town, and the site of the largest open pit gold mining operation in the world. (We took a tour on the way back, but I'll talk about that later). In its heyday, Kalgoorlie had a pretty bad rep as a rough town, so we weren't sure what to expect. Turns out that in our wanderings, we almost wound up in the famous red-light district! (But again, more of that when I talk about our return trip.)

We got back on the train around 10:30 and tried to settle into bed. Jen ended up curled up with her sleeping bag in the space between our seats and the ones in front of us. I tried sleeping sitting up with my legs stretched out straight in front of me on our chairs. Well. Jen was comfy, but I sure wasn't! My knees and back were NOT HAPPY AT ALL with this trip. I tried my best but there was just no way I could sleep in that position. I was getting desperate. I so wanted to sleep - and I wanted Jen to have a night undisturbed by me too! In the end I grabbed my sleeping bag and pillow and headed to the lounge car, where there were comfy long benches. We had been told by the train staff at the start of our journey that we were absolutely NOT allowed to sleep in the lounge car. Let me tell you - I sure wasn't alone! All over our train car, other folks were stretched out just like Jen... and pretty much all the useable benches in the lounge car were occupied too. But there was space for me and I took it. I figured if the train staff complained, I would tell them that (a) my knees were killing me and (b) I would be gone by 6am, when the buffet car opened for breakfast. And so that's how we spent the second night! I actually slept, and so did Jen!

We woke up early on Jan 8th, knowing we were almost at Perth. Overnight, the scenery had changed again, and we found ourselves passing through thickly wooded, rocky hills. We crossed the Avon river, the first surface water we'd seen in two days. Craziness. The best part was to come though - as we finally, FINALLY pulled into the Perth train station, we saw an older couple holding up a sign that read "Becky and Jen" - this was Pat, our friend Carroll's aunt, and her husband Rob, whom we would be staying with while in Perth. I can't tell you how thrilling it was to have someone meeting us, and holding a sign! We waved to them madly as they passed our window, but they didn't see us. One of the other folks on our train commented on the sign, and we got to turn and say "that's for us!". It was a wonderful feeling.

We stumbled off the train more than a little woozy and tired, but happy to be in Western Australia at last. It was blisteringly hot - something like 38C and humid on top - but we didn't care. We were OFF THE TRAIN. That night we knew we'd get to enjoy a bed that didn't move, and that was actually horizontal. What simple pleasures!

I will have to leave the adventure there for now, as my time is almost up. We head back to Melbourne tomorrow, and I will keep adding installments as quickly as I can!