N for

N for The Nullarbor Plain                      

Nullarbor – from the Latin Nullus – no, and arbor – tree. No tree. No kidding!!!

There are bumper stickers saying 'I crossed the nullabor' as a trophy for the capacity for sitting in a car for endless hours on a boring, dead straight, treeless, red, god forsaken road from nowhere to nowhere.

Admittedly, for many of my countrymen crossing the Nullarbor desert is the quintessential experience of the Australian Outback. To sit there for hours and the only relief is a redneck road house - a touristic treat no doubt.  For me it was so boring that I was bored with being bored and I only went 1/2 way.

We have an incredible diversity in scenery here in Australia and if you want to experience all of it I guess you have to go and get into it but my advice would be to make it as painless as possible by taking a massive dose of valium and knocking yourself out for the trip. The more civilised way of course is to just get in a plane and fly to Perth. 4 hours -v- 4 days, hmmmmm decisions decisions.

Seriously, the Eyre Highway (the road that crosses the Nullarbor) is 1675 km long, there are roadhouses dotted along it at 200 – 300 km intervals but not all of them are open 24 hours a day so you must carry water, food and fuel just in case. In between those road houses is a big, fat, red nothing. 
Because it is so remote, some sections of the highway serve as emergency airstrips for the Royal Flying Doctor Service. These airstrips are signposted and have runway piano keys painted on the road and even turnaround bays for small aircraft. (now THAT would break up the boredom).

Oh, and your phone wont work. 

The Eyre Highway is also the home of Nullarbor Links, the longest 18 hole golf course in the world.  Don't ask me why, I don't even play golf.

Whilst researching this topic I came across two different slants on this trip. I'll let you decide who is tossing you a spin and who isn't.

1) Widen your horizons driving the Eyre Highway across the vast, treeless and mesmerising Nullarbor Plain. You can connect to this journey from Melbourne, Adelaide or Perth and drive west to east or east to west along the highway. Whatever your direction, the scale of the scenery has a powerful impact. Watch wooded hills flatten into bluebush-studded plateaus and see mobs of kangaroos lining the road. Visit vast cattle stations, historic homesteads and remote railway outposts. Get up close to rare birds in Eyre, spot southern right whales from the rugged Bunda Cliffs and fish in Fowlers Bay. Sleep overnight in the roadhouses and campsites dotted across the highway. While this is a sealed road, it travels through remote areas and requires thorough preparation.

2) For much of its length, the Eyre highway can be described as a long and lonely road, While in the East you still find some towns like Kimba, Wudinna and Ceduna, the western three quarters is almost devoid of life. What you will find is a number of roadhouses, a mixture of hotels, caravan parks and garages. One or two of them are quite fancy (relatively speaking, that is) like a Border Village, right at the border between South and Western Australia, but most of them are just plain dusty & boring. The mean distance between them is about 200 km, with the longest stretch being 290km.

Yup, book me a ticket with QANTAS would ya!!!