The Nullarbor Plain
Originally sent Feb 14, 2018
This update has taken a while to write.
It covers the stretch of road running from Albany, WA to Adelaide, SA about 2600km (1600miles)
As always, if you don't want to read and just want to browse through some photos they're here: https://photos.app.goo.
Well,
I wrote a very long first email trying to process the experience of the
nullarbor, primarily around the sheer volume of racism, bigotry and
xenophobia I had experienced out there. If you're curious, I'd be
willing to share. I wrote a pretty large wall of text processing it
myself, but I've tried to keep these updates light. I feel like the
experience can't be told without at least mentioning the above (you
might as well have been in some of the most racist parts of America) and
I think what I saw was possibly some aftermath *still* of the White Australia Policy.
I'll
share one story that had a level of candor and shed a bit of light on
what things used to be like, and move in to some of the more
nature-focused bits.
While camping near one of
the road houses on the South Australia section of the Nullarbor I had
been chatting with an older gentleman for a while about mining in the
Northern Territories (where he'd spent his career) and now traveling
about Australia in his caravan among the class of people called the grey nomads (what a great term.)
He
mentioned his wife was American, and shortly after she came out of the
caravan and joined the conversation. I asked her how long she'd be here
[nearly 50 years] and how she came to be here.
The
response: "Well, my first husband couldn't handle racial integration in
the states anymore, so we moved to Australia so we wouldn't have to deal
with non-whites."
^ Seriously, see that white australia policy link above.
For me, this was surprising given the sort of progressive iimpression I
have of Australia. Things have been redeemed (I'm in Melbourne at the
moment) but there's still a long way to go. I found even the Aboriginal
section of the South Australia museum to be a bit lacking.
I
had the fortune of sitting and chatting for a couple of hours with an
Aboriginal woman on the Nullarbor and asking about her experiences, and I
even heard from someone who claimed to be on present at the incident
where asylum seekers were fired at (and felt proud of it.)
I'm going to leave that section behind. Because I also met a number of kind people.
The Nullarbor is incredible. It's
geological unique in the world as it is the largest exposure of
limestone bedrock anywhere. The first European to cross the Nullarbor
was Edward John Eyre in 1841. He's commemorated with an entire peninsula
named after him in South Australia (and there are some terribly pretty
bits of it, and some of the most mundane, hot, dull cycling I've ever
done through farmland in my life. And that's coming from doing it after
the Nullarbor. Anyway, One of Eyre's companions said of the Nullarbor
that it was a "hideous anomaly, a blot on the face of Nature, the sort
of place one gets into in bad dreams."
On
bicycle, the first crossing was at the end of 1896, with the first woman
crossing by bicycle approximately 50 years later. I've been told it's
one of the worlds great cycle-touring crossings. I have to admit, I
wasn't totally aware of it when I originally planned that. It just
looked like great fun to me.
Supplies were rare
to come by. I preppared with approximately 12 days worth of food, 2 10L
bladders of water, and another 4.5L of bottles. There are roadhouses
approximately every 200km across the Nullarbor that would be the main
resupply points for water and occassional supplemental calories and
over-priced beers when you were so over the day you really didn't care
that the Carona was $9.
A lot of people pull over or want to talk.
Foreigners
driving caravans slow down next to you "You're the first I've seen, how
far up is the rest of your group?" "What? There's no group that I know
of." "You're doing this ALONE?!"
I managed to get this shot when an Australian family pulled over and asked if I'd take photos with their kids.
If
you took the Nullarbor as your only experience of Australia: (Read:
This s not my real opinion of Australia, but it kind of got me down.)
1. Drunk driving is a popular sport.
-
several people hopping out of cars, dropping bottles on the side of the
road. Or just popping into a road house, downing a couple of beers and
hopping back in their vehicles.
2. Road train drivers love amphetamines and cocaine. And apparently supply some of the roadhouse workers as they pass through.
- Adelaide is apparently one of the drug capitals of Australia and it seeps out onto the eastern Nullarbor. [http://www.abc.net.au/news/
3. The Australian philosophy on wildlfe is: "Better dead than alive!"
-
I don't think you could stand on the road without having at least the
stains of dead kangaroo under your foot. Or wombat. The stench is burned
into my mind at this point. At the low points you envision yourself
being just one more blood stain on the grill of a road train.
4.
Everyone loves to talk about Trump. I'm not sure I could go a day
without discussing American politics. It's also amazing how many people
have opinions, but are clueless as to how the American system works.
5. Racism and xenophobia are alive and well.
There's also a bit of cool history, like Skylab going down out over one of the old roadhouses.
Pretty certain it's fake, but it's still cool.
But
mostly, it's a lot of open road. I'm not sure there's a single stop
light in the entire 2600km stretch until you hit Adelaide.
In some ways the open road is a dream. Who hasn't wanted to just go out and pedal for days? As long as you want. No major hills, low traffic all the time in the world.
The hard days are when the wind kicks
up to 40km/h directly against you. I was lucky, I met another pair of
cyclists for the last few days in the worst weather conditions (dumping
rain, windy) and we did the usual cycling drafting technique to help
speed us all up.
It was really quite great.
Passing in to South Australia you get close to the ocean again. Taken from the Bunda Cliffs
Sunrise over the cliffs. Some of the campsites I was able to score were truly epic.
And, of course, one of the holes from the world's longest golf course - the Nullarbor Links.
I
got lucky on the Nullarbor in many ways. I had very few hot days
(despite Adelaide turning into the inside of a barbecue in the same time
frame)
10 days of overcast or rainy weather. 2 days of "hot"
but not severely hot weather. The last 4 I actually was wearing most of
the layers I had with me. The highs were around 21C (70F) and overnight
closer to 14C(57F)
I'd even consider riding it
again. But, I'd want to swap my mountain bike tires for road tired. And
ride with the wind. The real enemy is always the wind.
After
Aderlaide I actually wound up taking a bus down to Melbourne, partly to
get out of the heat, partly because I'd broken so many spokes and done
so much damage to my bike it was time to get it into a shop along the
way.
Well, the bad news is: I've now cracked my frame in
addition to needing to replace almost the entire drive train and the
rear wheel. The good news is a warranty replacement is on the way for
the frame, and they're at least based on the east coast this time, so I
have some hope that it'll actually show up.
I've
managed to score a last minute permit for the Tasmanian Overland track,
and might try to do some more walking about while I wait for repairs to
be done and move on to my last planned stage in Australia.
As always, would love to hear from you. Yes, you. What's new in life?
Best,
Jas
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