Page 199 - Mit dem Wohnwagen durch Australien 2

to the car 11 hours later. They then drove to that first roadhouse to get something to eat and a bed for the night.
When they told the Landlady their story, she went all red in the face and said that the barn was full of tires and called
her lazy mechanic husband. Apparently his evening was not too peaceful

At approximately the same time the owners of Fraser Range Station needed a new Ute. An enterprising car dealer
in Perth advertised that he would trade in anything for the sale of a car. The guys drove there and loved a 1947
Chevy Ute. They then acquainted the car dealer with their trade in which they unloaded from their trailer. It was a
camel. The car dealer had to honour his add, but changed it immediately after that. The old Chevy can still be seen
at the entrance to Fraser Station.

We left the hospitable Station and drove Australia’s longest straight road, 145 km straight as a rod. The landscape
got a bit monotonous, even though the small shrubs and bushes showed an amazing variety of greens; blue-,
yellow-, dark-, light-, dusty-, fresh-, gray-, drab-, olive-, shiny-, linden-, pine-, bamboo-, intensive-green and every
shade in between.
Since there is no Radio reception, we passed the time by listening to a very funny audio book by Torsten Krol called
Callisto. The author lives in Queensland but that is all anybody knows about him. Not even his publisher knows who
he really is. I suppose he is an American by the way he writes. The book is sort of an adult version of Catcher in the
Rye or Shit happens. You’d love it.

Other people pass the time by playing the18 hole, 72 par Nullarbor Golf course. It starts at Kalgoorlie and ends in
Ceduna, with 1365 km it is the longest golf course on earth. Every roadhouse, Station or little town on the way has
one hole. You buy your score card at the one of the points and then stamp it as you go along. At the end you get a
certificate. The greens are laid with artificial grass carpet, since there is rarely any rain to get regular greens. There
is even an eight day championship once a year.

The heart of the Nullarbor Plain is the world’s biggest, flattest piece of limestone, covering an area of approx.
200’000 square km and up to 300 m thick. It was once part of the ocean floor and can best be seen from one of the
lookouts along the 90 m high Baxter cliffs.

The Nullarbor Roadhouse offers Motel, Backpacker and Camping Accommodation. Towards late afternoon the
dusty flat campground starts filling with Motorhomes, Caravans and Tent trailers. But the Roadhouse is also destination
for a traveller of a different kind. Shortly before Sunset a little one motor Airplane sets down and taxis to the
Roadhouse / Airport. The owner and Pilot has assembled the plane himself and is on the way from Esperance to
Broken Hill. The failing daylight made him stop at Nullarbor before he flies on tomorrow to Lake Eyre which is full of
water and life for only the second time in almost a century and then on to Broken Hill. His little two seater can fly up
to 300 km/h and is not hampered by rutted roads. The pilot still follows the roads, it is the only way of orienting
himself, other than the dried out riverbeds and Salt lakes.

We are approaching Ceduna where we have to pass a fruit fly stop. We will not be able to carry any fresh fruit or
veggie from W.A. into Southern Australia and are eating very healthily at present. We will cook up any remaining
fruit which we are allowed to take with us. The fruit vendors of Ceduna have a ball. Unfortunately their fruit selection
is by far poorer than the one in Kalgoorlie.

GAWLER RANGES
Remember the time when we suffered from the heat over 35 C and humidity? It is not so very long ago. Now we are
using the heater in the caravan and are wearing fleece jackets and long trousers instead of shorts. Winter is
approaching and we have temperatures between 6 and 18 C with a cold wind directly from Antarctica. No more
drinks full of Ice cubes in frosted glasses, now a hot chocolate is on the order of the day. We are ready to go up north
towards the warmer tropics again, but, alas, the weather charts show, that the cold goes right up to Katherine and
that it is even frostier in the normally red hot middle. So, we take it easy and stop in the Gawler Ranges, a series of
1.5 Billion years old volcanic mountains where the Rhyolite Organ Pipes can be seen. These stony formations are
visible through erosion which lays the usually compact structure of this rock masses bare. There are other rock
masses which look like huge dinosaur eggs, some of them cracked open and hollow. They are so big, that we can
sit in one and could have a warming fire between us. There are plenty of Emus and large gray Kangaroos which
have donned their winter fur and look very cuddly. We know better.