The road continues to be my temple. Each day I stride out to continue my worship. One man that I met said... "You going to Sydney matey? You got a long walk ahead of you, at least TEN days." Lol for Sydney was 3,500 kilometres away at that time.
I continued east and in the process walked past so many dead kangaroos that it was depressing. There was not one single minute on that stretch of a couple of hundred kilometres when I didn't pass a dead roo or a skeleton or a carcass in various forms of decay. Once I walked past one which had recently been struck for the poor creature was still breathing. If I had a knife I would have put it out of its misery
In Caiguna roadhouse the manager, a friendly woman called Maureen gave me a big greeting. Michael and I had dropped a huge bag of food there on the way from Melbourne to my start in Perth. That way we would have city supermarket prices out here in the outback when a chocolate bar can cost five dollars. She kindly chipped in and added two dozen cans of Heinz beans and eight cans of chicken breast. Next morning we were having breakfast in the restaurant and she came out and handed me a Wedge Tail eagle cuddly toy, for I had been asking questions about it the previous night after making some sightings. What could I say or do,? Only hand her a thank you card I bought in her shop and say. "I just want to give you back your card... And I will call her Maureen."
We continued to meet so many decent people on the road. People kept stopping to see if I was okay and needed water. There were days when I spent an hour in all just chatting away. There was so much of it that for one week I was getting up an hour earlier each morning.
One man gave me a choc ice and I enjoyed the envious look on Michaels face when I caught up with him. Another man from Brisbane had sold his house and was living out of a fifty-seater bus. He had converted it into a luxury motor home and even had a plush sofa and a well stocked bookshelf. He was on a road trip to Perth and stopped to give me a cold bottle of water. The days are warm, about 25 C, it's the winter but I am comfortable.
I walked past eucalyptus trees and so much brush. I was told that eucalyptus trees are a bush fire hazard due to their oil they contain that the trees just keep on exploding. This is another reason why many people don't live out here, also scarcity of
water. As one person said to me. "Last year we got nine inches of rain." It seems to me that vegetation and wildlife depend upon condensation, for I have noticed that there is plenty every morning on our tents. I guess birds and kangaroos know where to find it also. Some people have suggested that there are not any wallabies here because they require more water. Unlike the Stewart Highway when I ran from Melbourne to Alice Springs to Darwin four years ago it was all wallaby land and I can barely remember seeing a single kangaroo.
I also heard about a bush fire tragedy when the Western Australia authorities allowed a convey of trucks through a minor fire zone. Soon after the fire became out of control and tragically three trucks didn't make it through. I passed a memorial to those truckers last month.
To my left there is to me what looks like a fifty-metre high cliff. It's jutting up, almost like a mini Wall of China. Trees and bush are growing out of it, occasionally there is a hiking trail over it. I have followed alongside this for well over a week. A couple of people mentioned it's the result of a meteorite which crashed here in ancient times.
I was walking a dream, as the Nullarbor was one of those 'must do' things on my list. Now I was living it, big time. Michael asked me was I still as excited as I was all those years ago. That was very perceptive of him. I was, even if a certain amount of road routine has crept into my life. There are times when I am not as much in awe as when I once eagerly and with almost boy-like excitement I fingered through books written by my fellow adventurers. Now I am living it and each day is special, sacred and unique in its own way. Each day is a spoke on a global wheel which revolves alongside me. Together we take the smooth with the rough, the ups and the downs.
One night I was scrolling through Facebook news feeds. One of the sponsored advertisements took my notice... It was for a dating agency website. Even though we were camped deep in the bush in the middle of nowhere the add said that this beautiful lady was only one kilometre away. However, I had a choice, for another one was a massive ten kilometres away, and they were both online! Three days later these elusive ladies were no closer, so Michael told me I should walk faster! Just goes to show how stupid these adds are!
Then from Caiguna it was a three-day, 91 kilometre hike to Cocklebiddy. I didn't find it interesting, so we just stopped for lunch, walked two more hours and camped ten kms down the road.
In Madura Pass roadhouse we got a great greeting from a young lady with a fabulous smile, I would have killed for! Her name is Walker, but she prefers to run lol! I began to spot grey and then brown kangaroos gracefully bouncing through fields and occasionally across the road. Before then, all that I had seen were dead at the side of the road. In the following few days there were so many kangaroo sightings, it was almost as routine as Latino dogs.
Millions of fossils scattered along the shoulder of the road. Perhaps remnants of prehistoric wildlife. The bones I am seeing today as I walk past will probably be fossilized for another world walker, a million years from now.
One day I saw a small grey snake and was puzzled by it for it was also the only one I have seen in five weeks. It was surely a baby for it was about the length of a carrot and as wide as the tip of my little finger. One night we stopped in a campsite and spoke to some campers who were sitting outside their motor home drinking beer. One of the men, a retired farmer knew his snakes and gave us a crash course.
"If a snake has a pattern it's venomous. If it climbs a tree it's not."
"Why is that?" I asked. And his reply was obvious.
"Would you climb a tree to eat your dinner if you didn't have to?"
Next day on the road I met three young lads traveling around in a camper van. Many young people work a year or two and then do a road trip before returning home before their student visa expires. Two were from Norway and France and the other from Iowa, USA. After a few minutes chatting I recalled the joke acronym for the state of Iowa. And then the joke was on me when I stopped dead in my tracks.... I O W A.... Idiot Out Wandering Around! We all laughed heartily!
Then I marched the 116 kilometres in four days to Mundrabilla, my fifth roadhouse on the Nullarbor. I could have done it in an easy three or on my world run all those years ago I would have been looking at two days. Now, I don't care, whatever it takes. In cricket terms I am notching up a big score by clipping off singles and doubles. I don't need to hit fours and sixes, my big-hitting days will come when and if necessary.
Then another two easy days took me to Eucla Roadhouse,
'Spirit of the west' they call it. Thanks to the kind manager called Razza who gave me a half priced dinner and then when we checked out the price of the budget hotel she gave us a complimentary room. We had a nice chat for she resonated with my cancer awareness message by not selling cigarettes on the premises. My message: Life is precious, early cancer screening saves lives.
The Nullarbor plain continued to fascinate me. After two and a half weeks walking I am about 60% across it. The distance from the start in Norseman to the end in Ceduna, is 1,200 kilometres, further than from Amsterdam to Warsaw. Or, alternatively, from Paris to Madrid. And Western Australia state, Australia's largest is bigger in area than all of Western Europe put together. It's also 1.5 times bigger than Alaska.
Thanks to Dave Dempsey and Kevin O'Grady for their help!
Please check my live position when I am walking. Just click on the Spot track link on the homepage of my website.
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