I don’t really remember Nixon in ’74 but I do remember another fine old crook back in ‘83.  Alan Bond had just won the America’s Cup – who could forget Hawkie’s fashion-crime jacket and those execrable boxing kangaroos?  Bondy eventually fell from grace but, like Nixon and China, maybe he was something of a visionary.  Kalgoorlie made us think so.  Mining here used to be all underground, mine numbers were high, costs were even higher and output was low – not your ideal business model.  Bondy attempted to accumulate all the individual leases and eventually open a massive open cut mine – he didn’t complete, but it exists today in the guise of Kalgoorlie Consolidated Gold Mining and its SupaPit.  It’s recently reverted to Australian-ish ownership who have announced an extended future – Kalgoorlie is booming again – on and off since 1893!

KCGM allows tours of the pit and we highly recommend👍👍.  The scale of both the equipment and the actual hole in the ground is breathtaking.  One ore truck we saw go by was carrying 252 tonnes of rocks.  If, and only if, it was gold bearing ore, it might yield a golf ball of gold.  Don’t worry – I’ve done the work: it’s about 3 parts per million! Must be valuable, huh?

The other fascinating thing about Kalgoorlie is that their water all comes from Perth – quite literally, a lifeline.  C Y O’Connor was the tragic figure and brilliant engineer (who doesn’t love an engineer, Doug?) who put in the pipeline from 1896-1903.  The enormity and the pressure of the task meant he topped himself in 1902, before it was complete, but he’s honoured throughout the town.  Parts of the line are still the original rivetless pipes. Impossible to imagine a modern-day public servant being allowed to even attempt, let alone run, such a project.  Australia’s Brunel, I reckon.

We could have easily spent more time here, but the west coast called.  The Prospector Caravan Park deserves a mention though.  Apparently, it is one of many that have a check-out by 10am policy but still close the amenities blocks for cleaning at 9.30 – the time of peak demand.  The park itself was fine but run entirely for the management’s convenience👎👍.

Our next two night’s stopovers were far more satisfactory.  Three solid day’s driving brought us to Geraldton, and along the way, we had our most interesting and our best campsites so far.  First up was a 24hour campsite at Merriden Peak👍.  About 300km west of K, it was a stop on the trainline and steam trains meant water – it seldom rains here!  What to do?  Fortunately, all around this landscape are massive granite tors – the one at Merriden is maybe 50 football fields in size, shaped like a massive upturned saucer.  Whatever rain falls simply pours straight off the rock, so they built a huge granite gutter around the base and diverted the water into a “railway dam”.  Ingenious.

The second stop was at “Gums n Gully”👍👍, not near anywhere at all, but closest to Cowalla .  Our second “HipCamp” so they knew how to charge but we were all alone with our fire, the local sheep the nearby river, a glorious sunset – bliss!  Run by artist Kerry Munns and her tradie/farmie husband, their’s is a garlic farm!  The camping area was flat, treed, grassy and pretty.  We were only allowed one night (all we wanted) because the next day, they were hosting a Caravan Queens group – 100 people in vans and tents, kids and some husbands.  All sorts of activities lined up, including art classes.  It looks like HipCamps give a bit of advice about how to make it work and it looked like it was working. 

From here, our route was mostly coastal, driving along some magnificent coastline, spotting a couple of whales and stopping off at the Pinnacles in Nambung National Park. An area of bizarre and unexplained limestone pillars which stick out of a quartz sand desert. Geologically recent, dreamtime stories don’t really exist for this area. Nonetheless, an instructional legend has it that the pillars are the fingers of naughty children who were told not to go there, went anyway, and are now struggling to climb out of the sand – that’s the way to keep the kiddies in line!

And so we continued on to Geraldton where a cray fishing adventure had been booked. Lots of money to go out on a boat, pull up cray pots and keep whatever we caught. What could possibly go wrong?