October 26th, We tackled the Nullarbor today....

The Nullarbor is meant to be a huge feat for the few thousand people who attempt it a year. Apparently it’s treacherous, life-taking and downright dangerous to travel. The sun is hot, the road is straight and the desert is mind-boggling. Or so we heard. Every time I told someone we were driving to Perth, they’d shake their head and ask if I knew anything about the Nullarbor Plain. I heard horror story after horror story….’take plenty of water’, ‘carry as much extra fuel as you can’, ‘make sure you have enough food for a few days and enough extra car parts to get you to the next service station.’ HA! I really was nervous the night before we left and nearly talked Matt out of going. We had a conversation about leaving the car and flying to Perth just so we didn’t have to cross the big desert. It was supposed to take 3 days we were told.

Well, we did it in one. That’s right, one measly day. And it was so easy and we had the whole 5 gallons of water left and we only used one extra can of fuel and that was only because we wanted to use it up. We didn’t need any extra car parts, except a bit of oil, and we didn’t go insane….well not really. We did find ourselves bored enough to come up with some pretty wacko ways to pass the time. Every car that passed us would wave, so we had fun making up new ways to say hello to the passing cars….we went through peace signs, one finger, two fingers, three fingers, an exaggerated whole-hand wave and, finally, we decided to put on hats and tip them at every car that passed. We got a big kick out of it, even if we have no idea if anyone even saw it. It seemed to help the 90 kilometer stretch of straight road.

The Nullarbor Plain is called the ‘treeless plain’ and stretches about 800 miles from South Australia to Western Australia. There truly is nothing to do or look at, except a few hours in, we got to stop and see the Southern Right whales play just off some cliffs on the beginning stretch. There was a massive mother whale and she was clearly teaching her calf the things it needed to know to make the long journey to Antarctica. The small calf was mocking her every move, as it was breaching, splashing its tail and swimming on its back. It seemed like we were at Sea World, as Matt and I were the only two there and the whales were giving us a private show. I swear there was a trainer just out of sight from where we were sitting. The whales were just off the shore, too, so it was extra incredible.

The only glitch in the day was when a ‘road train’ (a semi pulling up to 8 trailers) in front of us hit a kangaroo and we witnessed the whole thing. We pulled over, because the kangaroo was injured, but not dead. The poor, poor animal was run over and both of its back legs were broken. It was either going to lie there in the middle of the road and do major damage to the next car that would surely hit it, or it was going to suffer to death. So, unfortunately, we had to find something to knock it out with and move it away. Who am I kidding, I obviously had nothing to do with it and was actually in a ball in the car about to puke everywhere, crying and screaming curse words at Matt, calling him a kangaroo killer and all sorts of nasty things. Now, though, I am sure he did the right thing, though a tire iron and a 30 second ordeal are not quite the way I pictured the kangaroo needing to be killed, but nonetheless, Matt was the Australian they all are and did the ‘manly’ thing while I bawled like a baby. Ha.

So the Nullarbor was a bit of a learning experience. It was only done in a day because we realized it was Sunday and the road trains have to pay an extra tariff on high traffic days and also it was pretty overcast and not hot at all. I am sure the ride back through will not be as pleasant…..