Prologue - Across the Nullarbor

A solo trip from Sydney to Perth and back, 10,000 kms in all

  

A road trip across the Nullarbor has always been a dream of mine. But after my trip to Tennant Creek, a total of 6,000 kms just a trip to Perth of 4,000 kms was not going to cut it. It will have to be Perth and back. So I get to cross the Nullarbor twice! The trip would be 4 days each way at a minimum. But I had nearly two weeks up my sleeve. So I will take a slightly longer route, hugging the coast. On the way to Perth, I would hug the Victorian coast and then take the Great Ocean Road. On the way back, I would travel via Albany and Esperance. This brings the distance to a respectable well-rounded 10,000 kms. I would take a whole day to recover, once in Perth and then turn around to make my way back.

As usual, the opportunity came up with very little notice. Of course, I have been making hazy plans with a few routes in mind. The trip to Tennant Creek gave me some background. Once again, it was in the middle of school holidays. This meant accommodation will be an issue. A quick search seemed to confirm this. Most of the places I would prefer to stop over had limited options. The schedule needed a bit of rejigging to fit the stopover dates. It was the middle of a mild summer. I would have the long daylight hours to travel in without the high temperatures. I had traded the convertible for a coupe, so I would be in an air-conditioned bubble anyway.

Most places I will be traveling through will have kangaroos. This meant travelling between dawn and dusk. Traveling in the dark is a big no-no. Hitting a kangaroo may mean your car is written off or worse - you yourself could be written off. The day of rest at Perth would be used to get some exercise and do some laundry. Rates are high during school holidays but I will try to splurge a bit on hotels and go all out in Perth. I would try to keep journeys under 10 hours, where possible. Deciding the stopovers was an exercise in navigation. I made a list of almost every possible stopover - there are unsurprisingly few as you get to the interior. Then pick the best spot that stays under 10 hours and is still within reach of another spot. I used booking.com to search for motels. The map feature allowed me to eliminate stopovers with no decent motels available.

I will try not to stay in the same town when returning. I will try not to follow the same route while returning. I have been through Mildura before, so this time I will come back via Broken Hill.

Sydney to Perth

Perth to Sydney

Sydney to Perth
Day	Start	End	Distance	Time
Day 1	Sydney	Lakes Entrance	730 kms	9:30
Day 2	Lakes Entrance	Warrnambool	795 kms	10:35
Day 3	Warrnambool	Port Augusta	965 kms	10:35
Day 4	Port Augusta	Nullarbor	765 kms	8:00
Day 5	Nullarbor	Norseman	905 kms	9:20
Day 6	Norseman	Perth	720 kms	8:00
Sydney to Perth Total			4880 kms	56:00
Day 7	On the 7th day, I rested
Perth to Sydney
Day	Start	End	Distance	Time
Day 8	Perth	Albany	650 kms	7:30
Day 9	Albany	Kalgoorlie	840 kms	9:10
Day 10	Kalgoorlie	Border Village	910 kms	9:20
Day 11	Border Village	Port Lincoln	880 kms	9:10
Day 12	Port Lincoln	Wilcannia	950 kms	10:15
Day 13	Wilcannia	Sydney	940 kms	10:50
Perth to Sydney Total			5170 kms	56:15
Grand Total			10055 kms	112:15

Like last time, besides clothes and my camera, I packed a few other essentials.

• 10 litre jerry can of petrol
• 10 litre jerry can of water
• Canned and instant food - a lot less than before
• Small Esky
• Personal Locator Beacon (PLB)
• Satellite Phone

On my previous trip, I used a Thuraya satphone. Using it involved finding and pointing to a handful of geosynchronous satellites. In practice, this means one-way connection - you can make calls with difficulty but cannot receive calls easily, especially while inside a car. This time I was expecting work related calls and needed to receive calls reliably. I opted for an Iridium. This uses multiple satellites. In addition, it can use an antenna mounted outside the car so it can receive signals even when the handset is inside the car. It has a normal mobile number - this means it is an ordinary call for anyone calling you. You can make a call at $1.20/minute with a $0.40 flagfall. You can SMS any mobile for 50c. You can even send out an email using the SMS mechanism. I also had Personal Locator Beacon(PLB) with a built-in GPS. I got all this gear from EPIRBhire. I last hired gear from them 7 years ago and was pleased to call them and have them respond with my name!

Clockwise from the bottom left is the protective case for the satphone, PLB, charging paraphrenalia for the satphone, the external antenna, the bracket to attach the external antenna to the satphone and the satphone itself - the Iridium 9555. The external antenna has a magnet in its base to attach to the car roof. This is where I encountered a problem. The body is probably aluminium - the magnet wouldn't stick. I could not find a steel surface handy on the dash either. Finally, I duct-taped a metal washer to the dash and then attached the antenna to it.

Despite going from a convertible to a coupe, my boot space has actually gotten smaller. Most of the space is taken up by the space saver wheel. Fitting a 10L petrol can and a 10L water can was a challenge. But I found sleek cans at Supercheap auto. The two cans are identical in size. The cans measure 170H x 240H x 340L mm. They fit nicely in the gaps. You can see the red petrol can and just a bit of the blue water can. I also packed my camera tripod knowing fully well I may never use it.

It was impossible to find a case that fits in the shallow 20cm gap so I used a duffle bag just half filled. At the back, you can see the backpack with my laptop, a fair amount of food. On top are a few scattered reading matter. In the front was the esky with a few beers and a few soft drinks. There is also a small bag with the camera and the satphone.

The car has 32K on the clock. The tires are in good condition. A full tank lasts between 600 to 800 kms. the petrol can should give me another 100 kms. Most trips will involve a refill and will provide a welcome break.

Last time, I used a video camera on a suction cup. When I needed to take a video, I would go through this rigmarole and turn the camera on and off. I decided to take the simple approach of using a dashcam. It would be constantly on. The quality will not be comparable but I don't have to worry about turning it on and off. What's more, those rare unpredictable occasions will be caught on camera with no intervention on my part. I will have a video of the entire drive from which I can pick and choose the interesting bits. I do expect the memory card to fill up by the end of the day. My daily routine will include copying the files off the card and clearing it.