Onwards to Coolgardie 110k
Posted by cyclenullabor on April 15, 2009
The previous day’s heat had drained almost all our water supply, we had to cook our porridge using gatorade, so it was fortunate that a service station resides at Widgiemooltha, 30k from where we camped. Here the man chatted to us for so long that we had a second cup of coffee. I don’t think there is much to do in Widgiemooltha, but the servo is up for sale for a million bucks if you’re interested. There’s also a bar and a caravan park, plus it’s where they found one of the world’s largest chunks of gold, so you never know you might be lucky.
The road around here felt hazardous, loads of trucks, no shoulder and heaps of blind corners. It was stressing me out because I was trying to think of profound things to say, just in case they were my last words. This continued right up until Perth pretty much, Garrett must have thought I was going mad with my constant declarations of love for my family and friends and statements about life being only for living to the fullest because each moment may be your last.
We arrived in Coolagardie to come upon our caravanning friends from Harvey Bay – we’d run into them at Penong, Nullabor, Eucla and now in WA so we caught up and chatted like old friends.
And oh Coolgardie. If you’ve ever been there – it’s exactly the same. The sun burns a line down the wide old main street making everything look impossibly dry and everything has ‘Closed until further notice’ on the front door. To our horror even the pub was closed as it was Good Friday. One good thing was we didn’t pay at the caravan park – the owners just didn’t seem to be there.
Our mate Oliver and his mother Jan arrived to see us, bringing much needed chocolate, chamois cream and painkillers (I won’t tell you how many we’ve taken over the course of a month, it’s quite outrageous). We enjoyed a ‘lovely’ meal at the local Caltex, the one and only place open in town.
