Crossing the Nullarbor

The Indian Pacific Railway is so called because its route draws a wavy line from one ocean to the other across 4300km of southern Australia.

My starting point is East Perth station, destination Adelaide. I covered the final leg of this trip to Sydney late last year after taking the Ghan up through the red centre to Alice Springs and Darwin. My plan from Adelaide this time is to head south to Melbourne and jump a 767 back across the Tasman Sea to Auckland.

Another incredible journey takes off through spacious suburbs and gently rolling hills, vineyards, grass palms, an occasional pine and gum trees everywhere – of course.

Gum trees are amazing, and there are hundreds of different kinds. One species that stands out here is dropping a scruffy skin of gray shredded bark to reveal an exquisitely smooth, deep mahogany red coloured trunk underneath.
The landscape is all looking a little brown after a long hot summer and before the winter rains. Splashes of green and hot pink bougainvillea mark out single storey sand coloured houses. It’s impossible to describe so many shades of green and brown in the surrounding bush without actually seeing them pass in front of a watchful eye.

It’s a long way and a leisurely pace to the Pacific Ocean. One crow, six sheep and ten cows are the only living things that punctuate the first three hours of a vast and passive landscape. I clock up twenty-one hours before spotting kangaroos – could be wallabies, too far away to tell. They are pretty tall jumpers though, so probably roos.
It's quieter still towards the far edge of the wheat belt and a 5.45pm sunset at the start of the Nullarbor plains. Nothing to see until morning now, except on late night walkabout at a stop in Kalgoorlie, gold capital of the nation.
I know now what Larry McMurtry means when he talks about big skies and far distant horizons on his trips across the US in Roads.