The Journey - Part Two

The Challenge: To drive from Melbourne to Perth in my 1988 Rover Vitesse without any sleep or power naps. Challenge Accepted.

Part Two

Adelaide to Bordertown

Aussie Burger

With a smile I said goodbye to Adelaide and headed for Port Augusta. The distance between Adelaide and Port Augusta is about three hundred kilometres and I was determined to make up sometime on this leg. I was in the zone and I managed to make up about half an hour and even though I was still an hour and a half behind I knew this was a good start. The sunset was amazing and couldn’t help but take my eyes of the road at times to admire it. I arrived in Port Augusta at eight thirty and this was the first time since Horsham that I stopped to eat, and this time I spoiled myself by ordering an Aussie add mayo. It was nine o’clock when I’d finished eating and I prepared for the longest and most eventful leg of the journey, and that is, from Port Augusta to Norseman. It’s long, it’s boring, and it’s hot.

The Revelation

I left Port Augusta in high spirits and hoped to arrive at Kyancutta at eleven thirty pm. I’d been driving for about forty minutes when I started to feel that something was amiss. This feeling began when I remember something that had taken place when I drove over earlier this year, and that was, the National Freeway does not enter into Port Augusta directly there is a turnoff. As this memory became clearer and clearer so did the revelation that I hadn’t taking part in any turnoff since I left Port Augusta. Panic. I pulled over to look at my map and it was then that I realised I’d driven fifty kilometres in the wrong direction. Anger. The fact that the only remedy for the situation was to turn around and travel back to the turnoff was incredibly frustrating! This was the second time in twenty hours that I’d had to turn around and fix a problem I’d created. By the time I’d arrived at the turnoff I lost about one hour in time, rookie mistake. I did manage to makeup fifteen minutes and arrived at Kyancutta at twelve fifteen am.

Road Rage

Its seems that when life gets tough the ones you love the most are always the first to suffer because the Rover got punished when I travelled from Kyancutta to Ceduna. It was during this leg that the challenge first started to takes it toil on me. It was the earlier hours of the morning and I’d be driving for about eighteen hours straight and my eyelids felt like they were made out of reinforced concrete. It was at this time that I forgot on one occasion to turnoff my high beams when I passed a road train. In return the truck driver decided to unleash his lights full potential. I tried to speed up but he kept coming at me and the lights were blinding, and if you’ve never experienced a road trains high beams at hundred meters behind you, just imagined the MCG lights right up your backside while your driving incredibly tired. The safest option was to go faster and faster until I was out of his range but driving at high speeds while I was half asleep wasn’t safe either but I judge it to be the best option.

If you ever drive across Australia you’ll soon realise that some truck drivers are champions and the rest are pretty ordinary. For example, if you are struggling to pass a road train the champions will use their right side indicator to tell you its safe to pass, on the other hand, the cruel truck drivers will force you to overtake at night without any assistance. Another example, I make it my personal goal to wave to every vehicle that I pass on the road, and some truckies return the wave and even offer a smile, which I would humbly accept, and the others completely ignore my simple gesture of mateship. Although it’s give my great pleasure to state that most truckies are good blokes!

Road Kill

I was stuck behind a truck about forty kilometres outside of Ceduna when it happened. I was about to overtake the road train when I saw a wombat suddenly appear from underneath the rear of the truck. The truck didn’t injure the wombat because the body of the truck was high enough off the ground to miss it completely; I on the other hand was not so luckily. Honestly, the wombat didn’t have chance, and neither did I because I simply didn’t have the time to react in a way that would’ve spared his/her life. If I’d swerved to miss the wombat there was a chance that my wheel would connect with the animal and at speeds of a hundred and ten kilometres an hour there is fair chance that the car would roll. When the wombat raised his/her head to move, I removed it, the end result, road kill. I felt terrible, and the noise it made when it’s skull connected with my chassis was bone chilling because I knew that had to hurt. Poor little bugger never stood a chance, cut down in his prime. Although in saying that the Rover didn’t leave the incident without her fair share of bruises. The wombat did some danger to her front chassis. All in all though the car came through quite well. Rover one, wombat zero.

Truckies Advice

I arrived in Ceduna at three am on Wednesday morning. I turned into a Petrol Station and after I’d inspected the damage the wombat had inflicted on the Rover I went inside to pay for petrol. As I walked back to my car I reached inside my pockets to take out my car keys only to realise that they weren’t in my pocket, and what made matters worse was that as I searched through my other pockets I couldn’t for the life of me remember taking them out of the ignition, and sure enough I looked through the window and there were my keys still in the ignition. Why? Why did I have to lock my keys in my car in the middle of nowhere? And so, I walked back inside, and as I did I hoped that one of the truckies would know how to break into a car. When inside one of the truck drivers said he could break into my car for me but I couldn’t blame him for the damage he inflicted upon the car while he did it. Damage? He said he’d smash the window for me. Bugger. I declined the offer and went over to ask the shop assistant for a coat hanger in order to jimmy open the car. After I’d acquired a coat hanger from the gentlemen behind the counter I went outside to stand before the Rover. It was as I stood there that I realised I’ve no idea how to jimmy open a car door! Then I realised the seriousness of the situation and the idea of being stranded in the middle of nowhere seemed to generate confident within me. After about ten minutes and goodness knows how much damage inflicted upon the Rover I somehow manage to open the side door. It was with great hast that I jumped into the drivers seat and drove away, far, far, away.

Turn and Face the Change

I drove throughout the night and I was about fifty kilometres short of Bordertown when the sun rose over the ocean to the east. The road upon which I travelled ran parallel to the Great Australian Bight and so I decided to turn down a gravel road and watch the sun rise across the Great Australian Bight. Even though the cliff face was only a hundred metres off the main road it turned out to be a bumpy drive. I turned the engine off and approached the cliff face, and as I looked down at the waves smashing into the cliff face below I had sudden urge to jump! Maybe it’s just me but I love diving and the thought of soaring through the air really makes me feel alive, I’d love to be able to fly! Nevertheless I sat down on the cliff face and watched the sunrise. People think I’m crazy because I decided to drive back over to Perth but to those people I’ve always said that there is nothing better then being alone in the middle of nowhere with no body or building to be seen and watching the sunrise over the Great Australian Bight while your feet dangle over a cliff face. It’s so beautiful. I’m amazed that even though isolated I never felt alone. The wind in your hair and the sun of your face, the sound of the waves crashing below, the smell of the ocean and feeling of freshness that each morning brings. I love it and I wouldn’t trade it for all the money in the world and I also wouldn’t expect people to understand unless they’ve experienced it for themselves.

While I sat and watched the sunrise I smiled as I thought about this year and all that has happened. Yet even as I thought about the year and everything that had come to pass I felt something new stir within me. This stirring did not exist independent of the past but rather amidst that which has already occurred. I felt that I’d grown and that the boy who made this journey seven months ago was gone. I felt that I’d lost my innocence because for the first time in my life I’d stepped out into the unknown and taken a risk. I knew that I was completely responsible for the choices I’d made this year and thus the consequences. The boy had long since departed and I was faced with the reality of being totally responsible for my life, and even though I was returning home to live with my parents I knew things would be different. I had mixed feelings about this revelation because it indicated that I could never go back to way things once were, in short, I’d changed. I smiled at the thought of having complete control over my life and of possessing the power to choose my own path. I slowly rose and walked back to my car and as I stood there about to open my door I laughed as I thought about how difficult the next few months would be and where I’ll be this time next year. I arrived at Bordertown forty-five minutes later and crossed into Western Australia.