A little place by the lakeside

The last “big” thing on our list of things we wanted to see was Lake Eyre. It’s a huge lake, which most of the time is just an empty salt bed and has only been filled with water four times in the last 150 years. On the way, we thought that we’d check out Coober Pedy first, the largest opal mining town in the universe. The blurb mentions how apocalyptic it looks, and has been used in such films as Mad Max 3 and some other unknown shit. They also all live underground, like hobbits, to hide from the high summer temps, which can reach 50 degrees. When we got there we were a little disappointed, as it just looked like every other shitty outback town.  

We popped into the information centre, and the lady behind the counter made the Kalgoorlie information centre look like a fountain of useful facts. Dejected we went to explore the town. We headed for the big winch, which was a large winch.

Say what you see

The whole town was quite run down and there weren't many people. We couldn’t work out if this was because its glory days were behind it, or it was just off-season. There were a few opal trucks, which looked a little like a Mad Max prop, but not much else.

Looks similar to our car

We stayed at a place just out of town that had the novelty of camping underground for a few extra dollars. The owner turned out to be a bit of a douche, dropping daddy jokes with a dickhead edge. Having seen the place, camping underground seemed to be like camping in a basement, so after he had given his salesman pitch to us we took the cheaper outside plot. The rest of the hot afternoon we spent in the campsites TV basement, and the whole basement thing made sense as it was a lovely temperature down there. Becky entertained herself with podcasts and puzzles while I wrote a blog. Just before we left the basement, I swigged on the last remaining dregs of a coke, and my sunglasses that were resting on top of my head, fell off and the lens cracked on the hard floor. I was pretty pissed, but luckily I had brought a second pair with me… It had seemed silly to have two pairs, but in the end having a spare pair paid off. That night we had three-minute noodles under the stars.

The next day, after stocking up on supplies and fuel we headed towards Lake Eyre. The dusty, unsealed road was in lovely shape, and things were all going very well when we pulled up to the William Creek hotel, the last place before the turn off to Lake Eyre. They had an interesting area filled with junk and graves of locals and some woman who’d died in 1998 aged 28. Sad.

Where next?

We asked a lady working at the hotel what the 4wd track in to Lake Eyre was like, and she grumpily replied it was "just a track". Brilliant, that was the kind of inside information we were looking for, and it felt good to tap into local knowledge rather than rely on a tourist book. After a burger and chips at the hotel, we began the 60km drive to Lake Eyre. Turns out it's not "just a track", and nor is it really 4wd; it’s just a badly managed shitty road that is really, really corrugated… It was almost as bad as Mitchell Falls! After 20kms we started talking about whether we should turn around, as it was very slow going and the flashbacks of the dramas we'd had were haunting us. I decided we should push on as the road started to get better. For the next 20kms things seemed okay, and the scenery was amazing.

Moon landing in a beaten up cruiser

But then the corrugations started again, and the car was getting thrown about once more. As we approached the campsite, we could hear a familiar clanging sound from under the car. After we picked a spot in the empty campsite, I took a look under the car to find our brand new exhaust, just installed in Perth, had broken off the bracket by the muffler. I couldn’t fucking believe it. It seemed we were jinxed to have the same issues with the same parts of the car. To calm ourselves after all this stress, we went for a walk on the lake. The expanse was mind-blowing. What do you do in such places? Bit of badly done yoga, obviously.

It almost works

As we walked further out onto the lake, Becky started sinking, getting her flip-flops and feet covered in the dark muddy ooze that resides below the thin salty upper layer. She was not a happy bunny! 

Grubby feet

Back at camp, we used some of the 85litres of water we’d carried in to clean her feet. This just added to the worries Becky was having. She wasn't worried about the thousands of flies or the heat, but didn't feel very comfortable with the isolation at the end of a road that leads nowhere. Her biggest worry was if the car broke down, and we were stranded, how much water could she use for her daily shower? The exhaust issues (again) had not eased her fears, and she started discussing escape routes and how long we should wait until we tried to walk out. I just spent my time under the car trying to stop the exhaust clanging against the diff using tie wire. Still, it was an amazing place.

Lighter on foot than Becky

By sunset Becky was still worried about dying trying to get out, but it didn't stop us enjoying the fact we were all alone and getting this part of Lake Eyre to ourselves. The sunset over the expanse of the salt flat was breathe-taking.

Taking in the beauty, and forgetting the risk for a moment

Although the flies were out in force and I had to enjoy it through a green mesh.

I haven't really got the hang of how fly nets work

That night, under the stars of the outback, I slept well, Becky not so much. We got up at sunrise, firstly to enjoy the colours of the morning over the lake, but also because Becky wanted to get out of there asap. 

Ow big is it?

Sunrise was as enjoyable as sunset, but it was quickly over.

Sunrise enjoyed, so let's get the fuck out of here.

Once the sun was up, we packed up quickly and started the slow drive out. We crawled the first 20km over the shitty bit, which took around an hour. We then tried to make some progress over the middle “good” bit, pausing only to take a photo of a plaque remembering the 28 yr old we saw mentioned at William Creek.

A sad story

We later googled her name, and Becky was pleased we didn’t read about it before as it would just have fuelled her worries further. It is a scary reminder of what can happen in these places, with a succession of fuck ups leading to the tragedy. However, our story ended well, taking a little under 3hrs to make it back to the main dirt road.

At this point we weren’t really sure what we should do. We were both a little tired of camping, and the exhaust issue, in conjunction with the engine light and multiple small leaks had pushed us to the limit of fucks to give. We stopped to take in some of the sights while discussing our plans. The first place was a spring with water bubbling up from the Great Artesian Basin, meaning some of the water could be millions of years old. It was an interesting place but so windy that you could only pee safely in one direction. At least the wind stopped the flies bothering us.

Some old water

As we continued our journey, enjoying the multiple abandoned homesteads on route, we whinged about our bad luck on this road trip. Sure, we were lucky enough to do it and had seen sights that we’d remember forever, but we’d had exhaust problems three times… that has to be worthy of some pity! 

We stopped for the night, after driving 7hrs but not getting that far, at an abandoned town called Farina. It has become a restoration project over the past few years, and was a very cool place. The campsite was really nice, and the wildlife put us both in a better mood. 

Daddy and his kiddies.

Wandering around the site, reading about the fascinating history behind the town and the tragic stories of the townsfolk who fought in the two World Wars was just the thing we needed to pull us out of our self-pity slump. That night we both went to bed happy.

A "restored" building... someone should tell them it's missing the roof.

The next morning as I was checking the car I noticed something all too familiar… We had another fucking puncture on one of our new tyres. C’MON, WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK.

New day, similar problems