Travelling West 2021

Leaving Esperance and heading to Albany where we were to meet our friends, Pat and Allan, all was going well. We’d left reasonably early and although there were quite a few road works going on and we were often stopped, we were still going to be in Albany by early afternoon. When we stopped for lunch at a small roadside rest area, Rob sent a few messages to some of his golf mates and one of them called him to say that Perth and South West Western Australia was going into a 5 day lock-down due to a community transmission of Covid. (It had been 10 months since WA had had their last community transmission of Covid!) To start with, we thought he was joking. I tried to find out what was going on but we had limited mobile coverage where we were and for a while we didn’t know what was happening. Finally we managed to find a radio station that was playing the WA Premier speaking to the community and we realized that this was no joke. In the middle of all this, the main road between Esperance a...

We had a reasonably easy drive to Esperance today, stopping at Norseman for fuel and arriving in Esperance at lunchtime. After settling in to the caravan park which is on the seafront, we had lunch and then went into town to restock, mainly fruit and vegetables as we’d not been able to bring any in from SA. Esperance is a beautiful town, surrounded by some stunning beaches so we spent the afternoon driving along the Great Ocean Drive and calling in at beaches, lookouts and all the places of interest. Before we had even left the main part of town however, Rob was very impressed by the quality of the public lawns along the esplanade. During our drive, we saw some brave souls in swimming, many people and dogs enjoying strolls along the beaches, a few wind-surfers and some very impressive kite-surfers.

We departed Nullarbor Roadhouse around 8AM and didn’t travel that far before we decided we needed to stop at least at one of the Great Australian Bight lookouts and enjoy the beautiful view, despite the overcast conditions. From there we travelled to the WA/SA border. We were the only people at the border stop. We had a lovely female police-officer from WA who checked our G2G (good to go) pass and happily allowed us into WA. She was working at the border, near Eucla for 2 weeks and was from Norseman. We then had the van checked by another woman for fruit and vegetables which we’d managed to dispose of or eat before. We had to wear a mask while all this was being done and the police-officer told us that you could buy good coffee in Eucla, so we headed there and stopped for both coffee and fuel! We continued on and made good time (as we gained an extra 2&1/2 hours, today) and there were quite a few roadworks happening along the Eyre Highway. At one stage we were stopped by a “lollipo...

After a very good, quiet relaxing sleep, we departed from Kimba, heading for The Nullarbor Roadhouse, in SA and close to where the famous whale watching centre is. The weather seemed quite mild, certainly not hot so we were very grateful for this considering it is late January and we’re visiting places that are usually known for their very high temperatures. As we headed further west, the temperature started dropping and the clouds gathered so from about 9AM onwards the rain started and did not really stop! It was extremely heavy at times. By the time we reached Ceduna where we intended to refuel the vehicle and stop for lunch the rain was still quite heavy. Poor Rob putting diesel in the car, holding an umbrella and trying unsuccessfully to stay dry, was quite a sight. We stopped here for lunch before driving on to the Nullarbor Roadhouse. Although it is not raining at present, it is quite evident by the water lying around that they have had a significant amount of rain. Also, we’ve...

  Wednesday 27/01/21 We left Adelaide around 9:30AM as we didn’t need to hurry to cover the 460km to our first stop, Kimba. Stopping at Pt. Wakefield, Rob noticed that an alert appeared on the dash to say that his fob (key) for the Land cruiser, was in need of new battery. After checking the manual for the correct battery number, we called into Pt Augusta for fuel and a new battery for the fob. We had lunch on the foreshore near the wharf area and then continued to Kimba. Before settling in we visited the beautiful silo artworks and also an impressive sculpture of Edward Eyre at a lookout, just a few kilometres out of town. We returned to town and are spending the night in the very impressive community run campground. There is no charge but you make a donation for the use of toilets, showers and water facilities which are all very new. The area is attached to the showgrounds, oval and sporting facilities so the community would use them too. They are also in the process of buildin...

Caravan is in the driveway and being prepared and packed slowly. The garden is being prepared for some time with out us watering, auto watering systems checked and neighbours helping with hand watering. Very hot in Adelaide at the moment, but looks better travelling weather come Wednesday. We have completed our G2G application with the WA Government and have been granted entry (it is still only Saturday though!!) Intend to travel to Kimba first day with a later start in the day than normal giving us a leisurely drive of 460Kms and then it is over to the Nullarbor Plains. Google Maps suggests it is 2631Kms to Albany, our first real stop.