No-one Knows This About Me, But…
No-one knows this about me, but I once broke down whilst crossing the legendary Nullarbor Plain as part of a twenty-thousand-mile road trip around Australia. It was October, and the beginning of the sweltering Australian summer when I peered out of the window and laid eyes on the Great Beast that was parked up next to the kerb at my Melbourne home. Resting before the mammoth journey, the white 1998 Ford Fairmont I had bought for $1,000 a couple of months earlier would soon be thundering along the most punishing roads Australia had to offer. I glanced over to a world map I had pinned on the wall, it only deepened my perspective of how big the journey was.
You see, Australia is considered to be the largest island in the world. This might not sound too impressive, but take this into consideration; Europe spans roughly 3.9 million square miles, Australia is a whopping 4.7 million. It is also vastly uninhabited with a population of only 24 million people. For further context; England has a population of roughly 65 million people situated in 50,000 square miles of land. Nowhere would this isolation be more apparent than when crossing the Nullarbor Plain, the most daunting part of the trip that had been stirring in my mind since I first had the idea of circumnavigating Australia a few months earlier.
“NULLARBOR PLAIN: EASTERN END OF TREELESS PLAIN.”
No sooner had I been planning the trip did I find myself passing a sign ominously welcoming me to the Nullarbor Plain. The Great Beast had so far showed no signs of being anything other than its name suggested. It had already made its way through Melbourne, Adelaide, up to Uluru and was now facing the Eyre Highway. The highway runs between Port Augusta in South Australia all the way to Norseman, Western Australia, a total of 1045 miles. Of the 1045 miles there is nothing but desert, average temperatures of 45’C and the occasionally roadhouse which wouldn’t look out of place in a Crocodile Dundee film.
Now, I’m not somebody who finds themselves intimidated by much, but as I drove along the first few miles of the highway the only words my head could conjure up were: “FUCK, FUCK, FUCK.”
Each window of the car seemed to offer the same view. Nothing but sandy desert with the occasional tree sticking out on the horizon, much like the Empire State building sticks out of the Manhattan skyline. The thermostat on the car was flickering between 43/44’C, and I began to hear the engine struggling as it chundered along the single, vast expanse of road that looked post-apocalyptic enough to be used as the filming location of Mad Max: Fury Road. My back by this point was covered in sweat, and the five litres of ice cold drinking water I’d bought in the last town that offered civilization was now uncomfortably warm.
I pulled off into one of the many rest areas along the way which offered ‘safe haven’ from a road which sees one or two cars pass every two hours. My plan had been to travel at least three-hundred miles a day, but this was clearly not a viable option because of the toll the heat was having on the car. Pulling out my travel stove and positioning my uncool, but comfortable foldaway camping chair, I set about cooking some dubiously advertised chicken noodles in the last glimmers of sunlight. As unforgiving as the sun was throughout the day, and as baron as the land appeared, it certainly made for a beautiful, uninterrupted desert sunset which is one of the few privileges any person brave (or stupid) enough to find themselves in the middle of this vacant part of the world will ever enjoy.
By mid-afternoon the following day I found myself slowly coming to a stop at the border crossing that separates South Australia from Western Australia. The so called ‘border town’ featured four gas pumps, a small building which housed every type of Australian souvenir you couldn’t possibly want, and a less than helpful store attendant who looked as though in that very moment, he had just realised he worked in the most isolated gas station in Australia. I paid for my gas, grabbed a cold Pepsi and sat myself back in the Great Beast to carry on the journey through the border crossing and on to Norseman, the town that would put me back in touch with civilization.
“SHIT… NO, C’MON, NOT HERE…”
My worst nightmare had become a reality. The Great Beast failed to kick into action when I turned the ignition. All it was giving me was a pathetic, noisy splutter and then silence as the engine failed to break into life. So there I was, stranded 448 miles from the nearest town with car insurance that didn’t include towing. I trudged back into the gas station kiosk and sheepishly asked the bundle of joy behind the counter to use the phone. “Why?” he said. “Well, I’ve broken down outside.” He gave me a look that must have been reserved for travelers unlucky enough to break down in this part of the world. “You’re nearly 450 miles from the nearest town, no chance of being towed,” he said with what seemed like a hint of pleasure. Quite aware of the predicament I found myself in, and becoming more and more frustrated I called the AA and told them the situation.
Four painstaking hours later, a local mechanic who was contracted by the AA turned up like a knight in shining armor, except the armor was a pair of flip flops and shorts that were two sizes two small. His horse was also more like a 1970s pickup truck that at first glance made it difficult to tell if it had been previously been scrapped or was shortly about to be. I waited eagerly for the news as he rummaged about inside the engine. “Cylinder head gasket that, mate,” he said. I gave a confused look as he proceeded to give me the solution to my predicament: “I can get it running again but your best bet is to drive and don’t stop until you reach the next town, if you’re lucky it will hold out.” With his words of wisdom still bouncing around my head, I leaped back into the car as he fired up the engine and proceeded to the border crossing where I managed to sympathize with the border agents to keep the engine running for fear of making both my day and theirs more difficult than it had to be.
The next six hours were some of the most painful of my life. Having to nurse an engine which was ready to give up at any moment as well as watch a petrol gauge slowly decrease was near heart attack material. At 8pm I finally rolled into Norseman. The Great Beast had managed to plough through the remainder of the Eyre Highway and come out the other side, albeit slightly worse off than when it started. I was only in the town a few minutes when I drove into the car park of the first mechanics I laid eyes on. It was 8pm by this point and everything had closed but once I stopped I knew I wouldn’t be moving anywhere in a hurry. Pulling out my small gas stove and digging in to the same noodles I had the previous night, I began to wish I was back on that godforsaken piece of road, if only for the sunset. The pink brick walls of the mechanics didn’t come close.
