The nullabor plain is named after the latin for no trees.  It is the worlds largest limestone karst landscape, stretching 1,200 kilometers from Ceduna to Norseman.

Day 1

We left Ceduna feeling slightly worse for wear.  Heading out of town Emma flicked the iPod onto our road trip playlist selecting ‘Go West’ by the Pet Shop Boys.  We hit the highway and turned left at Penong a town famed for its multitude of windmills.  About 20kms down a track that varied in condition from excellent to extreme corrugation we reached Cactus beach.

This is a famed surf beach and there were certainly a few surfers hanging about when we arrived.  There is a nice camp ground here too that is sheltered from the winds by sand dunes.

We had a quick stop and some morning tea before moving again

Back out on the highway we decided to make it a short driving day and headed to Fowlers Bay.  When we got there the caravan park was located right on the shoreline and the wind was buffeting us as we got out and walked around the tiny town.  We quickly decided that we would not stay the night here and kept going.  Following the dirt track back out to the highway we soon reached the Nundroo roadhouse.  We pitched the camper in a spot far away from the roadhouse to avoid any generator noise in the night.  The place wasn’t much, but for $8 a night we had toilets and showers.  We opened all the windows and retreated inside the tent for the remainder of the afternoon to avoid the flies.

During the night we were both disturbed by the sound of a generator.  It wasn’t until the next morning we realised that a refrigerated roadtrain carrying its own generator onboard had stopped the night. Sometimes you just can’t win.

 

Day 2

We headed off along the highway and stopped at the Head of the Bight.  This is a lookout point with board walks from which to observe the whales.  Although not the season to see the whales we paid the $7 entrance fee and stretched out legs and admired the view.

 

The next stop was the Nullabor Conservation Park scenic look out.  The short walk from the car park to the lookout point provides spectacular views along the coastline of the Bunda cliffs sinking directly into the sea.

We also stopped at the scenic lookout points 2 & 3, but the first was definitely the best.

 

 

Reaching the border crossing we pulled into the quarantine check point.  We hadn’t used all the vegetables we were carrying so handed over our potatoes, tomatoes and cucumber, a few peaches and a small jar of honey.  Adjusting our clocks for the time change we  reached Eucla.  We were initially unhappy about the $20 a night fee for an unpowered site until we realised that there was a pool we could use.  As the temperature was somewhere in the high thirties we promptly set up camp and took a dip to cool off.

 

While cooking dinner that night our neighbour donated us their left over salad items as they were heading east and would need to hand them over at quarantine.  Win!

 

Day 3

We were about half an hour down the road when Em realised that we hadn’t stopped in to look at the historic ruins of the Eucla telegraph station.  We decided not to turn back to take a look but were a bit annoyed with ourselves.

We stopped at Caiguna blowhole and was totally disappointed.

Next stop was just to snap a photo of the sign that declared we were about to start the longest piece of straight road in the country.

The scenery was pretty monotonous from this point. It was another forty plus degree day so we decided that we’d just get as far as we could and not bother with any of the side tracks following the telegraph track or to the limestone caves or historical ruins.

It was a long and hot day and we were both pretty knackered when we arrived in Norseman completing our crossing of the nullabor plain.