Wednesday, July 31, 2013

In search of Perthection

It’s very strange to stand still for a while. To stop, to dawdle, to twiddle thumbs unsure of what to do. To not have to fill up the car with petrol every single day, discount vouchers accumulating like faded biblical scriptures in the glove box. I think this is the void that work fills. I tried to fill the void with work and it was a partial success; my mind begins to turn to longer term commitments and the silly idea of getting a proper job. So when that started to happen, I booked a trip on hard work-earned frequent flyer points to escape to Europe!


Perth is not a bad place to stand still, not a bad place at all. I’ve been standing still enough to establish regular haunts and favourite spots. Of course, most of these involve food or drink of some kind. So, apart from doing some reasonably leisurely work I have been taking breaks to go for coffee by the beach. The very laid-back walk between City Beach and Floreat Beach ideally bookended by two rather fine waterfront cafes. The steps at Scarborough ideal for a takeaway flat white and scrumptious home-made salted caramel and chocolate slice, softening the endeavour of reading a few chapters of the never-ending tome that is the Game of Thrones library.

And of course, being beside the sea, a westerly stretching sea has offered the odd sunset. Although I think Canberra still has more colourful sunsets.





Other activities include shopping for food and cooking it. One thing that is to be said for standing still is a proper kitchen and an oven and fridge and freezer, so hello lasagne and pork belly and comforting chicken and chorizo bakes and pizza and home-made scones with jam and adequate cream. Only adequate though...I must need to get ‘home’. 

All this cake and laborious reading beside the beach and lardy home baking started to make me feel a little guilty. This, coupled with a little restlessness made me transform a nice walk around Lake Monger into a little bit of running. Then I did it again, at Lake Herdsman, then again back at Monger and even further this time without stopping. Still, such escapades have allowed me to discover some of the parks and open spaces of Perth and its surrounds. Like Bold Park, which is a fine, wild space sprawling between the inner suburbs and the sea, its rolling heath and bushland undoubtedly waiting to burst into flower at any moment.

While finding the new has been good, the old, revisited has been better. A calm but overcast Sunday afternoon meandering through Kings Park a delight. Meandering you note, not running. Running would do its beauty an injustice. Signs of things to come emerging from the undergrowth, hopefully ready for my return.



For now I am having a ridiculously expensive beer at Perth International Airport. I’ll be in Munich tomorrow, probably supping on a better and less expensive beer, hopefully with some of those touristy clichéd serving wenches providing the refill.  I better go....plane to catch...can’t stand still. 

Saturday, July 06, 2013

Mine, not quite all mine

It only took about 24 hours for the idyllic paradise of Turquoise Bay to take on the appearance of a wet weekend in Grimsby. In an area of extremes in a land of extremes, heavy, sustained unseasonable rain pounded the Pilbara for nigh on two days, keeping us contained in an Exmouth that more closely resembled its English namesake, with the obvious exception of the still surprisingly good coffee. A set of circumstances that presented a chance to clock up work hours and take coffee breaks to interrupt the endeavour.

Mercifully the rain subsided for the long drive inland towards Tom Price, albeit with residual floodwaters for careful and cautious navigation. Tom Price is a mining town, named after a mining company executive who decided the hills were ripe for pillaging. Iron ore is the name of the game here, and Tom Price sprung up like a scruffier Canberra suburb to house workers and families and enable them to shop for fried food, drink at the local pub, and go to the local hospital after too much fried food and beer.

When in Rome do as the Romans do, which here means don a hard hat and protective goggles and drive past gigantic yellow machines gradually carving infinite levels out of a hillside in the pursuit of riches to sell to China. Unfortunately it does not mean getting paid like the locals, rather parting with $30 of hard earned cash to view operations at the Rio Tinto Iron Ore mine. Which is all rather fascinating actually, and gives a more informed perspective on the scale and process involved in digging up a hill and shipping it to China. Mining is obviously a visibly destructive industry, but I guess without it we’d all be screwed: Australia would probably be the economic equivalent of Spain, and Western Australia would be less smug about itself (hmm, some plus sides then).

There is a lot of land in the Pilbara, a lot of empty land, red and bare with low scrub and prickly Spinifex. Hills and ranges add a drama to the landscape and natural gorges offer a magnificent counterpoint to the man made holes in the ground. Thankfully a decent swathe of this land has some kind of protection in the form of Karijini National Park. Finally again a national park with a delightful campground, sheltered among trees above Dales Gorge and with walking trails direct to lookouts and overhangs, billabongs and waterfalls, cliffs and crevices.


Beyond the camping area around the Dales further roads of an unsealed variety deliver you to more gorgeous gorges in the park. Quiet Kalamina was delightful to meander along, full of thriving life denoted by melodic birdsong and recent pools of rain. At Knox Gorge, intrepid hikers (i.e. not us) navigate the precipitous ravine shaped by the waters of Joffre (without a kingly Y) Falls. More populous but nonetheless striking, Weano Gorge is yet another perfect composition of red cliffs, calm pools and flourishing nature, and very accessible for people who prefer somewhat more sedate walking.



There are, clearly, lots of gorges and many of them come together at one incredible point, visible at Oxers Lookout. It’s a spectacular view as four gorge systems – north, east, south and west – meet at one spot, like the centre point of a gorgeous compass. Far below, waters continue to carve out the plunging red ravines, almost constantly in shadow from the winter sun. So we have 360 degree views and high contrast shadows and glaring sunlight, conditions in which pictures cannot really capture the magnificence.

Things were less magnificent back at the park visitor centre, where a 40km trek along a stony road had an adverse impact on my back left tyre. The hissing sound was ominous, but I can be thankful that at least it happened where there was civilisation and help at hand, i.e. someone clearly stronger than me who could manage to loosen the wheel bolts to allow me to put on the spare. With this, another windscreen chip (thanks again, road trains), rubber seals on doors starting to warp and other assorted intermittent complaints, it was clear the car was starting to get fed up of all its hard work. It was time for the loop back to Perth, on bitumen.

It would be fair to say that the return journey to Perth, travelling inland, was less impressive than the outward coastal route. Karijini was obviously the stand out, and before leaving on a spare tyre there was one more chance to walk from the campground, down into Dales Gorge and reflect and absorb the calm, shaded beauty of Circular Pool. This is that earthen, uncompromising, brutal but beautiful Australia that I have long yearned for in seven years here. A fundamental Australia, simple yet complex, similar yet diverse. You must see and feel and hear and smell and dream it at least once before getting comfortable again in metropolitan or quaint rural civilisation.

The red earth continues practically all the way back to Perth and the places along the way primarily exist to dig it up. Places like Newman and Meekatharra and Cue and Mount Magnet are stops for shops and tea breaks, petrol and sleepovers. Huge distances are covered and all the way more gigantic yellow machines and huge parts thereof head northwards, often along both lanes of the road. The boom is not bust.



With the southward journey the temperatures cool sharply at night but at least the petrol prices also start to drop. At some point the outback becomes the wheatbelt and there is a greater semblance of order and control, and a slight tinge of guilt that you find this reassuring and comforting over the vast spectacle of the endless red plains. Green fields and pockets of woodland emerge, towns become closer together, bakeries and coffee return to existence. Even the names become altogether cosier, from Wongan Hills to the Avon Valley.

Perth is now but a stone’s throw, an archetypal Australian city with a young and shiny CBD, broad meandering river, beachside suburbs and inland hills. It could be Brisbane or Melbourne or Adelaide from here. But it’s Perth and it’s the final destination part 2, as final as a destination can be on this particular journey. The Subaru needs a service, I need a bed, and I really should do some work.



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And now, public acknowledgements for anyone who should happen to read this. This trip would not have been possible without the tireless, unstinting efforts of a 13 year old Subaru Outback, which never failed despite concern that it would catch alight any day (just what was that intermittent plastic burning smell? Wednesday’s service may tell...) Other crucial components were bakeries, fish and chip shops, petrol stations, bottle shops, Hamish & Andy’s Business Brunch podcasts, Eurovision CDs, repetitive commercial radio inanity and thousands of iTunes tunes. Jan and Jeffrey, otherwise known as Camp 6 provided useful guidance of places to stay, as did Lonely Planet, various brochures and guides and the old fashioned interweb. I can highly commend the National Parks departments of each state who do their best with dwindling funds to preserve the best of this astonishing country and allow you to engage with it.

In any story of endeavour there are always other people who make or break it. We met many nice people who also decided that life was good when viewing Australia from an automobile. A girl in every port, or a friend in each big city was a huge welcome. There is nothing like seeing a friendly familiar face and taking advantage of their inherent friendliness to have a few days of luxury (i.e. bed / shower). So Louise & Jake in Sydney, Alex & Irene in Canberra, Rachael (and absent Aunt) in Melbourne, Mr & Mrs Mair in Adelaide, and now Angela, Jeff & Stephanie in Perth, thank you so, so much. Last but certainly not least, thanks to the companionship and comradeship of Jill, whose undoubted patience, good humour, adventurousness, variable singing and safe driving made the ride all the more better.

What a ride, the plane would’ve been a bit quicker, but far less enjoyable.