Day 112 : Super Sunday

Kalgoorlie to Laverton

High Point : Martha getting to stretch her legs on the incredible road to Laverton

Low Point : The bottom of the Kalgoorlie Super Pit

No Point : I have been wearing one of Paul’s socks for 4 days

Dish of the day : Camping style hot dogs and pasta

Excessive Caffeine Intake : 3 coffees, 3 diet cokes and a V Energy Drink.

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Australians are a proud bunch, they love their very hot and massive country. They do however have a tendency to get a little bit excited when naming stuff in their country. Every other road seems to be prefixed with the words “The Great” and each place of interest is “the worlds” largest, longest, loudest, etc. With this in mind, you can appreciate that we would be slightly sceptical of a mining pit being named “Super”. Well for once, I believe the Australian’s have underplayed something. The mining pit just outside Kalgoorlie is beyond Super, it is Mega!  Trying to digest the enormity is tricky, people are too small to spot, a  normal sized van in the bottom of the pit is just a spec and the dumper trucks look normal size. Massive!

Fire Engines are awesome, there is no way of getting around it, they rock. Ours in particular, though short in length is a work horse. With 540 lb ft of torque she has smashed her way through some very tough conditions on her way to Australia through 22 countries. After all this time, I have a strange bond with this 1994 Mercedes 1124AF (evening missing her when she went in for a service). She has served us very very well but even with all the loyalty in the world, I must admit my eyes did wander at the Super Pit. The dumper trucks there blew my mind, crazy crazy big. Let me throw some stats at the situation.  The number 1 dumper :  fuel tanks hold 11,000 gallons of fuel, weighs a massive 376 tonnes, 6.4 metres high, 7.4 metres wide, can carry 220 tonnes of ore and each tyre costs $26,000 !! Impressed,  you should be.

We didn’t have much time to lap up Kalgoorlie, we barely scratched the surface of this infamous gold rush town. An incredibly remote town that owes it’s existence to gold mining. A wild west town with endless bars, strip joints and fast food outlets. Bonkers in all respects. Time to move on, the “Great Central Road” (could it be named anything else !) waits for no man. 1,200km of dirt track into the heart of Australia. The Lonely Planet advises “don’t even consider travelling from November to March when the heat is extreme”. Should be no problem in a fire engine with no air-con then. Time to get sweaty…

Steve

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