Lee & Lucy

Across the Nullarbor: Surviving the Indian-Pacific

Posted on by Lee Kelleher filed under World Tour 2002/03, Australia, Western Australia, South Australia.

After a very late night of farewell drinks and barbie we woke up slightly hung-over, having to finish off packing before Tamir & Narissa took us to East Perth Train Station. Big Thanks!

Much to our surprise the check-in process was more like an airport, we even had to put our backpacks through... so we had to quickly sort out our clothes, as we thought we'd be able to access them on the train.

Tina & Thembi just made it to see us off before we boarded the train. There was tears in our eyes as we left our home-away-from-home, Perth.

As we pulled out the station, everyone started to comment about the snail-speed of the train, assuming it would speed up, (boy were we wrong! - Lucy), no wonder it took two days to get to Adelaide. The train was pretty comfy, compared to British Rail standards! Seats were slightly bigger than aeroplane seats, reclining further and more leg-room. Plus we had a lounge cart and dinning carriage (which looked like an American diner - Lucy).

The journey was broken up with several stops, first at Kalgoolie, unfortunately it was late at night, so we didn't get a chance to see much of the town. All we saw was the inside of a pub. Second stop was early next morning at a place called Cook! I'd read in Bill Bryson's book that it had a population of 40. Slightly out-of-date now though! Current population before train arrival... 2! - population whilst train at station... 352!

Sleep on the train was quite an experience, we both got a bit restles, so we decided to take sleeping in shifts. Lucy would go read in the lounge cart, while I slept... then we'd swap over (This gave me a chance to see sunrise over the Nullarbor Plains - Lucy). We can now proudly say that we've travelled the world's longest straight-stretch of train-track!

We arrived in Adelaide at 6am, picked up our backpacks, found a hostel, then caught up with our beauty sleep (speak for yourself - Lucy).

In the afternoon we met up with Susan & Michelle, they showed us around Michelle's home town, (even went to the cafe that Shine was filmed). It was a good evening catching up with them!

We're off to Alice Springs now... for another 20 hour train journey (thats a doddle now - Lucy).