Crossing into the West

We once again, filed the tank with diesel in Port Augusta, stocked up on water and food, leaving the last scraps of a town, grunted off west.

Heading inland, the desert gave way to dry farmland sprinkled with small towns, often just a single shop complete with a bench of staring locals; we grunted on past. Not tempted by the scenery, we made the coast before nightfall.

It was now cloudy but dry, the locals looked nervously for their mighty sun god who was strangely absent from their scorched landscape.

The southern edge of Australia is a huge piece of limestone, this massive flake of earth just drops off into the sea dramatically. Its not hard to stare South off the cliff-edge and the edge of the globe, the Ocean ending in a massive waterfall, pouring off the charts.

In surrounding directions the limestone plain has been swept of soil and nothing bigger than scrubs and small bushes survive, thus the Latin name for these huge plains

: Null_Arbor, no tree.

Even here there is life. We saw Dingoes scavenging road kill, Emus gawking as they do, and truckies moving massive mining machines and camping on the roadside; a truck can pull a lot more when the road has no hills or grade to fight up!

Not much else to be said for the Nullarbor Plain, its very flat and it's really big.

Anyone who has driven across States will know the boredom of endless miles of plainsAnyone who has driven across the States will know the boredom of endless miles of plains, well its the same but with less gas stations, less people and more dingoes., well its the same but with less stations, less people and more dingoes.

Eventually trees reappear and the road begins to regain features, leading us inland and into WA!

After two days driving we turn South, heading back to the coast and the town of Esperance.

Our supplies were low, our cameras out of batteries and the only showers we could find resembled the filming location for every prison rape film scene ever made, so we raced to a local State campground on the beach.

The Southern Sea is freezing cold and even Australia gets cold in its winter; coldish anyway for a couple of months that is, but the Southern coast is amazing!

The beaches are pure white and the water is deep blue, despite the cold these were the best beaches we have ever seen; Rounded rocks jut into the surf and rise as little islands just offshore!

Stretches of perfect white sands curve the land free of roads or settlements trembleing in te powerful surf. Really pretty.

We showered, shaved and cooked with a friendly family of Kangaroos investigating our every move, in the distance and rolling thunderstorms drifting thru.

What Ozzie heaven!

Brain Cancer

So i wake up in hospitable, i cant focus my eyes and everything is loud and echoes like a dream, Ami is there, looking tired as hell and worried.


As i kick start my thinking, i begin to worry,why am I here?


It turns out at the end of our big Australian road trip, i began to get head aches and slight dizzy spells, one morning I awoke, in-pain and against my pleas, Ami took me to an Aboriginal clinic in the tropical north of Western Australia.


It turns out i was lucky to survive the last stages of a very aggressive brain tumor, i was operated on in Perth and my life was saved... so far.


But before the doctors let the good news slip, they had more numbers and odds of survival to use on me. It turns out to be a very rear kind of cancer, one of the rarest in the world, and starting next week here in Auckland i will be receiving big doses of radiation and chemotherapy to try and kill it off for good.


{This ain't your grandparents or friends lump, cancer so no comparisons or advice thanks...}


So, now, after waking to the long blurry nights and days in a druggy Hospital haze, Ami watching over me.


My entire family came and visited from the edges from the globe.


Not to spoil the ending, i survived to write the story, and we end up being flown back to NZ for the remainder of my yet to come treatment.


So before i talk of Australia, and our amazing adventures this little hurdle as thrown a spanner into the works. I am expected to recover my vision and walking etc.


We are now in Auckland and thanks to the awesome help from our families we have rented a villa near my new best friend, the Auckland city Hospital.


Now if you want to hear of the horrors of surgeries, needles and brain damage i'm not the one to ask. Its not worth remembering and it's not that interesting!


The best part of this whole story is how Australia payed for all my medical care and even flew me home to NZ where everything is free! We even get a sickness benefit and housing allowance to keep us going! got to love a caring socialist society!


I Am pretty sure if this had happened in the U.S. I would be dead by now.


I'm a pretty cheerful guy, and this experience has given me some massive insights into the brain and our awareness and all I will say is that the brain is less cluttered or perhaps more robotic than I understood. From what I have had the privilege to witness, we are far less flimsy humans. More like supercomputers with shitty software holding us back into emotional cuffle!


I had two days with pure logic and Vulcan like emotionless and they where the most relaxing and rewarding of my time here on earth.


Just an observation. Now back to the past!