Day 59 – Southern Cross – Mekering Memorial Park, 1st June

After a late start to the day, charging batteries thanks to David & Sue's generator, a leisurely breakfast over the fire, we started our drive towards Perth. We drove sedately along a straight sroad with small wheat-belt towns passing by, with little to entice a stop. That was until we reached near our destination, Cunderdin.

We've been driving along the Golden Pipe-line since Kalgoorlie and Cundedin had converted their pump-station into a museum. The pipeline provides water to Kalgoorlie. The kids got out of the car reluctantly, annoyed that their play had been interrupted, but by the end of their visit they were all reinvigorated, after realising that their education lesson hadn't been as painful as they believed. Yes, who would have imagined - museums can be fun! It was full of local history and equipment related to the goldfields and the setup of the water pipeline, old railway carriage, a cool tank, a fantastic display of old farm equipment and most importantly a moving platform recreating the earthquake that destroyed Merkering in 1968. Thoroughly recommended!

A storm shower passed us by as we drove to our stop for the night in Mekering. We parked for the night and ate burgers I'd prepared earlier that day. This is a new experiment, preparing dinner in the morning while everyone is still asleep, should save me an hour in the afternoons – a tip from Sue – we'll see how that goes! Maybe that will give me time for the much needed afternoon nap...

Tomorrow, we'll explore the town and then it will be on to Perth to complete the first chapter of our journey across Australia, having driven 9,000km from Sydney to Perth, taking in some breathtaking sight and meeting some tremendous characters and having some adventures of our own along the way.

Passing the Rabbit Proof Fence - didn't stop the Ralh's!

Another Ettamogah Pub in Cundedin

Ben in Pump-station chimney

Biggle and Co at the Big Camera in Mekering