Scenic Lookout (13km Peg) 7 February 2007

Awoke a much calmer day but still cloudy and a cool 16degs. Kept heading due east and while the countryside was similar, there were enough interesting things to keep us amused. The weather continues to be overcast and cool; a godsend really, but not what we were expecting crossing the Nullarbor. We saw a lot of road kill – all kangaroos, with the crows having a field day. The signs keep telling us to watchout for camels, wombats, emus and kangaroos! Worry if we see a camel! There was also a constant stream of road trains going west and also overtaking us. On a long flat stretch, one truck overtook us and then, straight away, braked hard and swerved onto the side of the road with the big, black, brake marks. As we passed the same spot, we saw a large wedgetail eagle flying away from a dead kangaroo. We couldn’t see anything wrong, so we kept on driving. About 100km down the track, we stopped at a roadhouse for lunch and saw the roadtrain eased in slowly. There had been two eagles and as he drove past the kangaroo, the first eagle took off too slowly and went straight into the truck, smashing his windscreen and landing in the passenger seat, dead! Gave him quite a scare! He explained that the sad thing was that eagles mate for life.
We stopped at Eucla expecting a town of sorts, but it’s really only a road house and some buildings indicating visits from the Flying Doctor and Police. It was interesting from a historical point and had a little museum describing the early settlement of the Telegraph Station. We took the truck and car down a rather rough track to the old telegraph station a few kms by the water. We saw a photo from the 1950’s showing a delightful intact villa even then. Now it is a roofless ruin, where the sand hills have all but buried it. It was eerie to think of how more remote it was in the 1870’s.
After another fuel-stop we crossed the border at Border Village, another milestone in our travels and took our obligatory photos! Like the NT/WA border, it looked like an old Eastern European frontier crossing for those entering WA! They are serious and really go through everything in regards taking your fruit, plants, honey, etc! Luckily we will not meet our interrogators until we reach Ceduna, as we are heading east.
We found our first lookout over the coast and cliffs not far into SA and settled happily for the night overlooking one of those views that make the trip! We watched a stormy looking sky all evening but never a drop of rain! The rainfall around these parts is only 300mm or 12” p.a. so we now know it is always just pretending!