Fraser Range Sheep Station is about 700 km west of Perth and surrounded by the low level Fraser Range Mountains from which it takes its name.  It farms a breed of hairy, not woolly, sheep called damara which is reared for its low cholesterol meat.  Most of the sheep are exported to the Middle East.  After days of driving this was a welcome, relaxing and peaceful spot to stop for the night.  One of the benefits here was to be able to walk the hills around the station and take in the marvellous 360 degree views with no settlements or sea in sight – just miles and miles of bush. Were lucky enough to spot a number of birds of prey and saw quite a few clusters of old bones around this hill slopes and tops.  We also spotted a few red kangaroos that bounded off up the hill as soon as they got wind of us, which reminded Margaret of one of her favourite albums – Paul McCartney’s ‘Red Roos Speed Away’.  On the way down we came across another couple of kangaroos that were much less skittish and got some good shots of them for the photo album. Surprise, surprise, but who should pull up alongside as night was falling – yes you’ve guessed it, Dagmar and Peter who’d made the 600 km journey from Eucla that day.  There is nowhere to hide in the Nullarbor!!  It was really great to see them again and they brought presents of a petrified root from the beach at Eucla, and two ice creams which we enjoyed later that night while watching a movie.  Margaret had a moment of nostalgia from her days as an usherette at the Ritz picture house in Edinburgh, and just had to walk backwards down the aisle of the van to deliver the ice creams to our seats.  She hasn’t lost the knack! Next morning it was off on the long journey to Kalgoorlie via Norseman.  Norseman sits at the western end of the Nullarbor plain and is essentially at a T junction on the road. It had been strange to see a sign 700 kilometres back saying ‘Turn turn left at next T junction for cheap petrol’.  Well this was it!  But Norseman was a disappointing, saddish sort of town, although we did get free internet at the local Telecentre.  One thing about Norseman and the other towns in this area is the very wide streets, which tend to make them look grander than they are.  This stems from the 1800s when the camel trains, which were only form of freight transport then, needed wide streets to turn around in. Kalgoorlie turned out to be a bit of a gem.  Technically, it’s now Kalgoorlie-Boulder, two towns joined at the hip.  It was really interesting to be here because we remember some stories from Rita about visiting this area years ago, even before we knew her.  Also, apart from her and Tracy, we didn’t know of anyone else who’d been here.  But it’s well worth a visit.  Its wide streets house lovely old buildings, good pubs and restaurants, places of interest to see and visit, and generally is a bustling and vibrant wee town.  Some highlights for us were the visits to the glittering Museum of the Goldfields, the revealing Mining Hall of Fame, the stimulating Langtrees 181 Brothel, and the massive Superpit.  The Museum of the Goldfields has some really interesting artefacts and old historical buildings on the site, which is where gold was first discovered in Kalgoorlie, and the gold vault was quite impressive.  The Mining Hall of Fame, a few kilometres out of town, saw Margaret desperately panning for gold (but unfortunately no luck), a wander around a collection of old mining equipment and a demonstration of gold pouring. But the highlight was a trip down a mineshaft to see the old mine workings and hear equipment being used.  It was deafening.  We won’t say anything about the brothel tour! We enjoyed wandering around the town particularly Eric who was interested in the bars’ skimpy nights!  We had a great meal (M’s best so far) at Blue Monkey on Hannan Street. We have had a dearth of culture for a few weeks so were fortunate to be in town when the local Goldfields Rep Company were putting on an evening of 4 one act plays. One evening getting a taxi from the campsite to town our shaven-headed/tattooed taxi driver turned out to be starring in one of the plays and directing another. His dry delivery in the taxi was echoed in his on stage role although the play he directed was somewhat more expressive (and expletive). The plays were very good and not at all amateurish. A trip to the neighbouring town of Coolgardie was disappointing in that it is now a very sad and rundown – such a change from its heyday when it was one of the largest and prosperous towns in Western Australia. Some of the grand buildings are reminders of the olden days.  With the number of buildings for sale or closed it is hard to imagine how it will survive.  We both feel that guidebooks and tourist information tend to play up some places and this one such example. 

We’d heard from a fellow camper that there is a marked tendency for the motor trade in Kalgoordie to rip you off.  Once again we had a wee problem with the valve extensions on our inside rear tyres.  Saturday morning and bearing in mind everything shuts at lunchtime or earlier, we headed off to try to get them replaced. We were not ripped off but tyre places were unable to help because they had no-one willing to undertake the simple job.  Getting desperate we tried the Goodyear depot that was just closing and 30 minutes later we were on our way and at no charge. Hope this balances the other negativities.