Broken Hill

Folks, now I have officially seen the Outback. I just got back from an awesome road trip to the outskirts of New South Wales. The original idea was to explore Tasmania during this long Easter weekend, but as the flights were expensive as hell, we decided to rent a car and drive…far.

Broken Hill is a small isolated town right at the western border of New South Wales and South Australia. Around 20 000 people live there, and it is by far the most populated place out there, in the middle of nowhere. Like a green oasis in the burning desert. From Sydney, it takes about 12 hours to drive there - a total of 1200 km. We started our journey with the rented Holden Calais early in the morning on Saturday and made it to Broken Hill around 20.30 local time, which is 30 minutes behind the normal time in NSW.

So what do you do first? Explore the nightlife. Actually, the last stop before Broken Hill was at a gas station in a village called Wilcannia and while we were filling up the tank, the owner came out to smoke a cigarette. Anything strange about that? Guess not. Anyways, about the dazzling nightlife in Broken Hill, this was centered on one pub. We got in, had some pints and started playing pool. Before long, the local people were challenging us for a game and of course it's obligatory to try and sell some drugs while playing.

After a good night's sleep in an old hotel from a horror movie, we made our way to a real ghost town 20 km from Broken Hill - Silverton. This town used to be big back in the days when they discovered silver there. Now there's barely anything left. Nonetheless, if anyone's seen the legendary movie Mad Max, that was filmed here in Silverton. The famous car is still standing there in front of the only pub in that god forsaken town.

Driving out there is both hot and extremely enjoyable. There's a sense of freedom on those straight long roads. Nothing but desert and a cloud of dust behind you. However, when the sun sets it becomes a challenging due to the abundant wildlife out there. There are kangaroos, wallabies, foxes and god knows what else EVERYWHERE. It is a miracle we did not hit anything. Came real close though on several occasions. All in all a great visit...although 2500 km in 48 hours is quite tough.

Now it's back to basics. Lots of stuff to do for school. Added a new photo album, check it out and stay in touch. Take care!