Day 5: The Outback Way

November 19, 2010

We camp the night at Niagara Dam, 100km north of Kalgoorlie. We traveled this route in April when we toured the Goldfields so we don’t show much interest in revisiting the sites we lingered over previously. We just want to get there – our destination: the start of the Outback Way.

We arrive in Laverton at 2pm. Johan promised me a drink in the Visitor’s Centre, which boasts of the best coffee this side of Perth, so we take a break over two iced coffees. One of our more compelling gadgets, surpassing the thrill of mobile Broadband (last week’s novelty), is our hand-held GPS navigator. It’s a toy you have to grow into because on first impression it seems to have no relevance to outback travel, let alone your life. The purpose of acquiring it was to participate in the geo-cache tracking game, which techies are playing worldwide. There are 34 caches along the Outback Way, which boasts of being the world’s longest geo-cache trail. I bought it thinking it would force us out of the car and its window-shopping reality. The GPS contains the coordinates for each cache and, once you get the hang of it, will guide you to within a metre of its placement. Inside the cache (tin or plastic containers) are trinkets – you can take something and leave something – plus a little notebook and pen to log a quip, if you’re so inclined. If you’re really techno, you can log onto the www.geocaching.com website and tell the world which caches you’ve found.

Our first round of geo-cache navigating proves unsuccessful. We rummage around a vacant lot in Laverton, worrying about what the locals might be thinking. After not too long we give up and head back to the Visitor’s Centre where the lady behind the counter pulls out the cache and apologizes that it’s not outside the front door – it too easily goes missing. We work out that our coordinates set-up is wrongly programmed and make the necessary adjustments. We find the next three caches on the first 40kms of the Outback Way with little trouble.

Finding our first cache, aptly called "Dead Falcon".

We’re thrilled to be on our way. The road out of Laverton heading northeast boasts a huge sign claiming Alice Springs is 1587kms away. That’s just past halfway. The road turns a dusty red and the landscape flat and scrubby. We set up camp on a ridge overlooking a stunning view of the Jindalee Breakaway, a circle of undercut cliffs and jagged ochre and yellow rocks. I take a moonlit walk further down the track and breathe in the eerie valley views and enveloping silence.

Start of the Outback Way

A rough and red road ahead.

First camp in gorgeous breakaway country.