We made it - made it together across the sweet-smelling Nullarbor. The bitumen lies behind; long trucks rumble on, feeding mouths. Ravens twitching, watching with their eyes, and a camel stood staring, fluttering her lashes. We were going too fast to smell her breath, but we saw her, she was there. This land is vast. One-horse towns, man-woman-and-child waiting behind bent fenders, steam from broken pipes. It's a harsh land.
Where you going, mate? One guy calls out. I told him. And you? I asked - got to be polite out here. Well, we all looked at the car: if I could use a dirty word, it would be the one beginning with F. Canberra, going to watch tag-team wrestling, big fan, the screwed, tattooed, ginger-headed man says. I look at him, he still looks at the car and all the miles it's got to go. It didn't look like it was going to be his deliverer.
You make friends out here, see them swallowing fuel at the stops, waving, passing each other on the straights. Australia has Holden Men and Ford Men - which one am I?
Then out of the heat, in for water, a Danish man cycling, red as rasher pork, days of pedalling still to go. Enjoying it? I asked, walking over. Not a word I'd use, he said.
We arrive at windy Port Augusta. The camper van comes to a dusty stop, I slap her on the back, tell her she's a good girl. We've just spent five nights under the Southern Stars. You need a good girl out there, not one who's going to muck you around. I always talk to cars.
Down and on to Port Germein, the longest jetty in the Southern Hemisphere, miles of planks to walk and down at the bottom. Crabbers are pulling them in, heave-ho, one-two-three, another crab's pulled ashore, bright blue critters. Watching it all, Livingston Seagulls stand on the runners, staring when we walk past. They don't budge: this is their territory, we're guests. We camp up. Billie sees a dog not being looked after, jumping at a fence over and over again. The owner comes home, rides in on his big bike, pony flowing behind. Billie wants me to knock on his door and ask to walk the dog. If not now, how about early tomorrow morning before he goes to work?
On to Adelaide, the Queen of the South, the Free State. It's quiet and still - anyone home? Shops full of booty, staff manning counters. I look around, I'm the only one there, all for me and my mooching. Oh, let's go to the Museum of South Australia, we say. We drive, park the van out front, no queue, no traffic, no fist-thumping in this ghost town. A lady gives us and one other family a guided tour. She's 88, words drip from her head, slither smoothly from her tongue to our ears. Aboriginal art, spears and clubs, an 18-metre giant squid. We liked it so much we came back for more, and topped it off with cake. Billie meets her friends from Halong Bay and we sizzle kangaroo steaks. Their parents are there - we nod heads, get down to putting beer in my radiator.
Time to saddle up, take the ocean road. It starts to rain, the first pitter-patter in months. Dried-out salt lakes, flocks of birds, sheep same colour as the land. I say again, this country's vast. Signage everywhere: At Your Own Risk, It's Your Responsibility, Bring A Bunny To Its Knees (something to do with myxomatosis).
We pull up the reins, stop at Port Fairy. We're going to play a trick. Make out we've gone troppo, native, hillbilly, Mr Aussie, call it what you like - have a giggle with cousins we haven't seen in a while. Girls get undersized frilly Victorian dresses and gorilla boots for feet. I go digger-blue in a cola shirt. Tracy goes for the bright, padded-shoulder look. We stuff them all in a plastic bag. The lady in the shop is aghast.
London Bridge really did fall down, it's out at sea, off the Great Ocean Road, eroded limestone. When it went in 1990, two people were standing on it.
Rainbow lorikeets, wedge-tail eagles fly around - could have been cranes or crows, it's all a mystery. Another blowhole giving out its wallop. Onto Thunder Cave, lumps of land fallen, taken by the sea. We rumble on. The Twelve Apostles wait, standing proud. There are bucket-loads of us queuing, looking over heads, waiting to meet them. The Apostles have become a Stonehenge, panda-grade attraction.
On the way into the night, we stop at a place offering A Bush Tucker Tour. The door's dusty and cracked, an Aboriginal fella sits there. He ain't going to do no tour, but does talk about snakes - copperhead, brown and taipan. He said the only time a snake would raise its head and spit its venom would be if you were between it and its hole. I nodded to that, then asked, how'd you know where its hole is? He shook his eyes and grunted, said we'd never know that. We were comforted and moved on with our one word of local tongue - nuken, meaning, bye bye.
Billie's take
We saw our friends who we met in Halong Bay. It was really good, they had a dog who had a lovely smile and I walked him, I could just tell he liked me. We had a barbie, one of those Aussie things, and it was alright food, plus they gave us a whole bag of candy canes, just sugar really. They had ping-pong and that was good fun, I was pretty good. We left late and parked up opposite, near their house. We could see them but they couldn't see us. We watched their manoeuvres. All night long there were trains and they rang bells, noisy things which didn't shut up. We stopped at Port Fairy, what a name, and dressed up in princess fairy costume, and we got some ridiculous clothes. We are going to see our cousins like hillbillies. The people in the shop got right into it.
The Great Ocean Road was spectacular, well that's what dad said more than once. They have the Apostles, which the whole word wanted to see, but I liked London Bridge. Some of it had fallen down with people on it, I wouldn't have liked to have been them, no way. And that's about it.
Tracy's take
Still on the road, it's beginning to feel like an endless journey. The girls are great, the roadkills have dried up and they turn to their imaginations, make steering wheels, gear sticks and radios from cardboard. They're driving sports cars, utes, 70s Mercedes, the three of them up front, me in the back making cheese and onion sandwiches again.
The landscape changes, abandoned farmland and hours roll by. We pull up in Port Germein and walk the long plank, an hour pushing against the wind to get to the other end. Next to the campsite lives a dog, Billie's sure it's neglected and spends the evening spying on the owner, a Hell's Angel of a man.
Adelaide welcomes us. We visit the Museum, wander among the whale skeletons and squid. Back to the van on the beautiful Great Ocean Road, I'm thrown from side to side as Mark takes the bends rally-style - the kitchen's closed.
