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Hitchhiker's Guide to the Nullarbor

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[edit] Students of Sustainability 2007 Hitchhiking Challenge

[edit] The ASEN Hitchhikers Guide to the Nullarbor

WIN!! Major prize of Hitchhiking Challenge: Solar Backpack! (Prize courtesy of the Sydney Energy Cooperative - http://energycoop.com.au)

Page still under construction. Please contribute and help out.

Also, feel free to explore the rest of the site, and add any knowledge you might have on you favorite topics. Hitchhiking and Students of Sustainability might be good ones...

[edit] What is Students of Sustainability?

On Noongar Land, Murdoch University, Perth, July 9-15 studentsofsustainability.org

The Students of Sustainability (SOS) Conference is the largest environmental and social justice based conference in Australia. Held at Murdoch University, up to 600 people will converge to participate in a week of forums, workshops, skill shares and field trips concerned with environmental and social justice issues.

[edit] What and why?

Can’t afford the mission to Perth? Before you spend $1000 on train tickets or fuck the climate through flights to Perth (don’t do it!), consider the oft-forgotten art of hitchhiking.

Hitchhiking is an official transport option to get to Students of Sustainability 2007. Hitchhiking is free, carbon-friendly, fun and adventurous but not altogether stupid, and it doesn’t fuel wars for oil.

We’re hoping to provide some initiative, ideas, information and networks. Hopefully people feel more secure and enthusiastic about the big hitch mission. We figure there's lots of people who don't have the time to fundraise and can't afford the trip. We figure most people going to SoS haven't hitched before – we’re excited about sharin’ the experience, supporting each other, and doin' the hitch safely. And there are many hott ‘n’ interesting truck drivers to be met.

Contents


[edit] Contact numbers of hitchin’ kids

N.B. Most of us will be travelling in pairs, for safety (and fun!).

Sydney
Maurice Wells: 0433 622 640 / mullets_for_freedom at yahoo.com.au
Natalya Wells will be hitching with Maurice from Canberra on 2 July

Chris Moore: 0422 521 598 / christophermoore at gmail.com
Alice Blackwood: 0422071085 / aliceblackwood at gmail.com

An Nguyen: 0421 675 232 / nguyenngochongan at yahoo.com
(excited to go, looking for hitch mate)

Matthew Jamieson: 0403 900 954 / mjamieson at students.latrobe.edu.au
(put a request up to hitch on needaride.com.au)

Emily: 0410187675 / emily@bizoo.com.au Hitching from TOOWOOMBA /or BRISBANE



Add your name today, just click the edit button to the right of this. Remember to say where you're going from and when (if you know).

[edit] Contacts of people pre-organising rides, inc Standby Cars & people offering rides

Put your name here if you are trying to organise something before you go

Clare 0431073397 i'm relocating a camper van from adelaide leaving sun 30th. got 2 spare seats, hoping to stop at some beautiful places on the way

Punjehl, the great chai tent person, is leaving from Adelaide this Tuesday the 26th and has three spaces in his car, looking to share costs and driving. Contact: punjehl@gmail.com, 0885567240.

[edit] Hitch Hikers' Progress Updates

You can update your progress here. The best way is to SMS your progress to a friend who can edit this page for you.

  • Maurice & Natalya

Canberra to Perth

Mon 2 July 10am - dropped off by dad in yass

Mon 10:30 - in a truck heading to Wagga Wagga

MON 3:30 On side road 115km from Hay after a 60km lift from conspiracy theorist.

MON In car with Argentine immigrant heading to Mildura.

MON Reached mildura by 2nd july evening.

TUES Morning ,got a ride from a priest, going almost to Adelaide!! Courier takes them to Adelaide by 4pm

TUES night, safe and warm in Adelaide at cousins' place!

WED Morning, are in truck, will be in Perth tomorrow afternoon!!

THUR 1pm: In Perth, after 28 hours drive with 1/2 hour break.

Fri Nite: getting bikes ready for SoS!

Maurice's return (Perth to Sydney)

TUES 17 July - heading off for the return journey! First ride a truck heading to the Lakes, with hopes to be passed on like a relay baton to another truck.

TUES midday - got a ride from an ex-con for 20km.

TUES 12:30 - got a lift to Northam (35km)

TUES 13:50 - on the way to Coolgardie.

TUES 18.30 - arrived Coolgardie, waiting at a truck stop.

WED 12.45 - stop in Bordertown. Expect to reach Ceduna by tonight.

THURS 7:20 - waiting in Ceduna for a lift.

THUR 8:40 - in a car en route to Adelaide.

THUR 20:50 - at the cuz' place in Adelaide, staying the night.

FRI 13:00 - walking to the highway, heading for Melbourne or Sydney, whichever happens first..

FRI 13:11 - At Nairn

FRI 13:50 - At Murray Bridge

FRI 14:20 - Waiting at Tailem Bend

FRI 16:20 - Bordertown

FRI 16:30 - in the back of a van lying on top of and under someone's wordly possessions, headed to Melbourne.

FRI 22:00 - arrived Melbourne.

SUN 13:00 - Left Melbourne in a truck taking flowers to Sydney.

  • Emily and Tom

Weds afternoon: Hit Beenleigh truck stop and got a rad ride with a sweet cafinated truckie (he had a weird oppinon on the WW2 though) all the way to Sydney.

  • Chris & Alice

Sydney to Perth

TUES 9an: Get a slow lift to Wagga Wagga. The truck's going fast but we keep stopping.

TUES: We're in Wagga, camped by the Murrumbidgee. Made friends with an overly nice truckie... Fun !

WED 8am: Get a lift to the highway, then another to Narrandera. Truckie sees our sign on the table, gives us a lift to Adelaide.

WED 6pm: Mildura! Will get 2 Adelaide by 2am, earlier if someone offers us a lift in the next couple of hours. Ah truck stops... huge trucks are fun !

THU 2am to FRI 2am: Wait at truck-stops in Adelaide. Hellish. A driver promises us a ride at 2am, we stick around.

FRI 8am: Pretend to be removalists. Help truckie with two loads in Whyalla and some other place.

FRI midnight: Sleep for about six hours in the trailer, on top of huge hessian bags.

SAT 10pm: Arrive in Perth!

Perth to Sydney

TUE 9am: Arrive at truck stop in Perth to find Scarlet and Shane, who've been trying unsuccessfully for two days. Shane has to meet his girlfriend in Melbourne, so books a flight. Scarlet and Alice get lifts in two separate trucks who are traveling as a convoy to Melbourne.

WED 9am: Chris pikes. The train is booked out. Books a flight.

WED 11am: Alice and Scarlet in Norseman.

Fri 1pm: Alice and Scarlett almost in Melbourne

[edit] What you need to take

  • A friend / someone to check in with [a phone/change for a phone/phone card is very useful also...]
  • Fresh food to eat. It’s hard getting anything else except hamburgers or chips. You have to pass quarantine at the SA/WA border, so eat all your fruit and veggies before then. Dumpster all the rest, folks.
  • Warm clothes. It gets really fucking cold over the Nullarbor – below zero.
  • Water – there's water at all the servos, which are approximately every 150 km. You can even pay for a shower at a couple of stops. Take a 4L bottle so you can refill.
  • Pack light. Hitching with a swag is a pain in the arse.
  • Torch, Wet weather gear, Hat, sunglasses and sunscreen, Warm sleeping bag, Torch and spare batteries, Candles and matches or a lighter, Plastic bags for wet clothes and waterproofing, Plate, bowl, mug, cutlery

[edit] Optional

  • Novelty musical instrument
  • Camera
  • Weed – even if you don’t smoke. (We don’t, but truckies often do.) Rolling papers.
  • Emergency space blankets, Emergency poncho
  • Puzzles, games
  • Cable tie / gaffa tape
  • Goon skin (good water bottle and pillow)
  • Stones ginger wine – cheap and good when you are sick.
  • First aid something.

[edit] Beyond Hitching – the fun begins! Some ideas

  • Register, let people when you’re leaving, and make teams! Turbo!
  • Add challenges, tips and ideas to the blog.
  • Contribute to the Aftermath Zine to provide info and inspiration for people doin’ this to future conferences. Send ya stories to mullets_for_freedom@yahoo.com.au or make your own zine.

[edit] Proposed Challenges: WIN!! Major prize from Hitchhiking Challenge: Solar Backpack!

  • Fastest hitch
  • Most number of hitches / furthest hitch
  • Best Story
  • Best recruit to SoS (bring your driving comrade to the conference!)
  • Most wickedest (sic) graffiti
  • Best message left to other hitchhikers
  • Youngest Hitcher
  • Solving the unsolvable sudoku and other mind games
  • Prettiest/weirdest hitchhiking sign
  • Best hitching costume
  • Most miraculous use of cable tie / gaffa tape
  • Best photos (for an exhibition in Perth)
  • Best Ivan Milat impression / lookalike

[edit] Tips and ideas

[edit] Time

budget 3 or 4 days from Melbourne, maybe 6 days from Sydney. If ya get to Perth earlier, sweet hitching!

  • Recommended route:
    • Melbourne-Adelaide-Port Augusta-Ceduna-Norseman-Coolgardie-Perth,
    • Sydney-(Canberra)-Mildura-Adelaide- Port Augusta-Ceduna-Norseman-Coolgardie-Perth
    • Townsville-Brisbane-Newcastle- Sydney-Mildura-Adelaide- Port Augusta-Ceduna-Norseman-Coolgardie-Perth

[edit] Train and highway details: best places to hitch from:

    • Sydney: The easiest (but not always fastest) way out is to take the train to Campbelltown or Macarthur and walk to the Hume Highway (~20-30min from Macarthur, 30-40 from Campbelltown). Then hitch south until you get to the turn off to Mildura/Adelaide or all the way to Melbourne if you're going that way.

Macarthur is one stop after Campbelltown and has the advantage that it is closer to the Highway and makes for a nicer walk through the Tafe. It also doesn't have gates for those without train tickets. However, all trains go to Campbelltown but not all to Macarthur. Check your timetables at: cityrail.com. Tickets from the city are $3 concession, $6 adult. Unfortunately if you don't have a NSW cityrail foil on your concession card, you can't get a concession. Generally if you hit sydney before midnight you should be able to get trains. I've put up a map showing the way from Macarthur Station to the highway here: http://www.bikely.com/maps/bike-path/Hitch-Hiking-from-Sydney-to-Can-Mel-Ade-Perth. You can see Campbelltown station on it as well. If you want more detailed info on any of this, give me a call: 0437940265 - Maurice

    • Canberra: Not many truck stops here. To get out of Canberra to go to Melbourne/Adelaide/Perth, you need to get to the Barton Highway. This heads to Yass, where it joins the hume highway in a sort of T-intersection. The choices will be to go North/right (signs say Goulbourn, Sydney) or South/left (signs say Melbourne). Obviously you want to go South to get to Perth. Incidentally, if you wanted to go North, you should not have got on the barton highway. The Barton Highway turns left off Northbourne Avenue when you head away from the city. There are many public buses that go up northbourne avenue from the 'city'. Check them out at: http://www.action.act.gov.au/. It's about $1.50 concession and $3 adult. Technically only ACT concession cards, as well as international student cards are excepted, though it's common to get the concession price with interstate student cards.

? there are none!? best to try and get to the Hume Hwy and go from there. There's a few truckstops near Canberra entrances/exits

    • Melbourne: add
    • Adelaide: truck stop in Grand Junction (Adelaide) has HEAPS of trucks going through it.
    • Brisbane: Catch the public train to Beenleigh. the highway is walking distance from there. Hitch South to Sydney. At some point you can choose the coastal road or the inland road. The coast is nicer and has more dumpsters but takes longer. Generally wherever your lift was going at the time is the better road to stay on. Once you get to Newcastle you have the option of the cityrail trains to Sydney to continue towards Adelaide/Perth

[edit] Places to stay:

  • Brisbane:
  • Newcastle:
  • Sydney – City - call K on 0414564721 or call Dan from usyd SRC on 0425255184
  • Canberra – Jeremy – 0421 808 763
  • Mildura – anyone?
  • Melbourne - try calling Rosie if you get stuck - 0400 561 987
  • Ballarat - Jon - 0415 755 181
  • Adelaide – maybe Karen Elliot Social Centre?
  • Ceduna- Cat, 0427109867, campers welcome!
  • Norseman – anyone?
  • Coolgardie – anyone?
  • Perth – call the SoS kids / camp out at Murdoch uni for SoS!
  • Service Stations. There are wild dogs at several of the Service Stations (Nullarbor stop especially), so it's best not to stop there overnight. They can be a bit scary sounding.
  • There are camping facilities at lots of the stops. Haven't seen any vampires, though the Nullarbor is reputed to be a good place to spot UFOs, and bits of Skylab…

[edit] Phone reception

There's pretty much NO mobile reception from Port Augusta to Norseman, and then it's only with Telstra. There are payphones at most of the service stations.

[edit] Dumpster locations

Brisbane: Shopping centres at Beenleigh have dumpsters. Good place to stock up before the hitch to Sydney.

Sydney: Call JP - 0401447675. Not so keen on putting up the all the places right now, but one good one that is certainly no secret is the Broadway Shopping Centre, in the city.

Campbelltown??

Melbourne: you got it its "sparkely bear" -barkly square dumpters are situated on barkly st just off sydney rd if your comming from sydney this is good as the hume highway turns into sydney rd. the're also bins up in coburg/morland area near bell st,this is also just of sydey rd. closer to the city is the carlto dumpis which are great as this is a richer area this means fresher food as the turnover rate is quiker, tuesdays was always a good day for fresh veg which is great for those travelling kidies who need a little more sustiance than 30 pakets of twisties or the dumpie doughnut.;)

Adelaide??

Remember, truck stops are great places to 'table dive'.

[edit] Other tips and ideas

  • Talk to truckies and servo dudes: We can get on radio or talk to truck stop and major service stations and tell them that we're doing this challenge to get to a conference and we don't have much money. Once in a truck, a hitchhiker can get that truckie to CB radio their truckie mates encouraging them to pick up ferals with 'eat the rich' patches. By getting the word out, drivers can feel more secure (you thought hitchhikers were scared, check out the drivers!) that we're all hitching for a good reason and not because we want to eat them. Then everyone should have good luck.
  • Many trucking companies actually forbid their faithful employees from picking up hitchers (ie. they could get in deep shit if caught with you in tow) (just so you don't think it's you).
  • Once you've got a ride, most truckies want some entertainment to help them stay awake... suggestions include the "have you ever..." game, truth or dare (though you can run out of dares pretty quick sitting in a cab...), the usual i-spy/word association/"this one time..." games...
  • Put up requests for rides to Perth on needaride.com.au
  • Click here for a link to Train timetables – print it off! (no harm in giving hitching a go and then bailing), fun tips, etc. Someone find the link?  :-)
  • Book a car at http://www.standbycars.com.au/oneways.aspx?cid=1 For example, there's one leaving now from elbourne to Perth for $5/day, fuel paid.
  • Other options include car relocations [just google it; you get a certain time frame to drive a car/van/truck from one city to another, usually from hire car companies but with the usual stipulations (over 25, full license etc)]
  • try backpackers... all them happy travellers with spare room in their vans and always keen for someone else to help split the petrol bill (and winter is the peak time for people travelling through the top end especially)

[edit] Links


We’d love more ideas, whacked-out challenges, testimonials of ya Nullarbor hitching adventures, tips and contacts of people keen to hitch or support hitchers.

See you on the highway. Oh yeah, and at Students of Sustainability.


[edit] Testimonials

KT and Shelley hitched from Perth to Melbourne for SOS 05, in a record breaking time of 43 hours… if anyone beats that I'd be happy to know! Fern and KT hitched back the other way in 2.5 days, with a stopover in Adelaide for a few hours.

It would be hard to replicate that mission but can give you some good tips:

  • Truckies sometimes like the company for long hitches like this. Girls, take a buddy. We had to knock back a couple of dodgy offers. There's pretty much NO reception mobile-wise from Port Augusta to Norseman, and then it's only with Telstra that you'll get your phone to work (unless you've got fancy tech). There are payphones at most of the service stations.
  • I recommend taking some fresh stuff to eat unless you're happy with only hamburgers or chips for a few days. You have to pass quarantine at the SA/WA border though, so eat all your fruit & vegies before then.
  • Pack light (duh) hitching with a swag is a pain in the arse.
  • It gets really bloody cold over the Nullarbor. Really, really fucking cold. I was wearing all my clothes and safe in a truck and still feeling icy. The onboard computer (no, seriously) of one of the trucks measured the outside temperature at Norseman (western end of Eyre highway) at -2 degrees.
  • Water – there's water at all the servo's (which are approx. every 150 km) but water restrictions. You can even pay for a shower at a couple of stops. It's probably a good idea to take a 4L bottle so you can refill.
  • The lifts we got on that trip were ace, all trucks, mostly with the one company. Got an empty removal van on the way over to Adelaide with 2 drivers (explains the speedy trip) then hitched out of a truck stop in Grand Junction (Adelaide) which had HEAPS of trucks going through it. Not sure where the best place to leave Melbourne is, I had the phone number of one of the truckies that took us over and he gave us a lift back.
  • I'd budget 3 or 4 days from Melbourne (if you get here earlier, lucky you) maybe a little longer from Sydney.
  • There are wild dogs at several of the Service Stations (Nullarbor stop especially), so it's best not to stop there overnight. They can be a bit scary sounding. There are camping facilities at lots of the stops though. Haven't seen any vampires, though the Nullarbor is reputed to be a good place to spot UFOs, and bits of Skylab…


The quickest way to go is Melb-Adelaide-Port Augusta-Ceduna-Norseman-Coolgardie-Perth but if you've got time and you want to explore the south coast (cold in winter but oh so beautiful) then turn south at Norseman and go to Esperance. There is a lead contamination scandal happening there at the moment though…. best not to breathe in should you go that way…


Also: hitching with a novelty musical instrument can also be fun. I've been carrying a ukulele for the last year or so and all I need to do now is learn some slim dusty tunes. or elvis.


Yay for Hitching

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