Esperance to Kalgoorlie

9am roll call and all troops of Nomad 1 and 2 are present and accounted for. Today we head north for 2 hours, a break in Norseman, north for a further 30 minutes to Widgiemooltha Roadhouse for hole 15, 30 minutes north to Kambalda for hole 16 then 30 minutes north to Boulder/ Kalgoorlie.

It’s pretty uneventful until Widgiemooltha Roadhouse, where a request for the golf stamps is met with a blank stare by one of the young backpackers running the place. 2 Nordic birds with less than strong English. Just before me a woman has roasted the poor girl for her poor effort in stamping her golf card. She said to her, loudly as though she was deaf as well as clueless about the Nullabor Golf championship ” Yooo need to listen to me, learn how to stamp properly so you don’t smudge the card. Yooooo have ruined my card, arm not heppy!!!!” I ask nicely and get a couple of lovely stamps and a smile. See, its not hard angry woman, she was doing her best.

Wodgiemooltha is a par 3 125m hole, not rated as hard, open fairways, big green, easy pin placement. Pauolo hits a mully grubba to within 2 metres of the green, The Don is pin high left of the green and a lovely chip gets him close to the pin but he can’t convert the Par. Captain Kirk hits it pin high, well left after initially losing the ball on the clouds, but then a number of chips before he hits the green. Harve is right and a lovely chip gets him near the pin, but he still finishes with a boggy 4.

Onwards to Kambalda International, a proper golf club, well sort of. Off the tee we see duffed  shots, duck hooks and squirts off the toe into the bush. After a variety of shots from various sorts of vegetation and ironstone fairways, we eventually get the hole finished. A relief. Thankfully no Norwegian backpackers are present to f…k up stamping our cards, its self service at Kambalda Golf Club.

Next stop is the Kalgoorlie Super Pit, nothing prepares you for the sheer scale of the operation. It’s massive, noisy, dusty and hugely impressive how human beings could do this. I know it’s a messy big hole in the earth, but it’s a messy impressive big hole in the earth.

Our late lunch is Red Rooster, then we find our Air B & B, a house about 15 minutes walk from town. Kalgoorlie is a big mining town, beautiful old buildings, lots of shops and a seedy under belly.

Dinner is at the Exchange Hotel, and old style pub where the early reconnaissance mission by The Don, Harve and Pauolo find that some of the bar staff left home in a rush and forgot to get fully dressed. We failed to see the sign outside ” Skimpies from 10am till late”. It was shocking!!!

The food is OK but it’s not cheap. Kalgoorlie has had a huge mining conference on, there are lots of blokes in suits, 5 o’clock shadows, pointy shoes, all with purple lanyards around their necks. A few females are attached to them like limpets to a submarine, clearly their PAs are here helping them with their PowerPoint presentations. What do you think?

Tomorrow we’re in Kalgoorlie, last 2 golf holes of the championship, I wonder who will win ???

Cheers, arrividerci

Pauolo