Hi Peter,

Your friends will be known locally as "atoms" then! I've seen the new shops on the way in - Lidl etc. Late summer was my last trip. It's sad the John O'Groats Hotel is lying empty - used to be a great venue for weddings (along with the Portland Arms in Lybster).

You're obviously a big fan of the place Peter. I'm more likely to meet up with you there than I am in Dorset I think.

Roy

Thought I'd add a pic to show the expanse of seeming nothingness. This is west of the South Australia/West Australia border. There are stretches of road that are extra wide with additional clearings at the side. These are so the Royal Flying Doctor Service and other airborne emergency services can land to collect sick or injured.

Eucla WA

Thanks for the pic. The far north of Scotland is the nearest we have to nothingness over here, but I suspect yours goes on a lot further and is much warmer!

Peter.N.

Yes - on that trip the highest temp we saw on the car thermometer was 44 - celcius! That was on the very south west tip of Australia at Augusta.
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&q=bu...&t=h&iwloc=addr

I'm surprised how green it is!

Nothingness seems to bring visions of arrid red dry nothingness to my tiny brain

Hi Craig,

From this overcrowded little island (and getting more crowded by the day) I envy you your space and tranquility. And yet, last night on TV I saw a programme about the ten nastiest, bitiest things you've got - taipans, salties, spiders that'll bite your arm off and so on - and suddenly our stinging nettles and wasps don't seem so bad.

Good on yer,

Derek

Hi Craig,

That's a serious stretch of road - no doubt about it. Don't you just love those maps too. I tried using Google earth recently to examine a few places of interest in Scotland. It highlights one major difference - none of the places I wanted to look at were available in Google earth - too much (permanent) cloud cover! I see the whole of Australia on Google is cloud free - though there are a few wee fluffy ones in your photo.

Given the 44 degrees C in the cool south - I think I might need a while to adjust - assuming I don't just melt into a blob first.

Cheers

Roy

Derek

Yes, all those nasty bitey things kill not many people at all each year. Certainly far less than a crazed yank running around with a gun or two or some deranged teenagers on trains and buses.

I think the last person to die from a funnel web spider bite was back in the 1980s. Not to say that people don't get bitten from time to time, we are just able to treat them with anti-venene etc.

Most of the people who become crododile lunch are o/s tourists who seem to think that crocs go to sleep at night so it is safe to swim after dark! NOT!!

The space we have is wonderful, but in reality over 90% of us live within two hours drive of the coast. (I think that fact is right or at least close to).

Part of the drive to WA and back was so remote that there was zero broadcast radio reception. No AM or FM. Then you know you are isolated.

Mind you the Eyre Highway is so busy with trucks that you never feel very lonely.

Hi UFO

I have some radio ham friends 'down under', one or two of whom have been over here. I used to regularly swap video's with one in Sydney, who would visit other hams when in the area, so I have seen by these means many parts of Aussie, including Alice Springs. I envy you all that space and warmth. I think I could live in the outback - if it wasn't to hot!

Peter.N.