Marla Roadhouse

Moving north from Coober Pedy We began the long haul up the centre to the top of South Australia and ultimately on to the Northern Territory. Marla was our first roadhouse overnighter at the Marla Travellers Rest roadhouse and the last stop in South Australia.

The drive from Coober Pedy to Marla was a 236km slog into the wind that made it feel a whole lot longer than it really was. You could feel the cruiser sucking the diesel down like a cold beer in the desert and it showed at the bowser when we finally got to Marla and filled up. We were expecting to see jacked up fuel prices this far north but tour our surprise it was only $2.30/L which wasn’t much above what we paying back down in Adelaide.

Barbara and Paul, from Tomcat Hill in Coober Pedy, also pulled in at Marla so we had dinner with them in the roadhouse bar & grill and reminisced on our time in Coober Pedy. This was our first taste of roadhouse cuisine. Jo and I both had the Braised Beef Spare Ribs, which were next level tender, succulent, juicy and beefy. After slogging up the Stuart Highway it was just the sort rib-sticking, hunger-busting comfort meal you need to wind-down and relax into the night. Barbara opted for their Chicken Schnitty and took half back to her van and had two other meals from it the next day. No half servings in the outback roadhouses…

While we were in Marla a couple of wide load prime movers pulled up, each one transporting an enormous Army Tank north. They were quite interesting and we were somewhat amazed at their size. It’s hard to imagine how tracked vehicles of that size can actually move let alone manoeuvre. The thought of the fuel bill for them made the cruiser’s fuel costs seem a little more palatable given the fuel-sucking drive to Marla.

Marla was also our first stop with no phone reception. It is a little jarring when you’re used to doing some instant research on your phone about the place you’re in and where you’re going next. Thankfully Google Maps still works, to some extent, offline. That said… having no phone or television reception gives you some perspective and you finally realise that you’re deep in the outback and things are a little bit quieter. Things that used to seem important receive a dose of perspective as you open your eyes and ears a bit more and re-engage with the real world.

Kulgera

The next day we farewelled Barbara and Paul as we headed to Kulgera Roadhouse. They were continuing a bit further to Erldudnda Roadhouse before we would all meet up again in Yulara. Jo took the wheel for the second time and thankfully the wind had blown itself out the previous day so it was a much more relaxed drive north.

We took a rest stop at Marryat Creek Rest Area, just south of the Northern Territory border, and had the first use of our portable gas stove, which was shiny new until this point. We made a couple of cups of Rooibos tea (South African Red Bush). Rooibos makes a red coloured tea that does not contain caffeine and has a slightly sweet flavour such that sugar or sweetner is not required for those of us who don’t like overly sweet beverages. It makes a pleasant change from normal tea.

After our break Rob was back in the saddle as we crossed the border into the Northern Territory. It was the first time in the N.T for both of us. The border has an impressive rest area monument area and a notice that unless otherwise sign-posted the maximum speed limit in the N.T. is 130km/h. 100km/h is plenty and much safer when you’re towing a van even though the Stuart Highway is hard, flat, fairly straight and easy to drive.

Interestingly, to this point, we had been rarely overtaken nor had we overtaken anything more than a few times. We also had not been overtaken by any road trains and had not passed many coming the other way. The few that had passed by us caused little to no turbulence but there still remains a slight anxiety when you see one coming towards you in the distance.

The push through to Kulgera Roadhouse was dry and desolate with strong winds but not as consistent and in our face as the drive to Marla. We pulled into Kulgera Roadhouse and thankfully it began to cool down and actually ended up raining that night. Not a lot but enough to settle the dust and produce that beautiful, fresh, clean-air smell that comes the rain.

Kulgera Roadhouse bar has a Happy Hour from 5:00 til 7:00 so we wandered into the bar for that and dinner. The ceiling of the bar is festooned with bra’s, hundreds of them, from liberated passers-by over the years. There was even a prosthetic leg dangling from one spot. We settled in for a few drinks before dinner and got to talking with Linda and her partner Marty, whose Winnebago camper van had broken down on the Northern Territory border.

They got out at the border for a break and then discovered when they started up again that they had lost 10 litres of diesel and figured that they should probably call for help. The mechanic from Kulgera towed them to the Kulgera Roadhouse but was unable to fix it there and arranged for his heavy truck to come from Qld to transport their camper to Alice Springs for repairs. This meant that they were stuck at Kulgera for four nights while they waited for the heavy truck. They were making the most of it and enjoying their forced stay. We had a great time chatting with them and learning about their trip and their current woes, all being handled in good spirits.

For dinner Rob had a camel burger that was every bit as good as a beef burger and seemed quite fitting out here. Jo had, of all things, a seafood basket. When in the middle of the outback and as far away from the coast as you can get, have a seafood basket! Actually… it was pretty good. Distance doesn’t seem to have as much meaning these days with refrigerated transport…

The other amazing thing about Kulgera was our phone and internet reception. From no reception in Marla to 30Mbps in Kulgera. 30Mbps is what we get back home and we were not expecting that sort of speed out here. However, despite the strong internet speeds, we got our first taste of central Australian fuel prices. Diesel at Kulgera jumped to $2.75/L, which is a bit of a shock after $2.30 at Marla. We were expecting it at some point and this was the point. You just have to accept it though because there are no choices. Interestingly… nobody seems to grumble about it and just accepts it as being how it is and fair enough really. It can’t be easy for these places who live and die on the supply trucks that ply the route.

After dinner Linda and Marty gave us a quick tour of their stricken Winnebago. It was about the size of the six berth campervan we had in New Zealand many years ago and was surprisingly spacious. They used the double bed area above the cabin as storage space. They had a double bed at the back which could be raised to the roof, and lowered, electriconically, which basically gave them a small living room underneath. They even had a (compact) two-seater lounge and two separate single-seater armchairs. Plenty of room to stretch out and relax, which given their current situation would have been quite comforting.

Kulgera proved to be a really good overnighter before our 321km push through to Yulara the next day and the magnificaent monoliths of Uluru and Kata-Tjuta…