Goodbye Meekatharra...Hello West Coast Australia!

Seeing as it's now been exactly 20 days since my last update I supposed I'd better fill everyone in on whats been going on.

After spending 7 excellent weeks at the Commercial Hotel in Meekatharra it was time to go. My last day of work was Tuesday but I decided to stick around until Friday just to say goodbye to the town properly (ie drunkenly). The lovely Aimee let me stay at the Royal Mail Hotel for free so I was free to spend all of my money on booze. :) Actually I had a very relaxing last few days, a very drunk last few nights, and a very sad last morning. It was very hard to say goodbye to Meekatharra and to all the people I had met there. My last night at the Mail was great, everyone came out to say goodbye, lots of drinking, dancing, and general merriment ensued. Carrie and Russell met me at the bus to say goodbye and Russell brought me a bunch of Meekatharra souvenirs from the Post Office. I was really touched by the gesture since I had no idea Russell really cared one way or the other about me. I boarded the TransWA bus on Friday morning and reached Geraldton by about 4 in the afternoon.

I had decided to treat myself and stayed at a real hotel (the All Seasons) for the first two nights. It was nice to have a place to myself but it was too far away from downtown for me to walk there, and it was pouring rain, so I pretty much slept for two days. I did get out of the room for a little while and got lucky enough to miss the rainshowers and get down to the beach. Thats the nice thing about Geraldton, you're never more than a few blocks from the ocean. The beach I found was pretty much deserted so I just wandered around, took some pictures, and (even though its was cold and windy) put my feet in.





On Sunday morning it was time to get back to reality so I packed up my stuff and taxi'd over to the Foreshore Backpackers. The Foreshore is actually quite a nice little hostel right on the beach, I mean I can hear the waves crashing in my room kind of close to the beach. This is the first hostel I've stayed in where I've actually gone for the group room and its not so back. My room only has three beds in it and last night they were all full but tonight there's only two of us. Since it is right on the beach and near all the shops its a little loud at night but for $25 a night I really can't complain.



The town of Geraldton itself is pretty boring. The beach is nice but there really isn't a whole lot of touristy type things to do. It feels more like a stopping off point for people on their way up or down the coast. I've spent most of my time reading, napping in the sun, and planning the next months worth of adventures.

And those plans are..

Well I purchased a hop on hop off bus ticket from Perth to Broome from Greyhound for around $450 and planned on doing my own thing cruising up the coast. NOT a good idea. I should have done a bit more research and realized that the Greyhound buses on the West Coast only operate four days out of the week (and are moving down to three next month) they don't go to a lot of the main tourist destinations, and their timing is very inconvenient. In light of that fact I decided to cancel my ticket, get most of my money back, and book an actual guided tour of the coast. Easyrider Tours (www.easyridertours.com.au) offers several packages up and down the west coast. What is really awesome about them is they are a Jump On Jump Off tour, which means you can get off anywhere they stop and stay for as long as you want, then jump back on again when you're ready. They still do all the guided tour type stuff, canoe trips, 4WD, paid accommodation for the nights they are scheduled to be there, but you have 6 months in which to use the ticket. This seemed like a pretty good idea to me so I e-mailed them and asked if I could jump on their Reef Cruiser tour in Geraldton instead of starting with them in Perth. I got a really fast response that said of course I could and they would knock $100 off the price since I was missing the first half of the first day. So I forked out the $650 and will be boarding the bus at 4pm tomorrow.

Thats pretty much all that I've been up to. I'll be sure to update on my current whereabouts as I head up the coast.


Oh and P.S. Grandma I've got my tickets all sorted and I'll be in Brisbane on the 17th of June (my birthday by the way!) and I will be on the same flight with all of you from Brisbane to Cairns.

Until next time!

Reflections on Five Weeks in Meekatharra

OK Ok...I know I'm in trouble for not updating in ages but, well actually I have no excuse except that I've been busy and feeling to lazy after work to get down to the computer.

Anyways, things are going well here. I've officially given my last day as May 18th so I've got another two weeks to go. I haven't been up to a whole lot of exciting things, just working, drinking, working, etc etc. One of the patrons managed to scrounge up a bike for the pub so I got to go on my first bike ride in ages a few days ago. It was nice to get back on a bike but not so nice to realize that I'm getting out of shape again. Oh well...only two more weeks until the free food stops and I'll have to start scrounging.



Amy and I out on the town. And yes thats a tap in the fridge door...bloody brilliant!

One of the girls that works at the Shire office had a birthday this weekend complete with a fancy dress party (thats a costume party). It was supposed to be super hero themed but the options for costumes were rather limited so I went as "super cowgirl"...original I know. But it seemed appropriate what with the whole Arizona thing. The party was alot of fun. It was nice to get out and do some dancing and socializing outside of the pub.



The boys doing karaoke.

Since its been five whole weeks in this lovely town I thought I'd do a bit of a retrospective.

Living in Meekatharra has been a very eye opening experience. The first week was alot more difficult than I thought. The bar patrons are very...spoiled, they're used to you knowing what they want and getting it for them the second they want it. It was hard to not take they're teasing personally. After that first week though things got better. I am still amazed sometimes at how presumptuous some people can be. If they don't get a new beer within 5 seconds of finishing their first one they start harrassing you. Not everyone is like that of course, mostly just the older locals who are kind of stuck in their ways. But I get the impression that its sort of a lack of respect towards females issue.

On that note...my impression of Australian guys hasn't been all that great. Of course I've mostly only met miners, truck drivers, and the like but it seems like their views on women are not...respectful. Now I am a barmaid and so I see the drunken, depressed, and stupid part of the population and I'm sure there are plenty of good Australian guys out there but as of now I've only met a select few.

I think when it comes time to leave Meekatharra I will be ready. I miss being able to sit around with a group of friends, get drunk on cheap wine, and have somewhat intelligent discussions. I really miss having that close group of friends that I had in Arizona (yes Meetup! thats you) and in college. Hopefully after I leave here and kind of settle in somewhere for few months I'll be able to find some people that I really enjoy. Until then life in Meekatharra is still good, the money is even better, and people are opening my eyes to the world...and that is what I came here fore isn't it?

Until next time!