The Indian Pacific...
So...riding the Indian Pacific may have exhausted me, but it has only made me want to do even more long train rides, particularly a certain train ride that goes from Russia to China...but that may just be because I met TWO people who had done it and told me many amazing stories about it.
There were a half dozen of us who rode straight through from Sydney to Perth, and we all got on pretty well. Which is good, because the trip would not have been nearly as enjoyable if we had not. I ended up spending too much money, but that is typical for my first days back travelling.
They pulled one of the engines up for us to take pictures of, so I did.
And this is my 'bedroom'
In fact I was sleeping in the widow above the c in pacific. It wasn't actually my seat, but there was no one in those seats, so I took the empty seats and spread myself out to sleep, it was a pretty good set up(that luckily panned out all three nights!)
The first part if the trip was fairly uneventful, mostly just watching the 'mountains' roll by and wondering if we would make it out of Sydney before sunset. Had dinner, and than got ready for bed and slept. Rather uneventful really.
The next morning we were up early and in Broken Hill, we had a choice to take a 'whistle stop' tour, but I wanted to simply take a walk and find some breakfast and coffee. Once we found those I wandered into the middle of the street:
And enjoyed the sunrise.
After Broken Hill we were back on the train for a short ride to Adelaide. Where I again took a short walk and picked up 'supplies' for the next leg of the journey, that of course included coke and chocolate. Because of course I wanted to eat healthy while on the train.
After Adelaide I had a train shower, which was rather unexciting. Though the fun challenge was 'don't grab the shower curtain when falling' because that could have been really bad. After that I managed to sleep quite well.
And in the morning I awoke to slight hills, and than lots of flat.
And lots of flat
And than flatter flat
Until we reached the thriving metropolis of Cook. And by that I mean the little tiny town, where both the hospital and school are now condemned buildings and you are not to enter or go near them for any reason.
And I took the opportunity to take some pictures of the train
And the tracks
And the flatness or course.
And than we passed further miles and miles of the sameness. It was beautiful, and amazing. And the sunset was so cool! But of course the windows were all dirty and reflective the pictures could not come close to doing it justice.
This morning I woke up and had one last breakfast on the train before disembarking about half an hour late, and enjoying the mad scramble to get luggage(they pretty much just pulled up the luggage carts and let us go at it). Found my way into Perth with some help(and some friends) dropped my stuff in the hostel and wandered the city. Before finding my way into Supanova Perth and seeing the John Barrowman panel...yet again. It was so different from the Sydney one, which was nice, because it would have been disappointing if it had been exactly the same.
Now I am sitting in my hostel room, avoiding the rain, and debating going to find food. Because I am hungry.