And She's In!

I did it. It has taken eight weeks but I have at last crossed a major hurdle in my battle to overcome my fear of All That May Kill Me In The Water. I fully immersed myself in the ocean and I have the photo to prove it. Okay, so you can’t really tell that it’s me in the picture – you can blame The Husband for that – but you’ll have to take my word for it. The figure almost completely submerged in the Indian Ocean is indeed me, and I’m even smiling! Honestly, I am, I zoomed in and saw a definite grin. I don’t think it matters that as soon as the photo had been taken I jumped up and hot-footed it up the beach to the safety of my towel. Nor do I think that we should pay too much attention to the fact that I am only lying in three feet of water. Okay, maybe two feet. No, what is important is that I did it at all. I lowered myself into the tumbling waves and put myself at the mercy of anything that might be lurking below, wanting to bite or sting me. I pushed aside my fears and let whatever might happen, happen. And of course nothing did. Although to be fair, I didn’t stick around long enough to find out. It may not be much, but it was a first step. And you know what? I actually enjoyed myself, even if it was only for ten seconds. The water was deliciously cool and there’s nothing like swimming (or just bobbing) in the great open ocean, the sky huge and blue and cloudless above you and the horizon stretching out into the far distance, where the sky meets the water in a collision of cobalt.


I’m slowly building up to the level at which I’m happy to swim out over the rocks and go snorkelling – at the rate I’m currently going that will happen just in time for Christmas. The problem is that in just a month we are off to the Ningaloo Reef, Australia’s largest fringing coral reef and home to the largest fish in the world, the whale shark. I’m going to have to up the ante if I’m going to be ready to swim out from the shore, purposefully seeking out marine life of all sorts. Maybe the only way to do it is to get it all over with in one go, just jump in and force myself to stay out for half an hour or so. Perhaps then I’ll realise that not everything in the ocean is out to get me, that it is perfectly possible to go for a swim and not lose a leg to a shark in the process. Well, either that or I’ll limp back up the beach in agony having been stung by a giant jellyfish. I’m hoping it’s the former, obviously.

Jumping Out Of My Skin

Expat Wife came close to certain death yesterday, or at least a stay in Karratha’s finest hospital. I was driving down the long stretch of road between Dampier and Karratha, flat, scraggy land on either side, when all of a sudden I saw it. A huge, man-sized kangaroo, right in front of me in the middle of the road. My heart leapt out of my chest as I went to slam my foot on the brake, but the giant animal merely looked at me for a second before bounding off, across the red, dusty terrain. As soon as it appeared, it had gone again and I was left wondering if I had just imagined the six foot beast I had come so close to colliding with. But the fear in the pit of my stomach was real enough and I moved on cautiously, scanning the horizon for other giant roos, whilst trying to take deep breaths and slow my thumping heart. It was the first six footer I had seen as well as being the first kangaroo I had seen in the middle of the day – they don’t usually emerge in the full heat and light of the day. In that sense I was unlucky but in every other way I was extremely lucky. Lucky that I hadn’t left a few seconds earlier or was driving that little bit faster. Lucky that the truck behind me wasn’t too close to me and so had time to react and slow down himself. Lucky that it was daylight, so the kangaroo wasn’t stunned by my headlights into standing stock still in the middle of the road. Yup, I was lucky alright but I really don’t want to have to rely on luck - I think it’s time we invested in a bull bar.

A Key Requirement, Part II

You won’t believe this – I couldn’t believe it and I don’t think he could either – but The Husband managed to lock us out of the house again. Now, to do it once is pretty silly but everyone makes mistakes like that at some point. To do it to twice, and not only that but twice in less than two months, is an act of monumental stupidity. Okay, maybe I’m being a bit harsh, but trust me, if you were there you would have been saying the same thing. Last night was the first time since the first incident that I had not asked him whether he had keys. I just assumed that I didn’t have to anymore. He’s a big boy now after all. But as soon as he shut the front door, he whipped round and manically asked, “Haveyougotyourkeys?” The tone of his voice and the terror on his face immediately told me that he wasn’t joking. Still, I asked, “No, why?”, hoping that I was mistaken, that he would laugh and say, “Well, it’s a good thing I have then!” But no laughter escaped from his gaping mouth. He said nothing but held up a set of keys under the dim glow of the outside lamp – they were his work keys and not the house key with the distinctive pink key ring.

Before I continue, I need to clarify something. I can imagine that you may be thinking, hang on a minute, why is it all his fault, why did you not have your keys? Well, I have an answer for that, as I did for him when he said the same thing to me. I prepare our water bottles, I get our towels and our money and the anti-bug spray ready. His only responsibility when we go to Bootcamp is to bring the house and car keys as he has a little bag in which he puts them. He knows that I will not bring my keys; he knows that he needs to bring his.

We were dressed in our fitness gear, ready to go to Bootcamp, but clearly that would not be happening anymore. I was so angry that I said just a few choice words to let him know how I felt, then told him that I was going for a run and that I expected the house to be open when I returned. Well, I have never run so fast or so far without stopping as I did last night. I tell you what, rage makes for an excellent work-out! And I did feel much better, and much calmer, when I returned. Instead of taking it out on him (which might have felt good but would have got us nowhere), I pounded it out on the pavement. Neither The Husband, nor the car, was there when I ran breathlessly back up the driveway, so I assumed he had gone to use someone’s phone or ask for someone’s help. I decided to do some resistance exercises out the back so I walked round the side of the house and across the darkened garden, stomping my feet and making as much noise as possible to scare off any snakes that might be lurking in the grass. I continued my work-out on the veranda, softly lit by the moon and a light that had been left on in the hallway, and was very proud of myself for only getting scared once or twice when a gust of wind shook the fence and sent the branches of the trees tapping at the roof of the house. I had come a long way since the first ‘incident’.

I was doing some sit-ups when I saw, through the glass patio doors, a figure rush through into the bedroom. I scrambled to my feet, heart thumping in my chest and banged on the door, hoping to scare away the intruder. When the body emerged from the bedroom door, however, it turned out to be The Husband, who had been let in by a woman from work who possessed spare keys to all the company houses. The Husband had interrupted her in the middle of a barbecue, from where she had to drive all the way back to the office to pick up the key and then drive all the way back to open the door for a very sheepish and apologetic man.
He assures me that he has learnt his lesson now but then you would have thought that he might have done so after the first lock-out. Hopefully, the memory of his embarrassment at making a total stranger leave her dinner to fetch him a key will prevent him from ever leaving the house without the correct keys again. We shall see.

It's Tennis, Just Not As We Know It

For the first time since our membership at The Royal Cliff Sports & Fitness Club ran out, three months ago, The Husband and I dusted off our tennis racquets, popped open the vacuum-pumped ball-saver, and hit the tennis courts. It wasn’t quite the experience we were used to at The Royal Cliff. Instead of walking up bougainvillea-lined steps to an immaculate club house set amongst tall, shady trees, we entered a security-barred cement box via a dimly lit path. Instead of a beaming woman opening the door to the reception for us, looking like our arrival had just made her day, we were presented with an indifferent youth behind a screen who liked like she would rather be anywhere else but there. Instead of seven well-maintained hard courts, there were four synthetic courts that had definitely seen better days. And of course there was no uniformed man bringing us a pitcher of iced water, glasses and towels on a tray.

What both experiences had though, was warm, dry weather and you can’t hope for better than that – it’s certainly more than you get for most of the year in England. I remember turning up for evening matches or training and finding it difficult to hold the racquet as my hands were numb with cold, and sitting under cover of clubhouse after clubhouse, waiting for the rain to cease. It may have been difficult to see the lines on the court at times last night, so covered with sand were they, but at least we were warm and dry. And, despite the rather more basic facilities, we had great fun - it was exhilarating to be pounding a ball back and forth again. Best of all perhaps, was that we played with someone else, meaning no arguments, no tantrums, no swearing. With someone else on court, we had to reign in our emotions and move on from any bad shots hit or balls missed. Which also meant that we were able to concentrate on simply enjoying the game! A Buckley tennis game without heated words exchanged at least once was previously unheard of. Perhaps now we can enjoy a civilised game – or would that be boring?

Flying Nowhere

Internal flights in Australia are bloody expensive. It costs less to fly from Perth to Bali than it does from Perth to Sydney. The main problem is that there just isn’t enough competition – there are only three or four airlines that fly domestically in Australia. This is a country so vast that, unless you’re an OAP or a backpacker with the time to amble from place to place in a caravan, car or clapped-out VW van, there is simply no option but to fly from city to city, so I can’t understand why there aren’t more domestic airlines. Unlike in the UK where it is possible to travel by train, bus or car to pretty much anywhere without it taking too long, thereby forcing the airlines to drive down their prices in order to encourage people to fly, the airlines here know that most travel will necessitate a flight and they take advantage of that.


Flying from outback Karratha, where the majority of the population is working on one of the mining or oil and gas projects and either has their flights paid for by the company or earns enough so that it doesn’t matter, it is even more expensive. The airlines know they can charge more so they do. I tried to book flights to Perth for a weekend of restaurants, bars, shopping and culture (just a little fix to keep me going!) but it was going to cost me AU$1300 return for the both of us – a whopping £740 just for a short weekend away, and that’s without a hotel, eating out and all the other expenses such a weekend would incur!

Before coming here I comforted myself with thoughts of a dose of civilisation once a month or so, knowing that Perth was only a two hour flight away. Those dreams have now been dashed on the rocks of airline greed. I will simply have to do the second best thing - get dressed up, pour myself several martinis, watch back-to-back episodes of Sex and the City, and dream of heels, cocktails and tables with starched white tablecloths.

Boys And Their Toys

I enjoyed the perfect Aussie day on Saturday, despite the fact The Husband was working and therefore sadly couldn’t join us. I breakfasted al fresco on our veranda, lunched on fish and chips (or, to be completely accurate, Firby Fish Bites – yes, I chose from the kids menu and got ridiculed for it but I obviously made the right decision as I couldn’t even finish the kiddy portion – it’s no wonder more and more Australians are becoming obese) and beer by the sea, then drove to a vast, empty beach and spent the afternoon catching some rays and playing a fierce game of French cricket. For the boys, however, none of the above came close to beating the real thrill of the day - making a detour to look at a huge dumper truck. I kid you not. Okay, I’ll admit that it was a fairly impressive vehicle. The bright yellow truck towered above us - it was like a gigantic version of a toy truck you’d play with in the sandpit, with wheels that you could climb in and a seat you have to use a ladder to clamber up to. It was quite interesting for about a minute, then I was ready to go. Unfortunately for me though, the boys were enthralled with this monster toy and stood gazing up at it with eyes as round as saucers, like kids first thing on Christmas day. They walked round it a few times, examined all the knobs and bolts and screws in minute detail and took turns posing beside it for the camera. “This is the best thing I’ve done in Karratha!” exclaimed one of them breathlessly, still looking up at the truck in awe. I know there isn’t much to do in Karratha but seriously?! I think the beach tops an old truck. Of course, these were all engineers and they do tend to get geeky about these sorts of things, but I think this weird obsession with gadgets and contraptions is fundamentally a male thing. Take the following day for example – I’m sitting around a table in the sunshine by the pool, glass of wine in hand, gazing up at the palm trees, attempting to chat about travel, but the conversation turns again and again to bikes. No matter how hard I tried to steer away from that boring topic, it keeps coming back to different models of bike, different accessories for the bike, different ways to get a bike delivered to Karratha. I didn’t think it was possible to talk about bikes for more than, say, ten minutes, but apparently it is. For much longer. At least I had a pair of big dark shades on so nobody could tell when I was drifting off or staring at the sky. And thank God for wine.

Content in Karratha

A lot of people complain about Karratha. Their mouths permanently downturned, acid on their tongues, they moan that there is nothing to do here, that it is a desolate town of red dirt with nowhere decent to shop, nowhere nice to eat, and nothing to distract them from the monotony of their existence but beer. I understand that it must be hard for the guys that come out here on their own and are put in a camp with just a small room and perhaps a basic kitchenette to call their own. Of course, they do get paid handsomely for the sacrifices they make to work here and are often on pretty generous leave cycles (I think even I could put up with long hours and a small living space if I was working two weeks on, one week off as are some of the contractors here). Ironically though, it is the frequent leave that contributes to their general feeling of loneliness and unhappiness. How could anyone ever feel settled if every few weeks they’re off somewhere else? You’d be constantly thinking about your next holiday, your mind would always be in another country, and not in Karratha. I’m not for a moment suggesting that these leave cycles should be changed – if I lived in a box and ate every meal in a canteen I’d need frequent escape too, and there’s no way you could ever feel settled in those circumstances – but it all contributes to the feeling of unhappy transience many workers here feel. I think the reason that The Husband and I are actually quite happy here (apart from the obvious fact that we are together) is that, living in a house with a garden and a having a bit of essential personal space, we feel more settled than others. We're trying to make a life for ourselves here, even if it is only for a year or so. 


And that is presumably why the following is happening. The State Government’s fervent desire to develop the Pilbara, the treasure chest of the country, has prompted a long-overdue facelift for Karratha, in its bid to transform the town into a major regional city. This will include building affordable housing, more shops and services and putting a bit of sparkle into the town, with the idea that this will encourage couples and families to move here together and not just for a year or two but to settle here permanently. I’m not sure how many people actually want to settle in as remote a destination as Karratha, but I suppose some people like the open emptiness, the ability to drive out and be on your own within minutes. What no-one likes is the cost of living in Karratha – everything from food, to clothes, to housing is eye-wateringly expensive and that leaves a sour taste in everyone’s mouths. Whether that will ever change remains to be seen (I doubt it will – the high salaries here spark higher costs of living) but if the government really can transform Karratha into somewhere people actually want to live, maybe more people will be able to stop scowling and enjoy what the area does have to offer. Beaches, crystal-clear water teaming with marine life, wonderful weather, two world-class national parks offering spectacular hiking, fishing in the rivers and out on the open sea. Coming from England, just the ability to have an outdoor lifestyle is wonderful and, despite what all the moaners may say, that is something all us Brits will miss when we leave. Try smiling - remember, unhapiness begets unhapiness.

Man Make Fire

At the weekend we enjoyed that time-honoured Aussie favourite, the barbecue. We did it the British way, however, and used a charcoal barbie (to use the local slang), something that proved hard to find and expensive to buy. We searched high and lo for one in the shops in central Karratha but all we could find were the kind powered by gas. We eventually found what we were looking for, a wonderful Weber charcoal beauty, in a hardware store out on an industrial estate. Australians are enamoured with the big gas barbies or, as we like to call them, outdoor grills. I understand why they use them – Australians love to barbecue everything so they might use their barbie three or four times a week, making the easier to clean, turn the knob and it’s ready to go gas jobs the hassle-free option. But when it comes down to it, they are just outdoor cookers – you don’t get that beautiful chargrilled barbecue flavour that, for me, really makes barbecued food so delicious. Besides, The Husband loves the whole manly ritual of lighting the barbie and, if the number of men surrounding it throughout the night was anything to go by, he’s not the only one. There’s something about men and fire. I suppose it goes back to the days of the cavemen, when fire equalled warmth and food. Men obviously still carry that primitive inbuilt survival mechanism that draws them to the flicker of a flame. I just sat back with a glass of bubbly and let them get on with proving their manliness and competing for the title of biggest steak. I love a good barbecue – the food, the aromas of sizzling meat, the al fresco dining, the chatter amongst friends. And of course I get a night off from cooking so I am more than happy to regularly let The Husband get his caveman fix.

One Small Step

A few weeks ago, I slapped on some sun cream, took a deep breath, donned a thick pair of gloves and boldly stepped out into the garden. It was time to tackle both my fears and the mounting piles of dead leaves and thick, sprouting weeds in the long-neglected garden. Considering, as reported in yesterday’s blog, that not much grows in the Pilbara unaided, we reasoned that it had been a really, really long time since anyone had touched the overgrown garden. Leaves were piled a good three or four inches thick under and around the trees and bushes and some of the weeds were so well developed they seemed to be attempting to masquerade as viable plants – in fact, I had to pause to consider whether a weed was actually a plant and vice-versa several times.


It was, however, the leaves I was most hesitant to tackle. The weeds would take grit and determination and a bit of hard work to heave out of the ground one by one, but disturbing the thick piles of mulchy leaves could very well disturb something else, something that has hidden in the soft, dark vegetation and made it its home. Knowing that at any moment I could send a snake slithering out of its hiding place, making a bee-line for my ankles, I armed myself with a long-handled rake and stood as far from the dark depths of the leaves as possible. I would make a few preliminary pokes, step several feet back and then, when I deemed it was safe to continue, begin the arduous (but hopefully now risk-free) task of raking up months worth of mulch. After I had raked all of the easier-to-get-to piles without incident, I was feeling a little braver and stepped under the branches and into the dark corners of the garden to reach the remaining leaves, looking around me constantly for spiders as I went.

Two hours and a litre of water later, I was feeling tremendously proud of myself – not only had I cleaned up the garden but I had tackled my fears of slithery, crawly creatures head-on. A few weeks previously, I would never even have considered stepping near those leaves, preferring a little patch of grass in the middle of the garden, far away from any dark, dangerous corners. Now of course, there aren’t any dark, dangerous corners as I can see every inch of the sun-dappled garden, thereby simultaneously transforming it into a safer, more relaxing haven where we can eat, read and play. We can now actually enjoy the garden and I have been pretty much cured of my debilitating fear of all that may lurk in the shadows.

Hang on, what was that sound? I think I may go inside now.

First Rain

It’s raining. This is the first time I have seen rain since arriving in Australia over a month and a half ago so I think it’s enough of an event to make it blog-worthy. I actually heard it before I saw it – like many houses in Australia, ours has a corrugated iron roof so you can imagine the noise when the heavens open and it starts to bucket it down. It’s immense, a ceaseless hammering from above, so loud you start to worry the roof might just cave in. It’s only been raining for about ten minutes but already the garden looks more lush, the grass greener. The leaves on the bushes and trees glisten with tiny drops of water and the roots greedily glug the moisture in the red soil. It takes effort and constant watering for anything much to grow out here – any green spaces require daily sprinkler-action but water is scarce so, with the first sign it might rain, I went into the shed to turn off the reticulation system for the night. Mother Nature can do its bit and help out today.


As I am typing this, the skies have darkened to an angry charcoal and the room I’m sitting in is cloaked with gloom. The branches of the tree close to the house are whipping away at the wall, driven by a wind that has suddenly picked up. We are past cyclone season but I imagine this is how it starts and I am very glad it won’t get much worse than this now. I’m rather dreading the summer when a cyclone can form at any moment, unleashing its fury onto the town with furious winds and thrashing rain, when sturdy buildings can be damaged and a man can be blown off his feet. A bit of heavy rain and a light wind is all I have to worry about for now. I’m nice and dry and cosy inside the house, congratulating myself for having the foresight to bring the washing in before the rain started to come down!

Bowls, Beer and Barbecue

There are certain things one doesn’t expect to do until eligible for a bus pass and discounts on visits to National Trust properties - watch day-time TV every day, play practical jokes on people with your dentures, figure out where all the best early bird specials are within a fifty mile radius, take a packed lunch to the midday showing at the cinema (my granny actually does do this), and play lawn bowls. I have still got the first four of those to look forward to in my dotage but I can now tick off the latter. Yes, yesterday The Husband and I donned our whites (well, he wore a white polo shirt and I lightly coloured tailored shorts – due to the constant presence of red dust here, white doesn’t feature much in our wardrobe) and stormed the green for a few games of that classic British game.


I must point out at this juncture that this was a work do and at no point in time has either The Husband or I joined a lawn bowls club. It was an unusual choice for a corporate function but scored high points for originality. The fact that beer and wine was free-flowing throughout the day also helped. Most people there had never played before and therefore hardly anyone knew the rules, which made for an interesting game. Each time we played a different team, we played by different rules. I’m still not sure what the correct rules of play are. I had played boule on the beach during many a family holiday so I understood the general gist of the game but I was rather too eager to begin with, sending my ball right to the back and into the ditch on more than a couple of occasions. Things weren’t going too well for me until, that was, I decided to see how beer affected my standard of play. I can conclusively report that, following my eminently technical scientific study, the amount of beer consumed directly correlates to the form of the lawn bowls player. The more I drank, the better I played, although I imagine there must be a ceiling, after which the standard rapidly decreases. By the end of my first bottle however, I was on fire. We ended up annihilating our opponents.

A break for a barbecue lunch and a glass of wine followed the first game, before we were back on the green to play the winner of another game. We had spotted this team at the other end of the green – it wasn’t hard to notice them as they whooped and cheered constantly. They were all dressed in red t-shirts and dark trousers so they had clearly been thinking about this for a while; they seemed to take the sport very seriously. We were in trouble. As predicted, we lost (although it turned out that they had been playing by an incorrect set of rules so we are convinced we were unfairly done by) but that did mean we could sit the rest of the afternoon out and just watch the other games, beer in hand. During the course of our combined three hours of play, we discovered that there was definitely a limit to the amount of lawn bowls one could play in a single day. Perhaps when we’re retired we’ll find our lawn bowls stamina and be able to play for an entire day. Until then, I might just stick to tennis.

Hopping Mad

Kangaroos are crazy creatures. Either that or they’re just stupid. It’s probably a little of both. We saw dozens of them in our first few weeks in Karratha but unfortunately not one of them was living - we observed them in various stages of decomposition on the side of the road. Some recent hits look like life-size stuffed toys, lying on their backs or sides, paws up in the air, rigid from rigor mortis, a surprised expression permanently plastered on their faces. They are the ones that have been cleanly hit and propelled across the road, to lie in their final resting place as road kill. Others clearly haven’t been so lucky and are so badly mangled it is difficult to tell what animal they had once been. But you can bet your life that the squished mess of congealed blood, ratty fur and broken bones on the side of the road here will always be a kangaroo. No other animal is stupid enough not to have learnt by now that cars equal death to four legged creatures.

That may seem like a harsh assessment of an innocent animal repeatedly mown down by man-made monsters but we don’t want to run them over. In fact we try everything in our power to avoid them, not least because of the damage a kangaroo hit can do to your vehicle, if not yourself. Generally, they avoid the hot temperatures of the day and only emerge as the sun goes down which, of course, makes it even more difficult not to collide with the bounding animals. Many cars around here have been fitted with high-powered spots to give the driver a better chance of spotting the roos. The problem is that lights will stun them, stopping them in their tracks, which is often in the middle of the road. Hopefully you see them in time to slow down and allow them to hop off into safety but, if the amount of road kill is anything to go by, that doesn’t always happen. It is therefore a foolish vehicle that attempts a night-time drive without a bull bar. This doesn’t help to avoid hitting a kangaroo but it does go a long way to ensuring they don’t fly through the windscreen and take you out. Apparently, if the kangaroo is still holding onto life they will instinctively kick out repeatedly, and even if the hit killed them outright, they can often reflexively perform a little kung fu action. These aren’t the sweet little animals you see in cartoons, these can often be big animals and a kick to the head could be the end of you as well as the roo.

With all this in mind, it was with a mixture of excitement and trepidation that we saw our first live kangaroos a couple of weeks ago. We were driving home from the beach on an unmettled road in the middle of the bush about an hour before dusk when one jumped out into the road ahead of us, instantly spotted the car and, like a rabbit caught in headlights, came to an abrupt halt in the middle of the road. Luckily, we weren’t driving that fast and immediately slowed to a crawl before stopping completely. This prompted the roo, after a few seconds of sizing us up, to carry on across the road and it was soon followed by two other, slightly smaller kangaroos. I like to think that the first roo was dad and the other two junior and mum. Little Joey was probably fast asleep in mum’s pouch. Eyes wide and grins on our faces, we watched them bounding off across the scrub until they were mere dots on the red horizon and I suddenly thought of all of the road kill I had seen over the previous weeks – it’s easy to look at them and see a pile of bones, something to quickly avert your eyes from, but these were once living, breathing animals. Grief they may cause the driver, but they are one of Australia’s symbols – an animal native only to this remote country, and perhaps we should all look on them with a little more humanity.

Nightmare On Spider Street

Last night I had a vivid dream, although it’s probably more accurate to call it a nightmare. I was in a city (just a random, faceless city – it could have been anywhere) with two friends, on our way somewhere when I had to stop for some reason. I urged the others to go on without me, assuring them that I would catch them up. It wasn’t until I had reached an unfamiliar underpass that I realised that I didn’t really know the way. I decided to take the underpass anyway, with the hope that I might recognise something on the other side that would help me get me bearings. I walked up to it and immediately noticed the huge spider’s web stretching across the entrance and, in the top left corner, the creator – a tiny arachnid. There was a gap in the middle just big enough to fit through if I dived in so I bravely (or stupidly) did just that, landing in a heap on the dusty ground. It was dark and dingy and eerily quiet, and suddenly looked a lot more like a narrow tunnel. I picked myself up, dusted myself down and turned towards the far end.


Now that I was inside the dark underpass it was plain to see that there were hundreds of webs criss-crossing the path ahead, all the way to the end. In each one was a little spider. I knew that if I tried to make my way through them all I would surely get bitten by one of them so I turned back to the entrance with the intention of jumping back through the first web to the light and to safety. It was then that I looked up at the roof of the underpass and saw the biggest spider I have ever seen outside of the movies. It looked like a big, hairy, long-legged tarantula. I screamed and ran through the web, forgetting momentarily about the spider that lived there. Out in the light of day, and away from the dingy, spider-ridden interior of the underpass, my hammering heart started to slow, my breathing gradually evening out. I looked back and saw an ordinary underpass, large and brightly lit. It was then that I woke but I can still clearly see the image of that huge spider in my mind and just thinking of it gives me the chills and sends my heart racing. It doesn’t take a psychiatrist to figure out what that all meant. I seriously need to get over this obsession with Australia’s creepy crawlies and stop thinking there’s something about to get me with every step I take. Operation Stop Being So Bloody Scared Of Everything In Australia will commence soon.

A Key Requirement

Picture the scene: we have just been driven home from our first Bootcamp session. We are exhausted, achey, red-faced, sweaty and are longing for a shower, a bite to eat and to collapse on the sofa in front of some mindless TV. We gingerly haul ourselves down from the truck and limp towards the front door, our tired muscles protesting with every step. We turn to wave goodbye as the truck drives off and we are left in darkness – the beam projected by the streetlights in Karratha is similar to that from a Victorian gas lamp and we had neglected to turn our outdoor light on before leaving. The Husband searches in his back pocket for the key he had earlier removed from the ring – apparently he doesn’t like the jangling of a bunch of keys in his pocket as he runs but, he assures me, he did check that the key he took was the front door key.
He finds the key, opens the outer fly-screen door, and tries to locate the lock in the virtual darkness. He finds it and attempts to enter the key. It doesn’t work. So he turns it the other way round and tries again. It still doesn’t fit. Starting to panic slightly now, he tries two or three times more. Not being able to see what he is doing, I am oblivious to The Husband’s rising fear. I assume that he simply can’t see what he’s doing and therefore is struggling to locate the lock. He turns slowly and looks at me and, even in the half-light, I can see that something is the matter. “What?” I say, noting the alarm in his face, “What’s wrong?” Without a word, he closes the fly-screen, pushes the key into the lock and turns it easily. I don’t understand at first but slowly the realisation dawns on me. “You’ve taken the wrong bloody key haven’t you?” I ask, accusingly. He closes his eyes for a moment. “Yes,” he says quietly, “yes, I must have done.”

Images of stepping into a torrent of cool water, washing away the grime and easing the ache of my sore muscles flash through my mind and then immediately disappear. I will not be showering myself clean, drying myself with a fluffy towel, pulling on my pjs, and collapsing in front of the telly any time soon. The urge to say “I told you so” was just too great – I had, after all, tried to persuade him to take the entire set of keys (there are only four small ones). I am not ashamed to admit that I launched into a bit of a tirade and even felt a few tears brim in my eyes. I was tired, hungry and dirty and we were locked out of our house less than a week after moving in. Oh, the shame of it. To make matters worse, we had nothing with us except the useless fly-screen door key. We had no money, no phone, no car. The Husband saw no option but to either kick the door in or break a window but I was adamant that he would not be doing anything of the sort. For one, we would have to pay an extortionate fee to get either door or window mended and we would be in an unsecure house overnight (24 hour services don’t seem to exist in Karratha). Secondly, we were new and were standing outside an unlit house. I had visions of neighbours hearing the smash of broken glass or the splintering of wood, prompting them to look out and see two unknown shadowy figures before immediately picking up the phone to call the police. Cue sirens, flashing lights, the entire street out on their drives and burning humiliation. Besides, he tried to ram the door with his shoulder and it didn’t budge an inch. The upside is that we now know that our front door is pretty secure.

I ordered him instead to run to the house of the man he shares a truck with (the very same whom we had waved off so cheerily minutes before) and ask to use his phone and his work contact numbers to get an approved locksmith out. Exhausted from Bootcamp but knowing from one look at my face that he had no choice, he set off down the road, leaving me on my own in the dark. I used the time to stretch down and hummed to myself as I went, trying to fill the deathly silence. It wasn’t long, though, before something else filled it. I began to hear strange noises. A rustling in the front garden, from behind me by the bin, from the roof over the driveway. I couldn’t see a thing so I could only imagine the worst . Spiders? Snakes? Then came the sounds of dogs, of werewolf-like howls. Were these wild dogs, about to pounce out from the darkness? Or perhaps some sort of wild desert beast prowling the streets? My imagination ran away from me, conjuring up all sorts of terrible images in my head, for the forty minutes it took for The Husband to return. By this point I was seeing the headlines in the papers – ‘Brit Mauled To Death In Mysterious Night-time Attack’ – so was overjoyed to see the bright headlamps of the truck pull into the drive.

His calls had produced nothing but answering machines so he had borrowed some tools with the idea of somehow jimmying a lock in the back. Minutes later, he appeared from the side-gate with a triumphant look on his face. “You did it?” I asked, tentatively, not wanting to raise my hopes prematurely. “Yup,” he said, a grin plastered on his face. My heart soared but I checked myself momentarily. “What’s the damage?” I asked, soberly. “None at all,” he replied, “the side door was unlocked.” Yes, we had almost broken into our own house, had cried and fumed, had run and embarrassed ourselves with tales of our stupidity, had scared ourselves witless on our drive, and it was all for nothing. We learnt two things that night. 1) Always check that all the doors and windows are locked and 2) Always check that you’ve got the right key. And yes, The Husband now takes his entire key ring out with him each time. I have to say it - I told you so.

What Lies Beneath

After weeks of being terrified to enter the ocean for fear of what may lurk within, I finally did it – I braved the waters at Dampier Beach. Well, I waded in up to mid-calf and then lay in the shallows. That is still pretty significant progress though, especially as, while paddling, I spotted a sting-ray and heard a mother call to her children, “watch out for stonefish and rays!” That trusty source of all information, Wikepedia, states that stonefish are ‘venomous, dangerous, and even fatal to humans. It is the most venomous fish in the world.’ The kids just brushed the warning off, running into the water and splashing around, laughing and shrieking as they played, oblivious to any danger. I, on the other hand, took heed of her advice and gingerly made my way back to the shore to sit in a couple of inches of water, keeping my eyes peeled for thingsthatcouldkillme the entire way back. In fact, if it wasn’t for that woman’s warning I would now be reporting that I had immersed myself fully and even swam. As it is, you’ll have to make do with me lying in a puddle of ocean. I stayed in for a good fifteen minutes though, and in that time spotted another ray and a huge orange and green fish, along with a shoal of tiny fish, moving quickly in their little huddle. I have promised myself that next time, stonefish or no stonefish, I will plunge in fully as,once I had put my fears to bed, it was lovely lying in the calm waters off Dampier Beach. The temperature was perfect – not too warm like the bath-like Gulf of Thailand but not frostbite-inducing like the mighty Southern Ocean can be. It was just cool enough to be wonderfully refreshing without taking your breath away with one dip of a toe.

I’m still not sure I’m brave enough to swim at Hearson’s Cove, where a sign at the entrance to the beach declares that there has been a crocodile sighting. That didn’t seem to deter a mother and her three young children from jumping in the last time we were there. Those Australians are a hardy bunch. Apparently the crocs are at the mangrove end of the beach and the sharks like the rocky end so as long as you venture out in the middle you’re fine. Now that is true Aussie logic! The first time we visited Hearson’s Cove the tide was far, far out, leaving a huge expanse of soggy sand to walk on. A film of water lay on the surface, making it so reflective the red, rocky hills towering over the beach were mirrored on the sand. We decided to wander out to the edge of the water, which meant leaving the safety of the beach and our car. It was a long run in the event of a croc sighting! Needless to say, we each regularly checked behind us, scanning all around for signs of big, scaly killing machines. What we didn’t count on was the number of crater-like holes in the sand – sure signs of giant mud crabs. But crabs are harmless, right? Not in Australia. Giant crabs are so, well, giant, that they can take your hand off with their claws. They are not to be toyed with. We didn’t sight any and they’d be more likely to scamper away from us if they saw us but we kept our eyes peeled nevertheless.

What with giant crabs, crocs, rock fish, sharks and sting rays (amongst a plethora of other dangerous marine creatures), it’s a wonder anyone ever ventures into the water here. Then again, we’re in Australia so of course they do.

Just Don't Call Me A Twitcher

To Australians they are commonplace – like a sparrow , a pigeon or a seagull to us Brits – but I just love watching cockatoos. The first time I encountered them I actually heard them before I saw them. I was in the garden, quietly reading a book and breathing in the glorious smell of freshly cut grass that instantly transports me to long, warm, English summer days when, screeching like a group of schoolgirls, the call of these noisy parrots shattered the peace of the morning as their voices filled the sky. Startled, I looked up and soon saw a huge flock of white-bodied, pink headed cockatoos flying overhead. Against the brilliant blue of the sky, their white bodies jumped out like chalk on a blackboard. They circled, swooped low into someone’s back yard, then scattered, resting for a moment across the lawn and on the fence. Their squawks quietened for a moment before once again they gathered, flapping their wings, and flew off, announcing their arrival to a new house with their schoolgirl chatter. They can be found everywhere here, often having mothers’ meetings on power lines, people’s drives, in the middle of the road, anywhere with space for a large group really. They just love to get together and have a good old chinwag.

They are not the only birds I’ve seen without having to leave my back garden. Another common visitor is a little yellow-headed, green-breasted, grey-feathered bird – there are dozens of them and they call to each other with a lilting whistle rather like a robin, very sweet and far less abrasive than the cockatoo’s screech. I’m still not sure what this little bird is but I am determined to find out.

Oh dear. See what lack of adequate entertainment has done to me? I’ve turned into a bird-watcher. I just spent the past half an hour searching the internet to see if I can identify the yellow and green bird and I’m actually, seriously, thinking about investing in a pair of binoculars. I’ve only been here a month – what am I going to be like in a year? Wearing a cagoule as a fashion item? Buying every book on birds in circulation and spending all my free time scanning the pages for species I may have seen? Thinking that an exciting day out involves sitting very still, not speaking and getting neck-ache from constant sky-gazing? Excuse me, I’m just off to put on some make-up, mix up a martini and try on every nice dress I own.

No Pain, No Gain

I am in pain. My entire body is screaming and it is screaming at me. “How could you do this to me?” it is wailing, “What have I done to deserve this?” And of course it is my fault, although I will lay some of the blame at The Husband’s feet as it was he who persuaded me to go to one of the thrice-weekly self-torture sessions also known as Bootcamp. Before I went I had pretty much convinced myself that it wouldn’t be my thing. I generally prefer gentler, more enjoyable forms of exercise such as tennis, swimming and hiking. I have been a member of one gym or another for years but have always treated it as a necessary evil – something to be endured to keep fit and healthy and attempt, in what increasingly appears to be in vain, to increase the strength in my spindly arms. At least at the gym I can go at my own pace and am not being judged by anyone but myself. The word ‘bootcamp’, with all its military, disciplinarian connotations, sent shivers of trepidation down my spine. I don’t like being shouted at and I don’t like being forced to do anything I don’t want to. Some may call me precious but I think I am just being sensible – what sane person would willingly put themselves through a barrage of abuse whilst enduring unimaginable pain? However, having decided to steer clear of the sterile environment of yet another gym I will only end up resenting paying for the privilege of boring myself to death in, I agreed to give Bootcamp a chance. It was touch and go though – I was still debating whether I should go or not as The Husband and I were standing outside the house waiting to be picked up. It was only the arrival of the car that prevented me from hot-footing it back inside the house. I flopped onto the seat with a rock in my stomach, convinced I was going to hate every moment of the hour-long class.

I knew it was a woman leading the sessions and had visions of a steely faced army commander type with her hair pulled back tightly into an immaculate bun, shouting orders at people with tortured expressions on their faces. I couldn’t have been more wrong (well, other than the part about the tortured expressions - by the end of the session we all had those). The lady that turned up was bubbly, full of smiles and encouraging rather than fearsome, pushing the group but in a kindly, supportive way. There were about thirty of us, ranging in age, body shape and fitness levels, which was a relief. Enough people to hide amongst and the hope that there would surely be a few at the same level of fitness as me. We started off with a couple of laps around the (worryingly large) oval, helped by a rather magnificent sunset, as all sunsets here seem to be, which lit up the sky with a flame of colours. That in itself is an exceedingly good reason never to step foot in a gym whilst in Karratha. We’re living in an area blessed with year-round warmth and stunning scenery – to go to a gym here would be a crime.

The first circuit wasn’t too difficult and I even managed to maintain a conversation with another willing torture victim with only a few gasps towards the end. By the middle of the second lap I was feeling significantly out of breath. It would be at this point that I would have stopped and walked or even made my way back home if I were on my own but we were barely five minutes into the class and I didn’t want to look like a complete wimp, so I ignored the pain and my brain pleading me to stop and pushed on. I then surprised myself by going on to complete a further twenty five minutes of walking/jogging/sprinting, a lunge walk that took me to a whole new level of pain, two more laps of jogging, and then twenty minutes of gruelling floor work. And therein lies the beauty of Bootcamp – there is no way I would have been able to complete even a quarter of what I did on my own but, with the support and encouragement of thirty others and, more importantly, the desire not to completely embarrass myself in front of the group and be considered the dunce of the class by the instructor, I pushed myself further than I ever thought possible. It showed me that I could do more than I ever gave myself credit for if I only stopped being, yes, alright, precious.

No matter that I could barely walk or talk by the end of it, or the fact that I ache all over today, and probably will do for many days to come, I achieved something at Bootcamp that I didn’t think was possible. I know I can push myself and I know I can do better. To say I enjoyed it would be going fifty steps too far but I will enjoy the increased levels of fitness and hopefully a slimmer, more toned physique and so, against everything I thought previously, I will be going to Bootcamp again.

The Road Through Nowhere

Karratha, like all communities in remote WA, does not sprawl. As soon as you leave the boundary road, you’re in nothingness. It ends abruptly so that you suddenly find yourself on an empty road surrounded by barren, sun-baked land stretching as far as the eye can see. For a city girl, that can be quite disconcerting. When you’re somewhere as remote as this, you really do feel like an insignificant dot in a vast landscape – a landscape that has been here, as it is, for sixty million years. That thought in itself is enough to realise one’s own import in the world. Of course, this also makes travelling anywhere, whether on foot or in a vehicle, potentially dangerous. Mobile phone signals die soon after leaving the towns, making it possible to become stranded on even a short journey, so it is essential to be prepared. Whether you get lost whilst out hiking or your car breaks down, if you don’t have adequate water you’re in trouble. We’ve bought a container of water that is almost as big as me to put in the car on journeys of an hour or more and always carry a couple of bottles of water in the boot wherever we’re going. Although Australia is home to numerous deadly creatures which have the ability to scare the wits out of most of us, the reality is that it is probably easier to die from dehydration than getting bitten by a snake or chomped on by a crocodile.

The emptiness of the land also allows for an almost completely straight road in between destinations. On a recent trip, we were only driving for about twenty minutes before coming across the neighbouring town but even in that time we felt our minds going blank, sedated by monotony. At one point, there was ever so slight a curve in the road and it felt like an effort to manoeuvre the car around it. I can imagine that after hours of such driving, accidents on an empty road could be a very real possibility. Yup, just another hazard out here! Twice along the road we passed a road train, a monster of a lorry hitched to multiple trailers, giving it a length of up to one hundred and fifty feet long. The couple we saw weren’t that long but they’re still big enough to involuntarily and unconsciously make yourself smaller in your seat. Or perhaps that was just me. Suffice to say though, you want to give these trucks some room – the entire road if necessary – as you’re not going to fair well in a collision with one. We also encountered another sort of train – this one on tracks – which was so long we couldn’t see the front of it. We were lucky to be driving up to the tracks just as the last carriage was about to pass across the road as you can be waiting thirty minutes for one of these to pass though completely, and the long line of vehicles on either side was testament to that.

This is a country where the journey itself can be part of the adventure.

The Other Side Of The Fence

So I’m sitting out in the garden reading a book, the sun warm on my face and the tinkle of an ice cream van drifting towards my ears. I close my eyes for a brief moment, feeling a soft breeze dance about my body but just as I’m really starting to relax and stop thinking about what may be lurking in the bushes/trees/piles of leaves, a deep, primordial gurgle instantly awakes me from my reverie. It’s a sound that seems to have crossed hundreds of thousands of years, from prehistoric times, and it’s resonating from the other side of the fence, in the neighbour’s garden, just feet away from me. All my senses are suddenly pricked as I furiously try to decipher a) what devilish creature this noise might be emanating from and, b) whether said creature might be about to leap over the fence, tunnel under the fence, or jump down from one of the overhanging trees. It was then that I heard a rustling of leaves, closely followed by the sound of branches swaying. I whipped around and scanned the ground, then lifted my eyes to the trees. Nothing.

Then came a strange tapping noise, as if something was bashing up against the fence. I was alert, ready for whatever was about to appear. That is, I was fully prepared to hightail it to the back door and the safety of the house. I wasn’t about to tackle anything that could make such a dinosaur-like sound. So I waited. And waited. And waited. Nothing. In the end I gave up and returned to my book, turning around every now and again to check that nothing was creeping up behind me, ready to pounce. Of course, nothing did. I can only presume that the noise was made by some sort of bird, with the wind and my overactive imagination doing the rest. Our resident lizard might have contributed to the rustling.

One day I might actually stop thinking that a snake/spider/dingo/as yet undiscovered deadly Australian animal that will become known from killing a newly arrived Brit, is lying in wait to attack me. Until then, I will continue to do things like spot a very snake-like tree root out of the corner of my eye, sprint to the patio (knocking over chair and glass of water in my haste to escape from deadly snake root) and spend the next five minutes eyeing the vicious looking thing before accepting, after throwing a stick at it without it moving, that it is indeed just an ordinary, harmless tree root.

Australia Is A Scary Place

I’ll readily admit it, I live in constant fear of being stung, bitten, or chomped to death whilst here in Australia. Coming from England, where there aren’t many species of reptile or insect that will do much harm to you, it’s a terrifying prospect that I now live in a country with more living organisms, both on land and in water, that could kill me than anywhere else in the world. If I found a spider in the bathtub in England, I’d pick it up and throw it out the window. Here, I take a deep inhalation of breath while my eyes simultaneously widen of their own volition, before I freeze for a good few seconds, then whimper and run swiftly out of the room. I have no idea whether the insect that just scuttled across my path will cause me intense pain and possible paralysis or is completely harmless. I would like to point out at this juncture that I am not the only one who feels this way – I have spoken to several British male engineers out here that have confessed to the very same fears.

On our first full day here, I had to force myself to sit out in the garden for a couple of hours to try and conquer my fear of what may lurk amongst the grass, under the bushes and in the trees. The tickle of a droplet of sweat down the back of my neck, a fly landing on my arm or a blade of grass brushing my leg sent me into wild panic. Was that a white-tailed spider dropping down from a tree? A western brown snaking its way through the grass? Some sort of deadly animal as yet unknown to me (of which, in Australia, there are many)? The thought that I could be killed or maimed in my own garden is a terrifying thought. Any time I confess my fears to an Aussie though, they’re brushed aside with a wave of a hand and assurances that bites and stings are fairly uncommon – I get the usual speech about how usually the venomous creatures that could send me into floods of pain or certain death are more afraid of me than I am of them. Yup, still not buying that one. I was sitting in my aunty’s back garden in Adelaide, the day after we arrived in Australia, when she breezily told me that she had found a redback in one of her bushes. This is a spider that, with one bite, can cause untold agony and possible death if not treated promptly and she was talking as if it was merely a pesky house spider. I suppose you can’t live a life in fear, and if you’re brought up with these dangers, you learn to treat them with respect but not worry about them too much. I guess I will just have to learn to relax a little bit more too, and I’m slowly getting there. This morning I heard some leaves rustle and didn’t even turn around. Well, not for at least a second or two anyway.

Shop Till You Drop

Thursday nights are the highlight of the week in Karratha as the shopping centre opens until a thrillingly late 9pm. We drove up at about 6.30pm and the car park was packed - as we walked in through the doors it immediately became apparent that the entire town had flocked to Centro - 'the largest shopping centre in the Pilbara'- to see and be seen. There were a few people buying but many were just wandering around, stopping now and again to talk to people they knew. Other than the fact that there is not much to do in the evenings in Karratha, the main reason for this weekly mass onslaught of people is that many who live in the town are employed on the big mining and oil and gas projects and work six days a week. They finish after closing time and many of the shops aren’t open on Sunday, their only day off. One would have thought that in a town with such a workforce it would make financial sense for shops to open on a Sunday but perhaps they don’t need the business. With the extortionate prices all the shops here charge, I wouldn't be surprised if they didn't.

It certainly makes a change from Pattaya, in which the shops open seven days a week from 11am to 11pm, but is not really any different from the UK. I used to get regularly frustrated in England by not being able to get to certain shops in the week as they were only open while I was at work. Not that there’s much choice here when you do manage to get to the shops when they’re open. There are two supermarkets, a number of gift shops, a handful of cheap clothing shops, a camera shop, a small electronics shop, a health food shop (which seems to only sell protein shakes and other ‘I want to build up my puny body to look more macho’ goods) and a small bookstore. It’s better than nothing I suppose, and certainly the best for a good few hundred kilometres. I think that when it comes to looking for something a bit special, internet shopping will be the way forward. The only question is whether they will deliver this far from the city - it's a good two day drive from Perth to Karratha. Yes, these are the life or death issues affecting a city girl in the remote country!