Nullarbor Plain Eyre Highway: Nullarbor Roadhouse to Madura

Waypoint introductions and full write-ups

1. 1. Nullarbor Roadhouse

   The Nullarbor Roadhouse stands in one of the emptiest stretches of the Eyre Highway, the sealed road that connects South Australia with Western Australia across the flat limestone plain. The name comes from the Latin for no trees, and the description is mostly accurate: the land is low, pale and covered in saltbush and bluebush, with a horizon so far away that it feels like the sea. The roadhouse is a small island of services in all that space, with fuel, food, accommodation and a campground, and it is a place where truckers and travellers meet and compare notes.

   Read the complete Nullarbor Roadhouse write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Nullarbor Roadhouse is where the day begins. Next is Eucla.

2. 2. Eucla

   Eucla is a tiny settlement on the Western Australian side of the Nullarbor, near the South Australian border, and it has a story that is out of proportion to its size. In the 1870s the telegraph line that connected Western Australia to the rest of the continent ran through here, and the Eucla Telegraph Station became an important link, with operators sending messages by Morse code to Adelaide and Perth. The old stone station building, now half buried in drifting sand dunes, is still there, and walking around it, with the wind whistling in the empty windows, is quietly moving.

   Read the complete Eucla write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Eucla comes up about 197 km into the recorded legs. Next is Madura.

3. 3. Madura

   Madura stands at the foot of a wall. The Hampton escarpment, an old sea cliff that marks the edge of the Nullarbor Plain, drops here by a hundred metres or so to the Roe Plains, and the Eyre Highway tumbles down it at Madura Pass, with a lookout where you can see the land stretch away to the south, flat as a table and glittering with salt bush. It is a rare moment of relief in the long, level crossing between Eucla and Norseman.

   Read the complete Madura write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   The route ends here after 379 km.