More than just rough around the edges, Hedland is considered the worst place to live in Australia. And it’s easy to see why. Barren, bleak and sunbaked it’s from this desolate port town that the Ozzies feed the world’s hunger for iron ore. The place is dusty and shade is a commodity rarer than water in the Sahara, or democracy in China. Everybody who lives here is somehow involved in the mining industry: in the supermarket, the bottle store, behind the wheels of the endless number of white pick-ups, and even at the campside everybody wears overalls with either orange details for BHP or fluorescent yellow for Rio Tinto, two big mining companies. Despite the hard atmosphere we do take a much needed day of rest here, during which we decide to leave the coast. Adding kilometers but hoping for more varied scenery, we cut into the Pilbarra Region, through the Karijini NP and to Tom Price, the other quintessential Australian mining town.
Despite mechanical adversity and a wind that seems to turn against us regardless, we get what we hoped for: hills, and a lanscape that offers a different view every so many kilometers, with the gorges and rockpools of the Karijini NP as the undisputed highlight.
