Day 40 Friday 28 August 2026
This could be a short blog today. It is being prepared in the bar at the Balladonia Roadhouse where I am spending the night, not in the bar but in their motel style accommodation. I am paying $230 for the night in what they class as a 'luxury room'. I kid you not, I suppose it passes for luxury in this neck of the woods.
Balladonia is a roadhouse, fuel stop, motel units, caravan park and bar with a restaurant, stuck right in the middle of nowhere. To get here I have driven 400km from Esperance. The first part of the journey was 200km north from Esperance and then take the first right hand turn and then drive another 200km east to Balladonia. All on dead straight roads.
There is no wifi in the luxury room and exremely dodgy wifi in the bar. There is almost no mobile coverage and what coverage there is is only available with Telstra.
Balladonia's main claim to fame is that the American manned space laboratory known as Skylab plummeted to earth in 1979 in this general area. Skylab was launched and put into orbit in 1973 and was occupied by 3 groups of 3 astronauts until about 1975. After it ceased to be of any use it was abandoned by the crew and left in what was supposed to be a permanent orbit.
However the permant orbit wasn't as permant as what was hoped for and the orbit started to degenerate. It was decided to bring Skyklab back to earth in some sort of controlled descent. Anyway the controlled descent wasn't as controlled as what NASA had hoped and instead of landing in the ocean somewhere Skylab scattered its remains over WA from Esperance to Balladonia.
Balladonia experienced its five minutes of fame over this event and still dining out on it. For a short while the event put Balladonia on the international map. NASA was very keen to get all the bits and pieces back and there are still arguments as to owns the wreckage or is it a case of finders keepers losers weepers. The mayor of Esperance issued NASA with a $400 littering fine.
The Balladonia Museum, also at the roadhouse has a piece of the Skylab in its collection. The Balladonians claim that NASA gave it to them, NASA claims the Balladonians stole it. I have a photo of the piece of Skylab in the museum but dodgy wifi is not letting me download it.
See how history can be fun and educational!
Some of my doubting Thomas readers have taken me to task for stating that WA has two time zones. I have listed below the time relevant times from Melbourne to Perth.
Melbourne 4.15pm
Adelaide 3.45pm
WA Central Time 3.00pm (WA/SA Border)
Balladonia 2.15pm
Perth 2.15pm
When I arrived the Balladonia roadhouse had 5 analogue clocks on the wall showing the above times. I have photographic evidence of the above clocks so if anybody wants to challenge me, show me the money.
My next stop is Eucla pretty much in the middle of the Nullarbor plain and I have no idea what time zone they are going to be in, maybe the Twilight Zone. Time will tell.
My word, I sometimes surprise myself with how interesting this blog can be. Space travel, time travel, it just goes on & on..........
A dr once asked me if i took Belladonna because my pupils are large. Strange thing to say.
ReplyDeleteI have not heard of Balladonia so needed to look it up on Dr Google. It must be an amazing place because it has an airport and I know why it's so expensive, it's a BP service station and anything that is attached to, or appearing with BP is expensive.
ReplyDeleteI also looked up the motel and saw they had a photograph of the five clocks you refer to and each one was displaying a different time. Amazing how if you spin that little dial on the back the big hand and the little hand all move and depending on when you stop, will depend on what time it tells you. That is the miracle of time in my opinion, especially so in WA by the sounds of it.
Out of interest, I was held up in my car the other day on my pilgrimage to Dan Murphys. A woman in her late 70's early 80's decided to reverse park into her carpark. A precision turn of the wheel and she was parked. Roughly 15-20 seconds. After I paid homage to Dan Murphys and donated a small amount of money to ensure good luck in the future, I was held up again in my car. This time, a 30 odd year old woman was reversing out of her carpark after she had driven in. After I sat and watched her drive forward and back again 3 or 4 times, I actually thought I should be videoing this. On about the 5th attempt and two minutes later, she almost reversed into me as she was finally out of her carpark but remained in reverse. The moral to the story is don't pay homage to Dan's around school pick up time. You never know what you will be greeted by.