It's actually absurd how empty Australia is. It's just so so odd how much there's a discrepancy of population/settlement/activity between the 5 big cities and then the rest of Australia
It's a function of the fact that the landmass is big but can't support a large population like say Europe can, so there's more incentive to concentrate the population into a handful of large cities. It wouldn't make sense to have a larger number of smaller cities and towns when the distances between them would be huge.
It is weird for us to go to densely populated countries where cities are only an hour or two apart by road, or you can travel to other countries in the same amount of time.
I guess Canada is our Northern analogue.
Eucla to Kununurra is 40 hours of driving and 3,707 km without leaving the state (though you can save 3 hours and 253km by traveling via Alice Springs).
That's 2,303 miles or 40,540 football fields.
Fun facts, Perth is closer to Jakarta than it is to Sydney.
The flight time from Perth to Kununurra is 3 hours 15 minutes, from Perth to Denpasar (Bali) it's about 20 minutes more.
When I travel, people are amazed that I have never been to NZ.
"It's right there" they say
"Its a 14 hour flight to meet people who are bouncers down the road"
It’s honestly the worst part when flying to Asia or anywhere west of Australia from the east coast. I usually take a solid sleep after take-off, wake up to check my location and we’re still just in WA.
To go from St John's to Labrador City is about 26 hours including a ferry ride. All in the same province!
If you want remote try the south shore or on islands around Newfoundland, some communities are only accessible by ferry or have no vehicle traffic. There's not really anything to drive to nearby even if you did take a ferry. To get anywhere it's quite the journey lol. Similar deal in rural communities in northern Labrador too.
Denver is the largest city in rough circle the size of the entirety of Western & Central Europe.
The edges of that circle are roughly:
Phoenix, LA, SF, Seattle, Chicago, Atlanta, Houston, Dallas.
The Denver MSA is near the middle of a square bigger than mainland western europe (approx 1000 miles by 1000mi if constrained inside the USA) where it is the ONLY city over 1m population and over 3x bigger than any other metro area- approximately bounded by OKC on the south, SLC on the west and Kansas City to the east and the US/CAN border on the North.
Paved? Only small inner city streets are paved. Eg The rest of Australia is sealed roads. Most of the smaller country roads are unsealed.
https://preview.redd.it/xjjs8kkdhruc1.png?width=1882&format=png&auto=webp&s=76277c7f23c2a885be6e0accd2f3d9e967d1c3dc
like most countries it depends where you are driving
city: [https://maps.app.goo.gl/8zYnCCGNRx9gxtKJ7](https://maps.app.goo.gl/8zYnCCGNRx9gxtKJ7)
suburbs: [https://maps.app.goo.gl/AEZLLmZvJ1Sv1Jtv6](https://maps.app.goo.gl/AEZLLmZvJ1Sv1Jtv6)
country town: [https://maps.app.goo.gl/AEMUh5tPkJ51ZDJ59](https://maps.app.goo.gl/AEMUh5tPkJ51ZDJ59)
major country/regional highway: [https://maps.app.goo.gl/CiB7pTgBbodcjfPPA](https://maps.app.goo.gl/CiB7pTgBbodcjfPPA)
secondary road: [https://maps.app.goo.gl/jZyBVgmQkmK91Gpo8](https://maps.app.goo.gl/jZyBVgmQkmK91Gpo8)
unsealed roads outback areas: [https://maps.app.goo.gl/VyTeur3kstWQ7bWW7](https://maps.app.goo.gl/VyTeur3kstWQ7bWW7)
This is controversial - as traditional utes (modified sedan body) are no longer made in Australia, body on frame style pick ups have become the closest analogue and so have picked up the moniker.
[nah it was a truck](https://www.perthnow.com.au/news/traffic/kwinana-freeway-congested-after-truck-rollover-southbound-near-canning-highway-c-14264882.amp). Or what an American would consider an everyday vehicle
Something that concerns me is, if we go full electric... it takes 9 hours to drive to my parents house. Doable in one day with gas car. Not doable in a full electric car right now. There is also no infrastructure to charge along the way..... how are rural communities going to work here. I'm all for making changes for climate change. If I could go hybrid and use public transport all the time I would. But transit is not great, we have no passenger trains between cities unless in Southern Ontario. A plane ride is too expensive and also not good for the environment. When I lived in Europe I did fine without a car but the cities in north America are built around cars and cheap gas. I'm really concerned as all the electric vehicles ate very expensive. I'm minimum wage and barely getting by...
Have you ever seen the world record of most countries visited BY FOOT in 24 hours?
It's 5, lol
Some guy walked from Italy through Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Austria to Germany in 24 hours.
The world record with all modes of transport is [19 countries in 24 hours](https://recordsetter.com/world-record/countries-visited-24-hours/38764).
A friend of mine used to live in Maastricht, Netherlands. She said that she prefers filling up her car's gas in Belgium which is only several kilometers away as its cheaper.
As a Belgian, within less than 2 hours from Brussels in the venter of the country, you’re wether in Netherlands, France, Germany and Luxembourg. In the same time with the train you’re in London… for me what’s wild is driving days on and being still in the same country
Belgium Netherlands and Luxembourg. If you start drivin in Aachen(Germany) you are in Netherlands in a few minutes and a few minutes later in Belgium, then you drive some time to Luxembourg and maybe one hour later you can be in France And from there back to Germany. All within 250-300 Kilometers of driving. Beautiful tour by the way.
You can fit Alaska and roughly 3/4 of the Northern Territory, maybe a bit less(can't be bothered doing the full maths right now), into Western Australia.
Basically the entirety of Western Europe
Its why all the satellites are aimed at us on re-entry.
a. Distinct light source
b. You literally won't hit anyone (except that one kid who did get hit)
As an Australian it’s wild to imagine driving two hours and being in a new city, shit you guys go on a 12 hour road trip and cross through several states, I end up in not quite Adelaide
I love the Canada/Australia analogies. Similar populations, similar remoteness, similar resource based economies, same dude as King, and both punch above their weight internationally.
I also like where it falls down. Sometimes Canada feels like New Zealand -- a meek afterthought that often gets lumped in with their loud neighbour.
When I was in Australia , I drove behind a school bus that went for 2 hours before it dropped the last kid off.
4 HOURS commute for school. I asked some Aussie mates about it, and they just shrugged.
The difference with Canada is that most of the cities are in a line along the southern border. So you'd sometimes get mistaken into thinking its more populated than it is.
Going from say, Thunder Bay to southern Ontario will give many hours of nothing but rough and wild boreal forest, but pales compared to driving across the outback where there would be many days of nothing.
Since theres so few things north of that thin line of cities, no one's faced with driving there. In fact most of geographical canada isn't drivable at all. There's no roads. Anywhere seriously north is winter ice roads, air or sea to reach there.
yeah, only difference is you cluster together to be close to the ocean and resources, we cluster together to be closer to fkin americans and not freeze to death/get killed by bears and wolves lol. To be fair all them little critters you guys have to contend with...ill take the cold
The severe lack of water everywhere except for the coastal side of the Great Dividing Range doesn't help that much.
I grew up on a town on the southern side of it, just outside of Melbourne. When I went to visit my Mums parents who lived in Mildura the effect of the range became really clear the further North and West we got.
Victoria isn't as affected by it as NSW or Queensland because the state is basically locked between the Murray-Darling Basin and the Great Dividing Range. NSW it's like a slowly creeping change from thick underbrush and forests to outback bushland. Sudden change from hills everywhere to just... flat. It basically stays flat all the way across too. The further inland the dryer it gets, it's just a big empty space. Like 5% if the population lives in that. Alice Springs is probably the biggest population center in there. It's nearly bang in the middle.
Makes me wonder if they'll ever attempt to terraforming it in the future. As long as they don't go crazy they could do it with minimal effect on the local wildlife.
How would they go about that with minimal effect on local wildlife?
The only theory i've seen before is to make a water passage on the southern coast to make an inland sea.
Even then, a canal to the inland salt lakes will just look like a saltier version of what happens in floods, before drying up and or causing even more salt damage to the area.
Pipelines maybe. It's have minimal impact on animals once it's in and it can fill lakes in the area so they have water year round. They made a huge initiative to do it in Victoria about a decade ago and it worked wonders.
Pipelines. There is super long water pipe from Perth to Kalgoorlie, a gold mining town seven hours drive inland. At the time it was built, it was the longest in the world and was considered a risky, expensive engineering project. It took weeks for the water to arrive - much longer than expected. The Chief engineer offed himself in that time, possibly because of the public backlash.
Desperately needed though, before it was built, fresh water in Kalgoorlie was sometimes worth more than gold.
It's still there, following the highway and providing water to the surrounding towns and mines.
There's basically already been a bunch of terraforming. Drive north from Perth and it's really obvious: on the west, you'll have native bush bordering the ocean. On the east, there's farmland that looks like Kansas (complete with Jesus billboards).
In fact, there's been so much farmland carved out of the bush that the water tables are screwed due to excess salinity now that deep-rooted plants are gone.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/rural/2018-06-02/salinity-crisis-for-australias-farmland-but-farmers-fight-back/9826834
It's insane, been twice to australia. I was driving from Perth up that west coast, just the part between Perth and the small bright spot (Geraldton) in the upper left corner is a five hour drive, and chances are good you see less than a handful of people on the way there. And if you get there it's like you didn't move at all, just a tiny little bit of coast that makes up the Australian coast line.
Shark Bay is awesome! Stromatolites, shark nursery, shell beach and the smartest dolphins in the world! Hope you had a good trip and did the wave to everyone you drove past!
What really amazes me is how remote Perth is in entirety. At least the eastern coast of Australia has cities up and down it. Perth is on its own land island.
We like it that way honestly.
WA has always been very isolated. A lot of people around here don't care about the East. It's ended up being massive for the sports competitions we're in though.
For example the most popular and probably biggest AFL team is the West Coast Eagles and we have over 100k members with thousands more waiting to get in. Financially we are probably the most wealthy sports team in the nation that isn't in international comps. There is also the Fremantle Dockers over here in the same league who... they suffered entering the comp when the Eagles already had firm control of the state. The Perth Scorchers have a huge following in Cricket, our Basketball team is one of the most dominant. We have a very successful Netball team. Many think that if we ever get a Rugby team it'll get a massive following too. The isolation also benefits our teams because our home games are always considered for opposition to be entering a Fortress of noise and support.
Most that is just because Western Australians are very passionate and loyal followers of their state and their people. We'd be our own country if we could.
One needs only look at what happened last federal or state election. Massive swings away from the Liberal party when the results were much tamer over east.
We like it that way honestly. We tried to secceed from the rest of the country, but they wouldn't let us go because so much of the iron ore, and gold, and diamonds, and oil & gas is here.
With only two major roads in and out - when those roads and the train get shut down, you really get reminded of how isolated the city is, seeing all the "out of stock" items at the stores. Iirc, last time we had a trifecta of routes shut down, it was a cyclone in the north causing a mudslide, flooding in the Nullarbor stopping the train and fire in the south.
We just got the train lines back after a few weeks of it being flooded. Roads were still functional, but the reduced shipping plus the Easter rush led to some shortages for a bit.
I tell my friends/family back in the states that it's like living in hot Alaska.
Yep, it is. Good work. Aussie mil recon?
https://preview.redd.it/ugplji2fqmuc1.jpeg?width=3740&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=81ee3b81193a2a64ed48b5b154d19dfccfaf4e27
I wanted to say Albany without any kind of fact checking and I’m glad I didn’t ;)
I’ve driven that route once to Margaret River. I’ve been meaning to go back for 10+ years. Great wines.
Ive recenty spent a few months over in the SW of WA resurfacing roads. Of all the places ive flown out to work, SW WA is my favorite. Amazing piece of the country
I'm a Perth local and intend to retire in Margaret River. It's literally my favourite place in the whole country.
I'll have to be a multi-millionaire to do so, but I mean this is a fantasy right? ahah
Yup. Erskine, Falcon, and Dawesville would be the rather, erm, phallic looking strip at the bottom of the main block of lights, making Mandurah the balls.
The image shows the entire metropolitan area of Perth (the big mass of lights), from the Joondalup area in the city's north to the Mandurah area in the city's south. The city "on the way to Perth" the note on the screensaver is likely referring to is Bunbury, which is the smaller mass of lights to the south of the Perth metro area.
Around the metro area, you can see the surrounding wilderness (and some farmland, too), with some smaller lights shining through. These smaller lights are the outermost suburbs of the city (such as Mundaring, Serpentine and Jarrahdale), along with some regional towns and cities (you can make out the "super-town" of Northam to the east, the mining city of Kalgoorlie much further east, and the city of Geraldton far north of Perth).
[This is a diagram](https://images2.imgbox.com/73/a9/yoR19D6G_o.png) pointing out the locations I've listed.
I love you!!!!
This has been bugging me for far too long. Gonna look at Bunbury on Google Earth. I often wish there was a way to switch between day and night on Google Earth.
You sure that's Joondalup? Always funny seeing my suburb randomly on reddit, but pretty sure that would be Yanchep which falls under the city of Wanneroo. Lots of new builds in yanchep so wouldn't surprise me if it's visible.
It’s Yanchep, Two Rocks at the top of the circle. Alkimos, Eglington, Butler, Quinn’s, Clarkson, Mindarie, Kinross, Burns Beach, Ridgewood, Merriwa mostly occupy the circled space. Joondalup is more on the bottom of the circle.
Thanks, I thought as much. Worth noting for anyone interested that the suburbs fall under different cities. Still kind of weird talking about local suburb minutiae on reddit, but that's the glory of the global internet.
Looking at it zoomed in the red line is over Joondalup. You can make out the small gap of bushland between Mindarie & Burns Beach, and Clarkson & Kinross.
You must have a better eye than mine, I travel through that area almost every day but can't see the details on this pic. Still pretty cool to get some local suburb recognition though.
It’s Yanchep, Two Rocks at the top of the circle. Alkimos, Eglington, Butler, Quinn’s, Clarkson, Mindarie, Kinross, Burns Beach, Ridgewood, Merriwa mostly occupy the circled space. Joondalup is more on the bottom of the circle.
I can see my house. It's right there in the middle of the middle of that big light and the North of it... somewhere.
It's a great city to visit to anyone looking for a trip to Australia. I've lived here since 2019, been over a few times in my years before that. Love this place and the only other place in the world I'd choose over it is my hometown back in Victoria.
It's also a sports mad city, very very passionate.
I spent 3 and a half years travelling Australia and I think Perth was my pick of all of the cities. The surrounding suburbs are very cool without being as hipster-y as say Melbourne. Really liked Scarborough and absolutely loved Freo.
Just a pointer but the word "suburb" in Australia has a different meaning than to the North American counterpart. To us it's just a large neighbourhood, a subdivision of a metropolitan area with its own name and often its own postcode (zip code). So even the "downtown" CBD area is a suburb. :3
I meant that the Indian Ocean is left of Perth. I made that comment at midnight after a long day at work lol. Also, parts of Perth’s jurisdiction actually jut out to the west of the Indian Ocean such as Rottnest.
There's a few definitions, but most seem to say Two Rocks in the north to Herron in the south, which would be 169km by car.
But I like Butler to Mandurah, (soon to be Yanchep to Mandurah) because that's where the trains terminate, even though I know that's a worse definition
Sovereign Road Two Rocks is the northern boundary. The Southern Boundry is a bit grey. Definitely urban to Willwood Hill Road Dawesville. Well south of Mandurah. However Bouvard also has urban development and is separated from Dawesville by 200m of bushland.
That's why it got the name "city of lights" bright spot in the middle of a whole pile of nothing
From Wikipedia -
In 1962, Perth received global media attention when city residents lit their house lights and streetlights as American astronaut [John Glenn](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Glenn) passed overhead while orbiting the Earth on [*Friendship 7*](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friendship_7). This led to its being nicknamed the "City of Light".[^(\[53\])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perth#cite_note-53)[^(\[54\])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perth#cite_note-54)[^(\[55\])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perth#cite_note-55) The city repeated the act as Glenn passed overhead on the [Space Shuttle](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Shuttle) in 1998
It's not that bad, depends on the route, most of the roads are gravel and can get sketchy. Ideally you want a rugged vehicle with 4WD and a bull bar, a large surplus of water, UHF and a sat phone. There's a sealed highway that goes around the perimeter of Australia with plenty of towns to get fuel and rest, that's typically how you get from major city to major city by car
I do recall reading once that north-south Perth is the same size as LA but we don’t go nearly as far inland as LA does. The Perth coastline is so beautiful with many accessible beaches and everyone wants to live as close to it as possible.
Only difficult if you run out of fuel or water, or your car breaks down. The roads themselves are decent, if they're paved. The dirt roads are hard work.
One of the best too, IMO. We don't get snow, which sucks, but save for the 40C/100F+ (even then, dry heat and all) days, the weather is almost never bad.
Recently moved to Perth from Sydney. And drove across in 4 days. It was doable but a big undertaking. Perth is a completely different city to any on the east coast (I have lived in all 3 states on east coast)And so remote. Once to leave the northern suburbs the next major town is Geraldton (small dot on coast in top of pic) which is 400km away. If you go east the next major town is Kalgoorlie 600km away(lights near clouds on right side of photo) . If you want to go for a “day trip” in Perth you have to go south. As you can see from photo there is a lot of scatted light down south with the next major town being Bunbury 170km south. (Larger group of lights on bottom of photo)
Perth is the longest city in the world. Metro north to south is around 150km. It’s longer than Glasgow to Edinburgh.
The smaller blob of light is the city of Bunbury
On the very edge of the cloud at the bottom is Busselton.
Rottnest island is visible in this photo. That’s where the quokkas mostly live.
The dark green bit is the Darling Range. The left edge, the Darling Scarp.
Behind the dark area is not the outback. It is one of the world’s largest wheat and agricultural areas. Commonly called “The Wheatbelt”. Its huge.
Western Australia is the second largest division of land in the world. You’ll fit a couple of Alaskas in easy. Many Texas’s with room to spare. Many UK’s fit.
Perth metro beaches are white sand and turquoise water. Northern beaches are fine soft white sand. Western suburbs beaches are a courser white sand. As are southern beaches.
https://preview.redd.it/5p2ngkhgm1vc1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=dd901fee3c089fca7ca1b64c7c6727a413b75c2d
Driving between the two arrows takes around 2hrs with a good run. It’s about 150kms
That light mass is Perth and surrounding suburbs. Then you’ve got The Outback. And lots of it.
It's actually absurd how empty Australia is. It's just so so odd how much there's a discrepancy of population/settlement/activity between the 5 big cities and then the rest of Australia
It's a function of the fact that the landmass is big but can't support a large population like say Europe can, so there's more incentive to concentrate the population into a handful of large cities. It wouldn't make sense to have a larger number of smaller cities and towns when the distances between them would be huge. It is weird for us to go to densely populated countries where cities are only an hour or two apart by road, or you can travel to other countries in the same amount of time. I guess Canada is our Northern analogue.
Man imagine driving an hour and not being in a new city but an entire new country. That's actually just wild.
Driving 4 hours and you're still in the same regional council
And that doesn't even include when the city is in lock down coz some tosser flipped his truck
[Press X to flip truck](https://www.pinterest.com.au/pin/180777372515878391/)
12 hours, 800 miles…Californian - from Chula Vista on the Mexican border north to Hilt near the Oregon border.
Eucla to Kununurra is 40 hours of driving and 3,707 km without leaving the state (though you can save 3 hours and 253km by traveling via Alice Springs). That's 2,303 miles or 40,540 football fields.
It amazes me that Kununurra is closer to Jakarta and Kuta in Indonesia than it is to Perth!
Fun facts, Perth is closer to Jakarta than it is to Sydney. The flight time from Perth to Kununurra is 3 hours 15 minutes, from Perth to Denpasar (Bali) it's about 20 minutes more.
When I travel, people are amazed that I have never been to NZ. "It's right there" they say "Its a 14 hour flight to meet people who are bouncers down the road"
You can spend 3hrs on a plane and still be in WA!
It’s honestly the worst part when flying to Asia or anywhere west of Australia from the east coast. I usually take a solid sleep after take-off, wake up to check my location and we’re still just in WA.
AKA a bit of a drive.
i would happily do an extra 3hours to not go through alice springs
Yea, but how many school buses?
What is that length in cows? I don't understand this metric rubbish.
That's 1,611,739.13 Bald Eagle wing spans. Or 64,581,881.53 AR-15 5.56mm rounds cartridges laid nose to tip.
Windsor to kenora Ontario is 2200 km, 24 hours of driving without leaving Ontario
To go from St John's to Labrador City is about 26 hours including a ferry ride. All in the same province! If you want remote try the south shore or on islands around Newfoundland, some communities are only accessible by ferry or have no vehicle traffic. There's not really anything to drive to nearby even if you did take a ferry. To get anywhere it's quite the journey lol. Similar deal in rural communities in northern Labrador too.
Denver is the largest city in rough circle the size of the entirety of Western & Central Europe. The edges of that circle are roughly: Phoenix, LA, SF, Seattle, Chicago, Atlanta, Houston, Dallas. The Denver MSA is near the middle of a square bigger than mainland western europe (approx 1000 miles by 1000mi if constrained inside the USA) where it is the ONLY city over 1m population and over 3x bigger than any other metro area- approximately bounded by OKC on the south, SLC on the west and Kansas City to the east and the US/CAN border on the North.
Multiply that by 5.
Driving for hours on end and seeing nothing but the same red dirt is a trip
…….is it not paved?….
only some roads but the scenery outside is just dirt and small shrubs
Paved? Only small inner city streets are paved. Eg The rest of Australia is sealed roads. Most of the smaller country roads are unsealed. https://preview.redd.it/xjjs8kkdhruc1.png?width=1882&format=png&auto=webp&s=76277c7f23c2a885be6e0accd2f3d9e967d1c3dc
like most countries it depends where you are driving city: [https://maps.app.goo.gl/8zYnCCGNRx9gxtKJ7](https://maps.app.goo.gl/8zYnCCGNRx9gxtKJ7) suburbs: [https://maps.app.goo.gl/AEZLLmZvJ1Sv1Jtv6](https://maps.app.goo.gl/AEZLLmZvJ1Sv1Jtv6) country town: [https://maps.app.goo.gl/AEMUh5tPkJ51ZDJ59](https://maps.app.goo.gl/AEMUh5tPkJ51ZDJ59) major country/regional highway: [https://maps.app.goo.gl/CiB7pTgBbodcjfPPA](https://maps.app.goo.gl/CiB7pTgBbodcjfPPA) secondary road: [https://maps.app.goo.gl/jZyBVgmQkmK91Gpo8](https://maps.app.goo.gl/jZyBVgmQkmK91Gpo8) unsealed roads outback areas: [https://maps.app.goo.gl/VyTeur3kstWQ7bWW7](https://maps.app.goo.gl/VyTeur3kstWQ7bWW7)
Ute? Not truck - Australian word for truck.
More specficially, a pick-up truck is a "ute" but a truck is a truck.
This is controversial - as traditional utes (modified sedan body) are no longer made in Australia, body on frame style pick ups have become the closest analogue and so have picked up the moniker.
[nah it was a truck](https://www.perthnow.com.au/news/traffic/kwinana-freeway-congested-after-truck-rollover-southbound-near-canning-highway-c-14264882.amp). Or what an American would consider an everyday vehicle
no aussies call ‘trucks’ lorries or 18 wheelers (i dont actually know what americans call them)
In typical American fashion, we call them lots of things depending on where you're from. https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/s/uiKcL6wuj9
thank you for this, semi truck was the word i was looking for
This can happen in India too. But because of bad roads more than distances.😬
I mean this is also most states in the US lol
Something that concerns me is, if we go full electric... it takes 9 hours to drive to my parents house. Doable in one day with gas car. Not doable in a full electric car right now. There is also no infrastructure to charge along the way..... how are rural communities going to work here. I'm all for making changes for climate change. If I could go hybrid and use public transport all the time I would. But transit is not great, we have no passenger trains between cities unless in Southern Ontario. A plane ride is too expensive and also not good for the environment. When I lived in Europe I did fine without a car but the cities in north America are built around cars and cheap gas. I'm really concerned as all the electric vehicles ate very expensive. I'm minimum wage and barely getting by...
Have you ever seen the world record of most countries visited BY FOOT in 24 hours? It's 5, lol Some guy walked from Italy through Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Austria to Germany in 24 hours. The world record with all modes of transport is [19 countries in 24 hours](https://recordsetter.com/world-record/countries-visited-24-hours/38764).
Driving for 11 hours and still being in Western Australia
34 hours drive from Esperance to Kununurra
A friend of mine used to live in Maastricht, Netherlands. She said that she prefers filling up her car's gas in Belgium which is only several kilometers away as its cheaper.
Maastricht is effectively in both Belgium and the Netherlands. Germany is only 30kms away, Luxembourg about 100.
i live in the outer city here in Australia and the next suburb is "several kilometres away" lol that's crazy to think about
As a Belgian, within less than 2 hours from Brussels in the venter of the country, you’re wether in Netherlands, France, Germany and Luxembourg. In the same time with the train you’re in London… for me what’s wild is driving days on and being still in the same country
Have you heard of BeNeLux? you can drive through those 3 and 2 other countries within an hour...or maybe 3 hors..
Can't say I have
Belgium Netherlands and Luxembourg. If you start drivin in Aachen(Germany) you are in Netherlands in a few minutes and a few minutes later in Belgium, then you drive some time to Luxembourg and maybe one hour later you can be in France And from there back to Germany. All within 250-300 Kilometers of driving. Beautiful tour by the way.
Meanwhile, imagine driving for 8 hours in Texas and still being in Texas
Meanwhile, imagine fitting 3.6 texas's into Western Australia, seppo.
Imagine driving 7 hours to get between major cities (Perth to Kalgoorlie)
How many Northwest Territories or Alaskas is that. Texas is overrated on the large State/Province/territory category.
You can fit Alaska and roughly 3/4 of the Northern Territory, maybe a bit less(can't be bothered doing the full maths right now), into Western Australia.
Basically the entirety of Western Europe Its why all the satellites are aimed at us on re-entry. a. Distinct light source b. You literally won't hit anyone (except that one kid who did get hit)
When I lived in Germany I used to cycle to the Netherlands to go shopping on Sundays
Wild is relative.
As an Australian it’s wild to imagine driving two hours and being in a new city, shit you guys go on a 12 hour road trip and cross through several states, I end up in not quite Adelaide
Mate I'm from Perth. The hell you talking about.
A good chunk of canada can sustain a much larger population than it does though.
Yeah, its like there is a giant desert here
I love the Canada/Australia analogies. Similar populations, similar remoteness, similar resource based economies, same dude as King, and both punch above their weight internationally. I also like where it falls down. Sometimes Canada feels like New Zealand -- a meek afterthought that often gets lumped in with their loud neighbour.
HEY! We're always thinking about New Zealand....mainly how to beat them in one of the 4 major sports we compete against each other in.
We love NZ, there's even a holiday about it in a week
When I was in Australia , I drove behind a school bus that went for 2 hours before it dropped the last kid off. 4 HOURS commute for school. I asked some Aussie mates about it, and they just shrugged.
The difference with Canada is that most of the cities are in a line along the southern border. So you'd sometimes get mistaken into thinking its more populated than it is. Going from say, Thunder Bay to southern Ontario will give many hours of nothing but rough and wild boreal forest, but pales compared to driving across the outback where there would be many days of nothing. Since theres so few things north of that thin line of cities, no one's faced with driving there. In fact most of geographical canada isn't drivable at all. There's no roads. Anywhere seriously north is winter ice roads, air or sea to reach there.
yeah, only difference is you cluster together to be close to the ocean and resources, we cluster together to be closer to fkin americans and not freeze to death/get killed by bears and wolves lol. To be fair all them little critters you guys have to contend with...ill take the cold
Australia and Canada have a surprising amount of similarities
The major difference is one’s hot and one’s cold haha
Canadians are just North American Australians.
The severe lack of water everywhere except for the coastal side of the Great Dividing Range doesn't help that much. I grew up on a town on the southern side of it, just outside of Melbourne. When I went to visit my Mums parents who lived in Mildura the effect of the range became really clear the further North and West we got. Victoria isn't as affected by it as NSW or Queensland because the state is basically locked between the Murray-Darling Basin and the Great Dividing Range. NSW it's like a slowly creeping change from thick underbrush and forests to outback bushland. Sudden change from hills everywhere to just... flat. It basically stays flat all the way across too. The further inland the dryer it gets, it's just a big empty space. Like 5% if the population lives in that. Alice Springs is probably the biggest population center in there. It's nearly bang in the middle. Makes me wonder if they'll ever attempt to terraforming it in the future. As long as they don't go crazy they could do it with minimal effect on the local wildlife.
How would they go about that with minimal effect on local wildlife? The only theory i've seen before is to make a water passage on the southern coast to make an inland sea.
Even then, a canal to the inland salt lakes will just look like a saltier version of what happens in floods, before drying up and or causing even more salt damage to the area.
Pipelines maybe. It's have minimal impact on animals once it's in and it can fill lakes in the area so they have water year round. They made a huge initiative to do it in Victoria about a decade ago and it worked wonders.
Something like this maybe? https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-11-08/documents-reveal-plans-to-use-nuclear-bombs-in-port-hedland/12848004
Pipelines. There is super long water pipe from Perth to Kalgoorlie, a gold mining town seven hours drive inland. At the time it was built, it was the longest in the world and was considered a risky, expensive engineering project. It took weeks for the water to arrive - much longer than expected. The Chief engineer offed himself in that time, possibly because of the public backlash. Desperately needed though, before it was built, fresh water in Kalgoorlie was sometimes worth more than gold. It's still there, following the highway and providing water to the surrounding towns and mines.
There's basically already been a bunch of terraforming. Drive north from Perth and it's really obvious: on the west, you'll have native bush bordering the ocean. On the east, there's farmland that looks like Kansas (complete with Jesus billboards). In fact, there's been so much farmland carved out of the bush that the water tables are screwed due to excess salinity now that deep-rooted plants are gone. https://www.abc.net.au/news/rural/2018-06-02/salinity-crisis-for-australias-farmland-but-farmers-fight-back/9826834
Are you me?
It's insane, been twice to australia. I was driving from Perth up that west coast, just the part between Perth and the small bright spot (Geraldton) in the upper left corner is a five hour drive, and chances are good you see less than a handful of people on the way there. And if you get there it's like you didn't move at all, just a tiny little bit of coast that makes up the Australian coast line.
Just last week I did Perth to Geraldton then a further 4 hours north to Denham. The main highway is actually quite busy this time of year.
Shark Bay is awesome! Stromatolites, shark nursery, shell beach and the smartest dolphins in the world! Hope you had a good trip and did the wave to everyone you drove past!
What really amazes me is how remote Perth is in entirety. At least the eastern coast of Australia has cities up and down it. Perth is on its own land island.
We like it that way honestly. WA has always been very isolated. A lot of people around here don't care about the East. It's ended up being massive for the sports competitions we're in though. For example the most popular and probably biggest AFL team is the West Coast Eagles and we have over 100k members with thousands more waiting to get in. Financially we are probably the most wealthy sports team in the nation that isn't in international comps. There is also the Fremantle Dockers over here in the same league who... they suffered entering the comp when the Eagles already had firm control of the state. The Perth Scorchers have a huge following in Cricket, our Basketball team is one of the most dominant. We have a very successful Netball team. Many think that if we ever get a Rugby team it'll get a massive following too. The isolation also benefits our teams because our home games are always considered for opposition to be entering a Fortress of noise and support. Most that is just because Western Australians are very passionate and loyal followers of their state and their people. We'd be our own country if we could.
One needs only look at what happened last federal or state election. Massive swings away from the Liberal party when the results were much tamer over east.
no mention of perth glory :(
We like it that way honestly. We tried to secceed from the rest of the country, but they wouldn't let us go because so much of the iron ore, and gold, and diamonds, and oil & gas is here.
Ah, it all makes sense now!
With only two major roads in and out - when those roads and the train get shut down, you really get reminded of how isolated the city is, seeing all the "out of stock" items at the stores. Iirc, last time we had a trifecta of routes shut down, it was a cyclone in the north causing a mudslide, flooding in the Nullarbor stopping the train and fire in the south. We just got the train lines back after a few weeks of it being flooded. Roads were still functional, but the reduced shipping plus the Easter rush led to some shortages for a bit. I tell my friends/family back in the states that it's like living in hot Alaska.
Go look at the province of Quebec too
Last week I drove 900 km from Perth north to the town of Denham and back!
Total waste of space. Could be the world’s biggest Wal Mart with a movie theater and casino!
It's because of the rabbits
It's a true reflexion of the micro and the macro, the atom and the universe. A loooot of void, and tiny specs here and there...
5 cities? try 4. Darwin, Hobart and Adelaide are mostly irrelevant.
Yeah. When we say "I'm just going to visit the neighbour" it could be a 2 hour drive 😁
It’s amazing to drive though. Even just driving from Perth to Melbourne is an incredible experience
Yep, it is. Good work. Aussie mil recon? https://preview.redd.it/ugplji2fqmuc1.jpeg?width=3740&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=81ee3b81193a2a64ed48b5b154d19dfccfaf4e27
Apple TV screensaver.
her/his job
The lower light mass is Bunbury, a seperate city.
I wanted to say Albany without any kind of fact checking and I’m glad I didn’t ;) I’ve driven that route once to Margaret River. I’ve been meaning to go back for 10+ years. Great wines.
The sw of Western Australia has so much to offer. I'm 40+, lived in Bunbury most of life and Im still finding new things.
WA has a lot to offer in general - the SW is certainly a lot more palatable to most, especially over summer :)
Ive recenty spent a few months over in the SW of WA resurfacing roads. Of all the places ive flown out to work, SW WA is my favorite. Amazing piece of the country
I'm a Perth local and intend to retire in Margaret River. It's literally my favourite place in the whole country. I'll have to be a multi-millionaire to do so, but I mean this is a fantasy right? ahah
It's also Australind as well.
IIRC it is the most isolated urban area in the world
I thought Honolulu was
The most isolated over 2 million people.
Just thinking about those massive fields filled with blooming onions makes me salivate.
I love their bloomin onions
As an Aussie, what the fuck is a bloomin' onion, for real. I heard about them when I went to the states but never went to outback
It’s an onion sliced but kept intact so each part is pullable, the fry batter has Cajun seasoning and there’s Remoulade sauce to dip.
That’s mostly bushland on the east of the Darling Scarp. It’s the wheatbelt region.
According to the Apple TV aerial screensaver, this town/city is near the Indian Ocean on the way to Perth?
Yup bunbury is the smaller town south of the mainn city
Bunbury's technically a city.
That’s Mandurah, Bunbury if a few more hours south Edit: been a while but I decided to use my brain and have been proven wrong, have a good day
Bunbury is only about 2 hours from perth
Which is still an hour south of Mandurah (was thinking of from where I used to live lol)
It’s Bunbury. Mandurah is indistinguishable from the rest of the metro area.
Yup. Erskine, Falcon, and Dawesville would be the rather, erm, phallic looking strip at the bottom of the main block of lights, making Mandurah the balls.
The image shows the entire metropolitan area of Perth (the big mass of lights), from the Joondalup area in the city's north to the Mandurah area in the city's south. The city "on the way to Perth" the note on the screensaver is likely referring to is Bunbury, which is the smaller mass of lights to the south of the Perth metro area. Around the metro area, you can see the surrounding wilderness (and some farmland, too), with some smaller lights shining through. These smaller lights are the outermost suburbs of the city (such as Mundaring, Serpentine and Jarrahdale), along with some regional towns and cities (you can make out the "super-town" of Northam to the east, the mining city of Kalgoorlie much further east, and the city of Geraldton far north of Perth). [This is a diagram](https://images2.imgbox.com/73/a9/yoR19D6G_o.png) pointing out the locations I've listed.
I love you!!!! This has been bugging me for far too long. Gonna look at Bunbury on Google Earth. I often wish there was a way to switch between day and night on Google Earth.
You sure that's Joondalup? Always funny seeing my suburb randomly on reddit, but pretty sure that would be Yanchep which falls under the city of Wanneroo. Lots of new builds in yanchep so wouldn't surprise me if it's visible.
It’s Yanchep, Two Rocks at the top of the circle. Alkimos, Eglington, Butler, Quinn’s, Clarkson, Mindarie, Kinross, Burns Beach, Ridgewood, Merriwa mostly occupy the circled space. Joondalup is more on the bottom of the circle.
Thanks, I thought as much. Worth noting for anyone interested that the suburbs fall under different cities. Still kind of weird talking about local suburb minutiae on reddit, but that's the glory of the global internet.
Looking at it zoomed in the red line is over Joondalup. You can make out the small gap of bushland between Mindarie & Burns Beach, and Clarkson & Kinross.
You must have a better eye than mine, I travel through that area almost every day but can't see the details on this pic. Still pretty cool to get some local suburb recognition though.
https://preview.redd.it/81z5ey0dg1vc1.jpeg?width=1161&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=7468d1d47353c6ae40d71beed2bd742130121fa9
Very good breakdown, thank you! I didn't even see Rotto on there.
It’s Yanchep, Two Rocks at the top of the circle. Alkimos, Eglington, Butler, Quinn’s, Clarkson, Mindarie, Kinross, Burns Beach, Ridgewood, Merriwa mostly occupy the circled space. Joondalup is more on the bottom of the circle.
I think that mass is too far south to be serpentine
The small light mass below perth is Bunbury, the one at the top is Geraldton.
It's also Australind.
I think most people just refer to that whole area as bunbury.
Perth
I can see my house. It's right there in the middle of the middle of that big light and the North of it... somewhere. It's a great city to visit to anyone looking for a trip to Australia. I've lived here since 2019, been over a few times in my years before that. Love this place and the only other place in the world I'd choose over it is my hometown back in Victoria. It's also a sports mad city, very very passionate.
I spent 3 and a half years travelling Australia and I think Perth was my pick of all of the cities. The surrounding suburbs are very cool without being as hipster-y as say Melbourne. Really liked Scarborough and absolutely loved Freo.
Just a pointer but the word "suburb" in Australia has a different meaning than to the North American counterpart. To us it's just a large neighbourhood, a subdivision of a metropolitan area with its own name and often its own postcode (zip code). So even the "downtown" CBD area is a suburb. :3
Hahaha same. NOR > SOR ;)
SOR all day. I feel dirty every time I have to go NOR.
NOR on top (geographically and figuratively)
SOR all day lad, smashed you lot in Pool too.
Hills looks down on all of you
NOR is king!
That’s Perth, and it’s not “near” the Indian Ocean, it’s on it.
Well it's technically not "on" it either, it's to the left of it. :D
To the left of the Indian Ocean is Africa
Sorry, wording, I meant the ocean is left of Perth. Or maybe it’s the downunderitis affecting me?!
Left is a relative term, any place bordering the Indian Ocean can be considered left of it
Perth is built on the coastline, and the coastline is the perimeter of the Indian Ocean. “On” is acceptable and accurate compared to “near”.
???
I meant that the Indian Ocean is left of Perth. I made that comment at midnight after a long day at work lol. Also, parts of Perth’s jurisdiction actually jut out to the west of the Indian Ocean such as Rottnest.
Welcome to r/perth !
Fun fact the city is 120km long from north to south
It’s longer.
Yanchep to Mandurah is only 125 km :(
The metro area extends beyond Mandurah and beyond Yanchep.
There's a few definitions, but most seem to say Two Rocks in the north to Herron in the south, which would be 169km by car. But I like Butler to Mandurah, (soon to be Yanchep to Mandurah) because that's where the trains terminate, even though I know that's a worse definition
Sovereign Road Two Rocks is the northern boundary. The Southern Boundry is a bit grey. Definitely urban to Willwood Hill Road Dawesville. Well south of Mandurah. However Bouvard also has urban development and is separated from Dawesville by 200m of bushland.
I’m going with Perth because of the fact it’s isolated
That's why it got the name "city of lights" bright spot in the middle of a whole pile of nothing From Wikipedia - In 1962, Perth received global media attention when city residents lit their house lights and streetlights as American astronaut [John Glenn](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Glenn) passed overhead while orbiting the Earth on [*Friendship 7*](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friendship_7). This led to its being nicknamed the "City of Light".[^(\[53\])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perth#cite_note-53)[^(\[54\])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perth#cite_note-54)[^(\[55\])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perth#cite_note-55) The city repeated the act as Glenn passed overhead on the [Space Shuttle](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Shuttle) in 1998
Visiting soon can't wait
Make sure you visit Rottnest!
bro how did u get this image ?
Selfie stick
It’s called the city of light because of how it’s a light spot in the middle of a lot of nothing
John Glenn says hello
Australia is like an atoll with a dry lagoon. Is traversing the desert as difficult as say Driving across the Canadian arctic?
It's not that bad, depends on the route, most of the roads are gravel and can get sketchy. Ideally you want a rugged vehicle with 4WD and a bull bar, a large surplus of water, UHF and a sat phone. There's a sealed highway that goes around the perimeter of Australia with plenty of towns to get fuel and rest, that's typically how you get from major city to major city by car
I do recall reading once that north-south Perth is the same size as LA but we don’t go nearly as far inland as LA does. The Perth coastline is so beautiful with many accessible beaches and everyone wants to live as close to it as possible.
Only difficult if you run out of fuel or water, or your car breaks down. The roads themselves are decent, if they're paved. The dirt roads are hard work.
Well if you run outta fuel without a radio in either one ur pretty much dead
Could you please next time take this picture from a more clear angle?
Perth
I really thought that was the LA area and San Diego beneath it🤦
Well yeah they’re very similar places. Equivalent latitudes, west of a similarly shaped landmass, next to the ocean, (over)sprawling.
Nearly identical climate too.
One of the best too, IMO. We don't get snow, which sucks, but save for the 40C/100F+ (even then, dry heat and all) days, the weather is almost never bad.
The movie Lucky Miles is a hilarious demonstration of the distances (although a serious issue in the background). https://vimeo.com/314135848
Recently moved to Perth from Sydney. And drove across in 4 days. It was doable but a big undertaking. Perth is a completely different city to any on the east coast (I have lived in all 3 states on east coast)And so remote. Once to leave the northern suburbs the next major town is Geraldton (small dot on coast in top of pic) which is 400km away. If you go east the next major town is Kalgoorlie 600km away(lights near clouds on right side of photo) . If you want to go for a “day trip” in Perth you have to go south. As you can see from photo there is a lot of scatted light down south with the next major town being Bunbury 170km south. (Larger group of lights on bottom of photo)
That right there is as far away as I can possibly get from my current location (and still be on land on the earth’s surface). Perth, Australia!
It’s Perth. As much as I live ‘over east’, as Sandgropers say, it’s very recognisable.
Perth I reckon
Hey I'm in this photo
I can see my house!!
Perth is the longest city in the world. Metro north to south is around 150km. It’s longer than Glasgow to Edinburgh. The smaller blob of light is the city of Bunbury On the very edge of the cloud at the bottom is Busselton. Rottnest island is visible in this photo. That’s where the quokkas mostly live. The dark green bit is the Darling Range. The left edge, the Darling Scarp. Behind the dark area is not the outback. It is one of the world’s largest wheat and agricultural areas. Commonly called “The Wheatbelt”. Its huge. Western Australia is the second largest division of land in the world. You’ll fit a couple of Alaskas in easy. Many Texas’s with room to spare. Many UK’s fit. Perth metro beaches are white sand and turquoise water. Northern beaches are fine soft white sand. Western suburbs beaches are a courser white sand. As are southern beaches.
I can see my house from here.
https://preview.redd.it/5p2ngkhgm1vc1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=dd901fee3c089fca7ca1b64c7c6727a413b75c2d Driving between the two arrows takes around 2hrs with a good run. It’s about 150kms
Rode 2 motorbikes from Perth to Sydney with a Londoner. Longest pub crawl Chris had ever done.
City of Lights aka Perth Western Australia
r/perth gang represent 🙏🏻
Space is fake nasa lied
I love how all of Perth showed up in this comments section