Perth - Norseman via Great Eastern Highway (Hwy 94)
Total distance 763km
All distances measured from Perth

You will need navigate to the Great Eastern Highway (Hwy 94) and travel though Mandaring to Northam (97km). An interesting detour would be to turn off Highway 94 at Mount Helena (54km) and visit the historic town of York where there is an excellent motor museum. A good road would then take you the 33km to get back on to the Great Eastern Highway (Hwy 94) at Northam.

We are in wheat country now as we travel to Merridin (259km) with its huge wheat silos and colourful jacaranda trees. The town is the centre of a large district that grows nearly half of the Stateís wheat harvest.

Our next town while still in the flat country of the wheat belt is Southern Cross (368km) site of one of the earliest gold discoveries, and this was soon followed by discoveries in Coolgardie (556km), and Kalgoorlie/Boulder. At one stage Coolgardie was the third largest town in Western Australia as miners flocked to the area but this was soon overtaken by colourful Kalgoorlie and twin town Boulder where gold is still produced today with mine tours available for visitors. To visit the twin towns means a detour of 39km but is well worth the effort.

Not many old trees are found as we turn south because most of the timber in the area was removed to satisfy the huge hunger for pit props by the ever-expanding mines during the early days of the gold rushes

This stage of our journey ends when we reach Norseman (723km) and the junction with the Eyre Highway (Hwy 1). This is a sizeable town and the jumping off point for the long crossing of the Nullarbor. It has good facilities plus an interesting lookout that gives views of the town and surrounding district. A very different use for corrugated iron can be seen at one of the townís roundabouts where figures of camels have been cut from the sheets to give a very lifelike appearance from a distance.