The town of Coolgardie. Photo / Australia’s Golden Outback
Australia’s largest outback city may seem an unlikely place for a mother-daughter bonding trip. But as writer Julia D’Orazio discovers, Kalgoorlie proves to be the golden ticket for a one-of-a-kind adventure.
My mum is a city slicker; her feet rarely tread red dirt roads. Yet, somehow, she surprised me, agreeing to get out of her comfort zone to join me on a trip exploring Australia’s largest outback city.
Kalgoorlie-Boulder, just shy of 600km east of Perth, showcases the riches of Western Australia’s goldrush era, a flourishing destination at the turn of the 20th century. The city – an amalgamation of former rival towns Kalgoorlie and Boulder – is peppered with some of Western Australia’s best-preserved Victorian and Edwardian buildings on its wide streets. But between its gorgeous heritage precincts are some oddities and one-of-a-kind attractions that make this goldfields hub, better known as Kalgoorlie, a curious place to explore.
While I fly to Kalgoorlie (a one-hour flight from Perth), she opts for the scenic route on her maiden voyage: a seven-hour journey on board the Prospector Train from Perth. Her chariot-like arrival gives me ample time to collect a hire car (highly recommended for travelling in the region) and check into the accommodation, Discovery Parks – Kalgoorlie Goldfields caravan park.
A delightful introduction to life in parched lands is Hannan’s North Tourist Mine. An industrial Disneyland, Kalgoorlie’s open-air museum for the young and old is a resting place for timeworn mining shafts and equipment, relocated century-old pocket-sized buildings and perhaps the most novel, mining trucks like the ones still in use today (more on that later).
I watch mum unleash her inner child, excitedly hopping on board the park’s iconic “ride”. We inspect all the nooks of a stationary 793C haul truck – think a monstrous yellow Tonka truck – awkwardly positioning ourselves into the 4.5-tonne tyre rim and posing in the shovel of the 994-wheel loader, which could easily fit our extended family. Climbing into the driver’s seat feels intimidating; I don’t know how drivers manoeuvre these 6-metre-tall earthmovers.
Going from highs to lows, another way to experience life in the “mines” is going back to basics with gold panning. While we have no pan luck striking gold ourselves, unearthed riches shine bright at the Museum of the Goldfields. Its main attraction, a vault, displays half the state’s gold collection, including nuggets, jewellery and the first bullion bar with a Kalgoorlie stamp, all behind thick glass, cameras watching 24/7. Standing 39m above the walk-through treasure trove is a bright red mining shaft. The city’s fitting skyscraper offers 360-degree panoramas from the viewing point.
To see how gold is discovered nowadays, we head to KCGM Super Pit Lookout. Visible from space, Australia’s largest goldmine, the “Super Pit”, is 3.5km long, 1.5km wide and 600m deep – and continues to expand. The monster trucks now appear toylike in action, slowly journeying winding roads cut into the earth. Feeling out of our depths and keen to learn more about mining practices, we join a one-hour Super Pit tour. It involves some miners’ cosplay, with hard hats and high-visibility vests required to step out and see the operations of a working mine, spotting conveyor belts and other industrial structures. It really is another world out here.
Speaking of other worlds, all innocence is lost when entering Australia’s oldest working brothel. Infamously known as “Pink house”, Questa Casa has been a Kalgoorlie institution since opening its many doors in the late 1890s. Despite prostitution technically being illegal in the state, brothels were tolerated and restricted to Hay St – mere metres from a police station – as part of the city’s containment policy. Once one of 18 brothels luring cashed-up miners, Questa Casa is now Kalgoorlie’s last remaining brothel.
These days, Questa Casa satisfies more curiosities than sexual desires with Australia’s only brothel tour (while it’s still technically operational, there are currently “no ladies offering their services”). Led by one of the Madams, it exposes the unlikely tourist attraction’s scandals, sex lairs and questionable fetishes. Is a brothel an appropriate place to take your mother – or daughter? Well, if you want to deepen the bond or break the ice with “taboo” topics, I can assure you that after a brothel visit, no topic is off limits. Seeing my mum’s priceless reaction to a bed sprawled with sex toys for hire will live rent-free in my mind.
Another place we wish the walls could talk is Gwalia. The once-prosperous mining town, 236km north of Kalgoorlie, now (barely) stands as a spooky time warp into the state’s gold rush era. Abandoned in 1963, the Instagrammable ghost town’s remaining 31 buildings on ochre lands include cottages, sheds, and attractions still in use today, such as the Gwalia Museum and Hoover House, named after the town’s first mine manager, Herbert Hoover, who later served as the 31st President of the United States.
Joining the out-of-the-ordinary ranks is Broad Arrow Tavern. Established in 1896, it’s the epitome of a classic Aussie pub, with its silver tin roof and middle-of-nowhere locale. A line of parked black motorcycles glistening in the harsh sun reinforces the outback mood board.
Inside tells another story – many of them, with the pub’s walls infamously covered in patron-penned graffiti. A collection of bras hangs above the pool table. Besides its quirky appearance, the historic tavern is renowned for its hearty, homemade burgers. We sit outside and mingle with bikers calling in for a pit-stop bite. The conversation leads to an invitation for mum to hop on a motorbike – she blithely accepts, surprising me yet again. Flaunting a rebellious streak on the slender joyride, I know she’s having a good time out here.
Getting there
Qantas and Virgin Australia fly to Kalgoorlie via Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth. See qantas.com.au; virginaustralia.com.au
Stay
Rooms at Discovery Parks, Kalgoorlie Goldfields, from $170 a night. See discoveryholidayparks.com.au
Details
The writer was a guest of Australia’s Golden Outback and Discovery Parks.