The Pilbara

Most Saturday nights at work I listen to a delightful ABC radio program called The Idlers. The show often features travellers wandering around Australia on The Big Lap. A regular question posed by the show's hosts is, 'Where is the best place you've visited'. And invariably these travellers reply, 'The Kimberley', in north west Australia.

Not so well travelled as the Kimberely is the neighbouring country of the Pilbara. Along with it's isolation and rugged accessibility, the Pilbara is renowned for being a lucrative mining district of hard, rocky, desert lands, around 500,000 square kilometres in area.

Ever wondered what it was like out there during the early days of the mining boom ? A few weeks ago Nicolas Rothwell in The Australian Literary Review detailed a wonderfully evocative and poignant account of the abandoned Pilbara settlement, Goldsworthy.

Titled Memory is all we have Rothwell produced a captivating story of the remote mining locale, its history and its people. A superb weekend read. Highly recommended.

Comments

[Tony.T]

Blimey, how the hell did I miss this article, Adrian. I lived in the Pilbara for 12 years and if I can't raise a post out of this, I never will.

Thanks.