Indeed if this picture was current reality, with 14 DC charging stations in the 1800 kms between Karatha and Kununarra, the road would have have been sweet indeed for any EV. However, I suspect, that these days even Time Magazine depends on government press releases for its click bait and puff pieces.

Had a real journalist done even the most cursory checking on-line, or even just on the Plugshare app, they would have found that some of the chargers on the map above, have been installed but not yet ‘comssioned’, others have been broken for months, others still, commissioned or not, are whimsical and will work some of the time and not others.

Northern W.A

We left Perth on our lap around Australia aware that the roll out of the WA EV Network in the Pilbara and Kimberley regions was having some difficulty but hopeful that reality could not be running too far behind that fabulous bit of publicity in a world-famous magazine.

We took some precautionary action as well. We wrote to the the man in charge of the WA EV Network project, the Environment Minister, congratulating him on the successful Time Magazine PR and alerting him to some problems with the Network. In particular we noted that the EV charger in Port Hedland was inaccessible due to construction being undertaken by the Port Authority and those at Fitzroy Crossing and Halls Creek, needing urgent repairs, having been vandalised several weeks prior.

As we drove slowly north, the problem loomed larger. We emailed and called pretty much everyone who could possibly have any influence on any charger and probably many who had none!

Briefly the issue is this: between Karatha and Broome, a distance of over 800 kms, there are currently no consistently working DC chargers, even though there are at least three chargers along the way, which have been functional from time to time. Nor is there a dependable fast charger between Derby and Warmun – a distance of over 700 kms – as the one in Halls Creek has been broken for many weeks now and at Fitzroy Crossing things are, well, a tad mysterious…

Chargefox

Here is what happened. Having failed to get the vandalised charger at Fitzroy Crossing to cooperate, we rang Chargefox, the provider in this instance. But the Chargefox operator could not locate its serial number on her documentation. Nor could she find Fitzroy Crossing on her map!! I offered to send her photographic evidence to prove that there was indeed a place called Fitzroy Crossing in WA, and that it contained all the material signs of a charging station with a Chargefox logo on it. But to no avail.

However, a little after hanging up on the Chargefox lady, our persistence was rewarded. After about half an hour of holding the card this way and plugging the car in that way, with advice from an ‘EV-angelic’ friend, who has driven more miles in his EV than anyone else in Australia, the whimsical charger suddenly roared into life and delivered as fast a charge as our Kona is capable of taking!!

Chargefox continued to be unhelpful. At Kununurra, they did eventually find the relevant charger, but it took a good quarter of an hour to locate the charger, as Chargefox had registered it under a wrong serial number! They were, in any case, unable to help much beyond agreeing that there was indeed a charger where we said it was.

You would think the Kununurra charger would be hard to misplace as it is located right in front of the office of Horizon Power, the WA state-owned company responsible for building the WA EV Network.

The location that turned out to be a boon for us, as were able to walk into Horizon, find Ron-the-Mechanic, who was able to call people who actually knew what they were doing. In a little while someone who might be called Archangel Michael, was able to do some magic from a long way away and bingo, the charger was back in action.

Once we had finished charging, however, Chargefox had no difficulty locating the charger and sending us the bill within 30 seconds! ‘Curiouser and curiouser’ (to quote Alice in Wonderland).

Grateful for the help from Horizon, we were able to make the most of our time in Kununurra, our final stop in WA, taking in the massive Lake Argyle, just 70 kms from the fast charger and the Mirima National Park, which some say is like the Bungle Bungles in miniature.

Like much of the Kimberley, the Bungle Bungles are beyond the reach of a 2WD car. But Mirima, the secret valley, 10 minutes drive from Kununurra town centre, is quite a wonder. For me the rocks in Mirima are reminiscent of the Ellora temples in India, carved out of caves, and dating back to 1000 CE, some centuries before the birth of Greek civilization, but barely the blink of an eye compared to these rock temples belonging to the Miriwoong people, made in the earth’s own time.

Yes, Minister

In Broome, on 15 August, after we had badgered the Minister’s office, and called anyone in Horizon who would listen, we got a lovely letter signed by the Minister. He confirmed what we knew: that some chargers had been vandalised and others though built (and some even connected to a power source) were ‘yet to be commissioned’. He was, he concluded ‘very proud of the work his government had done.’ Yes, Minister. But Minister…

‘Slow is in my blood’

Faulty Fast Chargers should not prevent anyone going to most places where cars can take you at the top end of WA. Anyone road tripping with an EV knows the work-around: slow down! Drop your speed and you can do longer distances per charge. And when faced with undependable fast chargers be prepared to stop overnight at caravan parks to charge up on their powered sites.

Speed, in any case, is nobody’s friend. All along Highway 1 around Western Australia, messed up cars and carcasses remind you to take your time, slow down.

Kimberley, the remote far north of Western Australia, where we have been driving in the last week or so, is one of the most sparsely populated places on earth, with less than 1 person in 1000 sq kms. Even Mongolia has more than twice that density of population!

When you think about how few people live here, the consequent skills shortage, the distances that any equipment has to travel to get here, it is a wonder that we have any specialised, uber-modern technology of speed, at all. Here, on this road, on the edge of a vast wilderness, surrounded by rocks formed by the slow rhythm of geological time, there are so many reasons to go slow!

As Leonard Cohen says ‘I always liked it slow/ Slow is in my blood.’