The Real Edge Of The Earth
In the Great Australian Bight in South Australia is a vast and empty Nullarbor Plain - a real end of the world. It is the world's largest single piece of limestone, covering an area of 270,000 square kilometers It stretches 1,000 km from east to west. The surface of the plain is so flat that stretches 483 km straight line here Transavstraliyskoy railway. Plain ends abruptly Bund cliffs that form the break length is 200 km, curving around the Great Australian Bight.The cliffs form the southern end of the Bund Nullarbor Plain, which stretches further. White base near the bottom of the cliffs - it is limestone Wilson Bluff.
This
chalk-like material formed on the ancient sea floor, when Australia
began to separate from Antarctica 65 million years ago. The thickness of this limestone formation is 300 meters, but on the cliffs can be seen only by its upper layer.
Above this limestone layer is whitish, gray and brown layers of limestone and crystalline rocks. Some layers comprise the marine fossils, including worms and molluscs, indicating that they are of marine origin. Other layers are composed exclusively of sea (foraminifera). Cliffs crowned by the hardened layer of pressurized wind-blown sand age from 1.6 million to 100,000 years.
The cliffs reach 60-120 meters in height, and you can see them from several points on the Eyre Highway. Although it is best to look at them, of course, from the air.
Eyre
Highway - the main east-west road in Australia - follows the line of
the stunning coastline of less than a kilometer from the edge.
The highway was named in honor of Edward John Eyre, who, along with John Baxter and three natives tried to reach Albany in Western Australia via the Nullarbor Plain. Due to lack of water and harsh conditions of the rebellion occurred, and two native killed John Baxter and fled.
Eyre and the third native continued his journey and completed it in June 1841. Eyre Highway paved exactly one hundred years later - in 1941.
At a distance of 85 km along the highway, there are five main points of the review, which offer great views of the cliffs.
West Point is the most popular because tourists can stroll through the rock sticking out from the cliffs and enjoy the amazing views.
On the east end of the cliff is another place where you can spend hours watching the southern smooth whales that frolic in the ocean bottom.
Southern right whales migrate here in the autumn, to give birth in the coastal water along the South Australian coast, and then remain here until their babies do not gain the necessary weight.
