Ubiquitous (adj.) – Being or seeming to be everywhere or in all places
We would soon be driving along the Great Ocean Road, a drive so scenic it made your eyes hurt – or so all the guide books said. The rugged coastline, thrashing waves, adorable little coastal towns and stunning forestry made it a must-do on many travellers’ trips to Oz. I was so caught up in gazing out of the window, taking in how quickly the landscape had shifted from bustling city to monotonous motorway to desolate space, that I almost missed it.
‘Argh!’ I screamed and caused Shelley to swerve slightly.
‘What the fuck!’ she yelled, getting the car back on track, following her gaze past my stretched-out hand.
‘Jeeeeesus, what’s happened!’ Cara asked, flicking her head up from her magazine, which she’d picked up from the last service station.
‘Kangaroos!’ I laughed, shaking my head in disbelief. Along the shrubby patches of earth, spindly trees and tufted mounds of grass were two actual kangaroos hopping alongside us. They were bloody mahoosive! I couldn’t stop smiling. It seemed so bizarre to see these creatures lazily jumping around just feet away from our car. Their long auburn tails thumped the arid earth, causing billowing plumes of dust to rise as they built up speed; it was as if they were racing us. Their funny T-Rex arms seemed to be at odds with their muscular stance, intimidating claws and all. I stared with my jaw dropped and tears misting my eyes.
‘God, Georgia, you nearly gave me a heart attack then!’ Cara tutted and went back to her reading material.
‘Aren’t you excited to see one?’ I asked, unable to take my eyes from them. ‘Look at them! LOOK!’
‘They’re like pests to us.’ Shelley shook her head, not choked up in the slightest. ‘My dad has a serious vendetta against them.’
‘Oh yeah, don’t get Uncle Keith started on the Spring of ’93 or whenever it was,’ Cara said, rolling her eyes.
‘What? Why? They are magnificent,’ I breathed, pressing my palms against the dirty car window and ignoring the fact I’d never called anything magnificent before.
‘Well, there are more kangaroos than humans on this island. They affect livestock, eat food not meant for them and farmers bloody hate them,’ she listed, matter-of-factly. ‘But they do taste awesome!’
I shivered. ‘Shh, they’ll hear you!’
‘Ha ha, we’ll see when you’ve had a ’roo burger, you’ll soon change your tune.’
My stomach flipped at the thought of it.
‘Right, look at that map and tell me exactly how far we’ve got to go,’ Shelley instructed, as the two kangaroos bounced away from us.
I pulled my eyes from the window and focused on the job in hand. ‘We’ve got one more town to pass through, then we’re there.’
‘Thank God for that. I need a drink!’ Cara chirped up.
‘And I need another wee,’ I added.
We’d been driving pretty much non-stop since leaving Melbourne, pausing briefly to take photos of the scenery, to gaze at buff surfers walking with their sand-coated surfboards down the roads in Torquay, and to pick up a quick bite to eat in the pretty seaside resort of Lorne. Everything was a novelty to me, from the food on offer in the quaint coffee shop we visited, to the rolling drawl of Australian accents. Even the road signs were different, their yellow and black diamond-shaped plates peppered the road, giving orders to be cautious and kill your speed alongside images of kangaroos. Shelley had given us a brief outline of our itinerary. We were going to stop for the night in Apollo Bay, a quiet fishing village, to get some rest in order to be up for our early start to visit the Twelve Apostles the next morning. She wanted us to get to the unusual rock towers for sunrise. I was still struggling to shake this tiredness, and the thought of an early night was exactly what the doctor ordered. The hen-do fun could start properly tomorrow.
*
We’d gotten a little lost so it was dark when we pulled up at our accomodation for the night.
‘We’re staying here?’ Cara asked, full of disgust as she read the battered-looking sign in the car park after we’d tumbled out of The Beast. ‘We’re staying at a youth hostel?’
‘Yeah, I thought it would be fun.’
Judging by how glamorous Cara was, this was going to be a completely alien concept for her.
‘It’s one of these new youth hostels,’ Shell babbled, reading the sign Cara was glaring at. ‘Eco-friendly and all that. It’s probably as good as a five-star hotel.’
To be fair, this was unlike any hostel I’d ever stayed in before. Gleaming floor-to-ceiling glass windows at the entrance, a sloping wooden roof and wraparound balcony full of potted plants, rustic garden chairs and candles hanging from tree branches welcomed us.
Cara grabbed her bag and strode inside, muttering something under her breath.
‘I knew she’d moan, but I’m sure once she’s had the backpacker experience she’ll be glad of it!’
‘I think it’s a great idea!’ I smiled.
I was excited to go back to our roots of backpacking, where Shelley and I had met. It had been so long since I’d shared a dorm room, hung out in the breakaway room, and had meaningful deep chats with strangers who were passing through the same place at the same time. A lot of the places that Ben and I usually stayed in were rooms in soulless airport hotels, or accommodation laid on for us by event organisers at conference venues, so I thought this would be a laugh, if Cara ever got over sulking that she wasn’t in a luxe hotel, that is.
Sadly, the excitement at the taste of five-star treatment on a one-star budget quickly faded when we wandered into the intimidating reception area. Signs listing their many strict rules and regulations were tacked all around a glass partition. Details of its eco-friendly credentials were plastered on the bare wooden wall opposite. Pretty much everything was recycled, reused and repaired here – impressive, but also fairly unnerving.
‘Hello?’ Shelley peered around the empty reception desk.
‘Hellooooo?’ Cara called out louder. ‘Well, this isn’t exactly a five-star welcome. They must be too busy planting mung beans to bother checking guests in.’
‘It’s probably because we’re out of season.’ I spotted Shelley clenching her jaw and was about to suggest heading somewhere else when someone called out to us.
‘Yes?’ The deep voice belonged to a man with a wiry beard, round spectacles and a fair few missing teeth, who seemed to appear from nowhere. He was like Lurch in The Addams Family, only more intimidating, and looking mighty unsure of what three weary women were doing in his establishment.
‘Oh, hi, I booked a room for tonight. It should be under the name of Robinson?’ Shelley smiled, trying not to be put off by his dead-eyed stare.
I felt Cara bristle next to me as he plodded around behind the reception desk.
‘Here.’ He thumped onto the counter a clipboard, which held a tatty form for us to fill in, and eyeballed us as we took it in turns to scribble out our details with a gnawed pencil tied on with string.
‘Thanks.’ I plastered on a smile, hoping to kill him with kindness, but even my fake megawatt grin did nothing to the man who clearly viewed us as outsiders. This was obviously a local hostel for local people. He took our forms and Shelley’s credit card, before passing over a receipt and a key.
‘Check-out is at 8 a.m.,’ he grunted, before sloping off out of the back of the office.
Cara was too busy reading out the exceptionally long list of dos and don’ts to add another snarky comment about the frosty welcome. ‘Check this – no pungent food to be brought into the hostel; incense burning is prohibited; don’t leave your toe or fingernail cuttings on the bathroom floors; limit showers to five minutes; sleeping bags are banned; guests are not permitted to walk around naked. Animals (dogs, cats and certain smaller pets) are allowed for an extra $10 per night. Sheesh!’
‘Do you reckon he’s coming back?’ Shelley asked, ignoring her cousin’s horrified expression.
‘No idea.’ I shrugged.
‘Eurgh, let’s just go, dump our bags, then find some wine. Lord knows we need it,’ Cara huffed.
‘Oh well, actually, I thought the wine could be saved for tomorrow, seeing as we’ve got an early start in the morning and all that.’
‘Great,’ Cara muttered sarcastically, before lugging her bag down the dark breeze-block corridor to our room, narrowly avoiding tripping over a large basket of dirty laundry. ‘Wine would have been the only thing to get us through this hellhole.’
‘She’s never stayed in a hostel before. Never did the whole travelling thing,’ Shelley whispered to me.
‘Pfft. If this is what it’s like, then I don’t think I’ve exactly been missing out,’ Cara snorted.
‘Here we are! Room Five!’ I said brightly, pushing open our bedroom door, wanting to avoid a domestic.
‘Oh,’ we all chimed in disappointed unison.
‘So much for luxury.’
The bedroom had two tightly made bunk beds screwed down onto a cold concrete floor; the walls were stark grey breeze blocks and a wooden rickety desk had been set up in the corner under the draughty window for guests to sit and write in their travel journals or scribble postcards to send home. Looking around the gloomy, depressing room, I guessed those notes would be more like cries for help.
‘It’s fine. It’s for one night,’ I said, trying to make light of it all, ignoring the look of fear on Cara’s suddenly much paler features. ‘Right, let’s heat up that soup we picked up and then see what the other guests are like,’ I suggested, with more enthusiasm than a tin of Heinz has ever deserved.
We wandered back down the dimly lit corridors to find some form of life in this place.
‘Surely being eco they could at least have some form of light, or are we meant to be carrying candles around made from our own ear wax?’ Cara muttered as we found the large and totally deserted kitchen.
With our soup on the hob, we headed to the breakout room opposite where a few backpackers sat on squishy sofas. It was surprisingly homely in here compared to the rest of the stark hostel.
‘Hi!’ I said excitedly, pleased to have some other form of human interaction.
No one replied or even acknowledged us. Every one of the five people already hunkered down in the room were silently on their phones, scrolling through their Facebook timeline with their thumbs, choosing filters for their Instagram updates, or watching something on a tablet with earphones firmly in.
Undeterred and wanting to help her cousin experience the real backpacking way of life, Shelley went and sat on one of the free seats. ‘So, this place is a little random. I mean, that receptionist could do with some social skills for one.’
A woman who was curled up on what I presumed was her boyfriend’s lap finally bothered to lift her gaze from her phone screen to give Shelley a tight smile. A smile that clearly said piss off.
‘So, where you guys from?’ Shelley asked, undeterred. An older man, wearing a snazzy multicoloured t-shirt, with crumbs in his bushy beard, sighed loudly at the rudeness of trying to start a conversation in a common room.
‘America. You?’ the girl drawled disinterestedly.
‘We’re from Australia and that’s Georgia, she’s from Manchester in England.’ Shelley smiled at me.
‘Hi.’ I waved lamely. ‘Any of you lot heading to the Twelve Apostles tomorrow?’
Two girls with platinum-blonde hair in matching cascading ponytails began giggling at some YouTube clip they were watching; everyone else ignored me. I glanced at Shelley and shrugged. This was a no-hoper. Here we were in this fairly remote part of the world, in a unique hostel, and all they could do was connect to their virtual worlds.
‘Okay then, well, have a good night,’ Shelley said, in a less than friendly tone, and got to her feet, purposely budging the comatose couple on her way past.
‘Eurgh. Rude!’ Cara said in a loud whisper as we left the zombie crowd to it. ‘I thought backpackers were meant to be friendly.’
‘What the hell? Is this what’s happened to youth hostels now?’ Shell ignored her cousin and shook her head as she angrily poured out three bowls of soup, spilling it down the sides. ‘It was never like this when we went travelling. Back then people were chatty, fun, and you made friends for life within the space of five minutes!’
‘The kids today,’ I sighed, feeling as deflated as she did.
‘This is why I don’t travel. Imagine if I’d turned up here single and ready to mingle!’ Cara spluttered. ‘Add to the fact that you then have to retire to your prison cell, sorry eco-room, to get some sleep. I’d be on the next flight home telling all who would listen that this backpacking lark is a load of bullshit.’
‘I thought backpacking was about getting away from things? About being independent? I mean, all those people in there couldn’t care less where we’re from, who was sitting next to them, or what our stories were! I can’t believe we’ve just been ignored, standing there like utter lemons as they all chatted to their mates back home on Facebook,’ Shelley seethed, as we ate our cheap dinner.
‘I know. But hey, we’ve got each other and this is just the first stop of our trip. Don’t stress it,’ I said, muttering a silent prayer that tomorrow would be a lot livelier.
‘I’m pretty knackered anyway,’ Cara said, a yawn escaping from her mouth for good effect despite it only being 8 p.m.
We all traipsed back to our bedroom in silence. I’d tried to connect to the Wi-Fi to send Ben a message and see how he was doing, but there was zero signal in this cell. We slumped onto our beds, which were as hard as they looked, and all eventually fell asleep, dreaming of weirdo receptionists, echoing corridors and tree branches scraping the windowpanes.