What is the most remote town/city you have visited?

[The Rok]

Perth, Western Australia. It's waaayyyy out there.

 

[aupirate]

Van in Turkey, not sure why......
It was a long time ago

 

[Major]

Erfoud in Morroco. Filled up with diesel and drove into the Sahara for nearly half a tank and then back to Erfoud for the night

 

[mhen]

Barrow in Alaska

 

[trooper]

Diego Garcia for me.....felt especially remote after travelling to it from Australia by sea!!

 

[elbarto]

Warakurna/Giles in Western Australia.

https://www.google.com/maps/preview...d-95.677068!3d37.0625!3m2!1i1158!2i648!4f13.1

 

[amaroo]

Luang Prabang - Laos

Remote but not uncivilised.

Saipan - Mariana Is

Small Island with a big history http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Saipan

 

[tgh]

Grytviken on South Georgia... magic

 

[phily]

Longyearbyen, on the large island of Spitsbergen. It's a territory of Norway, but a 2 hour flight from the Tromso which is the most northern town of Norway. Longyearbyen is about 1,000 km from the North Pole, or about 2,600 km from the top of the UK. It's about 2 degrees Celcius in Summer, the perfect time to play with the Polar Bears in the area.

 

[straitman]

Back in my RAAF days I have flown around most of Australia, New Zealand, New Guinea, New Britain, New Ireland and Sumatra by Iroquois helicopter.

Different places had different degrees of remoteness for different reasons. Many of them are memorable and I probably should document them all at some time.

One of the more memorable is a homestead we landed at enroute Normanton to Mt Isa with 4 Iroquois. For the trip we carried enough fuel but we needed to land at some point and transfer some fuel from bladders to the fuel tanks. We came across a homestead with an airstrip and landed only to find no one to be found anywhere. The homestead was open and so we simply refuelled, left them a note on the kitchen table and departed for Mt Isa.

Another that probably needs to be mentioned is whilst we were doing survey work in New Britain. I had only been married for a couple of weeks and then got sent to a detachment at Rabaul for 13 weeks. I went early as someone had managed to plant one of our helicopters in a hill and they were sent home to recover and face the court of enquiry.
Our main base was in a tent city on the airfield in Rabaul with the daily wakeup call being the Fokker Friendship departure at 0600.

From time to time we went to a forward base for a few days. On this occasion we were staying at Talasea (about half way along the island) and were asked to fly to Gasmata on the southern coast to look for some Japanese Zeros. As this was to be a bit of a 'jolly' flight we took most of our support people with us. (3 Iroquois with about 9 people on each)
The trip was uneventful and we landed in Gasmata to find an airfield full of Japanese Zeros in varying states of repair. (One is now in the Australian War Memorial in Canberra but that's another story) At this point the weather closed in and we were unable to leave. We now had approx 27 people for an overnight stay with a few Army rations and no accommodation. Suffice to say it was not a comfortable night.
The next day the weather was still very overcast so after making plans which mainly involved getting actual weather reports we left Gasmata in a 3 aircraft IFR formation departure. Fortunately we didn't have to go too far before we broke out of the weather and flew visually back to Talasea.
An interesting situation that could have turned nasty. If we had needed to conform to modern civil aviation rules then we might still be there today :!:

The point of the story is Gasmata is about as remote as I can imagine and the happy ending is that we discovered a whole airfield of Japanese Zeros that had just been sitting undisturbed since WWII.

See: WWII Battle of Solomons Map.

 

[ALH]

Bill. Sounds great, but I can't use that link from iPad so will try again tomorrow. I still have family in the Solomon's and very interesting stories of still finding wrecks

 

[puppysparkes]

I spent school holidays on Hawaii island, manus province Papua New Guinea. No running water or electricity and the toilets are built over the sea. It's far easier to reach these days. Back in the day it was by the weekly dash 8, then weather permitting, 30-40 min in out rigger style dug out canoe with an outboard motor strapped on the back. http://www.myamazingparadise.com/la...anus-where-the-sea-breaks-on-live-ammunition/

The Russians planned on launching rockets into space somewhere around the at one stage due to its proximity to the equator.

 

[Sprucegoose]

Remoteness?..".............Canberra?

 

[russ]

Does moving to Nhulunbuy from Tenant Creek in 1964 score any points?

10 points for moving out of Tenant Creek. Minus 20 points for moving to Nhulunbuy!
I've landed in the courtyard of the Walkabout Lodge at Nhulunbuy, which was a hoot
Next stop was Groote Eylandt, which was not

 

[medhead]

Remoteness?..".............Canberra?

Apparently Canberra and Wellington are the most remote capital cities, as in remote from another national capital. So yes, Canberra.

 

[Warks]

Kilembe (and smaller villages) out the back of Kasese just at the edge of the Ruwenzori National Park in Uganda. Probably less remote now than in 1990. Really felt like the end of the earth then. But somehow we got the news that Margaret Thatcher had been deposed. Who needs Twitter?

 

[11sjw]

Useless Loop. Even the town name screams out hopelessness.

 

[sergeyvzn]

I was born and grew up in Murmansk, Russia (MMK). How's that? It's pretty far from Australia but I still go there to visit mum every two years.

Other than that I've been to Exmouth in WA, Tahaa in French Polynesia and a few other places. However, the remotest of all was Ust-Kulom (Ust-Kulomsky District - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia) when I was a student in the USSR in 1987. Getting there was achieved by flying there from SCW in an AN-26. The local airport does not even have an international airport code...it was quite an experience. From the airport we were taken by car straight into the taiga where a railway was being built, it was a summer job for students from St.Petersburg Uni I went. I bet no one else here has been there

 

[ozbeachbabe]

Within Australia probably Bullita Station in the NT about 2 hours south of Timber Creek in the Gregory National Park where I saw in the new century with friends on NYE 1999.

Back in December 1999 I'd been on a quick trip to Asia to complete the 5 flights on OW Airlines to receive the 100K QF ff points bonus with the final leg of that trip SIN/DRW arriving at 4.30am on New Years Eve 31 Dec 1999. They picked me up at DRW Airport then we headed south to Katherine for supplies then another couple of hours on to Timber Creek.

Two of the guys worked for Batchelor Aviation so were availed ourselves of a couple of their Cessna 206 or 210's - can't remember which, then it was about a 20 minute flight from TBK to Bullita Stn.

It was pretty basic ie no facilities but there was some kind of undercover shelter that may have been stables a while back. I was pretty tired that night so flaked out on the ground by the campfire. The mosquitoes do the night shift then handover at daybreak to the flies but the birdlife was spectacular. It really felt like you were a million miles from anywhere.

The only other being we encountered during that time was Phantom, the Park Ranger's dog which was some kind of Husky hybrid.

Now when I see friends who have moved on to jet jobs both in Australia & abroad they always recall their 'bush time' in the NT as some of their best years ever & proves that life is the journey not just the destination.

 

[ashleyn]

Depends on definition of remoteness. But Perth has been claimed as the most remote city on earth being 2104 km from Adelaide. However it seems that Auckland (2153 km from Sydney) and Honolulu (3841 from SFO) have good claims. I've been to all 3. However, they all have decent transport options to make them accessible.

In terms of remote and inaccessible. I've been to William Creek, Birdsville, innamincka, Maree, Moomba, Lyndhurst and Maralinga. Even Andamooka is pretty remote. Not to mention Alice Springs which is near the Australian continental pole of inaccessibility.

Perth = Most remote capital city I believe.