BROOME

 

What is that noise?  It’s an aeroplane!  We haven’t seen or heard planes since we left Perth.  Plenty of room at Cable Beach caravan park, 500 sites, it’s huge. With a constant flow of vans coming and going, by the end of the day, the park is full.  Built around the airport & prison, Broome is a mini Noosa.  Trendy cafes, a wide range of accommodation from 5star Resorts to backpackers,  palm trees & evergreen frangipanis, it has that island feel about it.  Especially watching the sunset over Cable Beach.

Only at low tide, you can scale down the rocks and find dinosaur footprints.  This is a Theropod(46cm long).

When in Broome the thing to do, is a camel ride along Cable Beach at sunset.

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We packed our tent, water and food, put our van in storage and headed north to a camp called Middle Lagoon.  180klms from Broome, with red sandy corrugated road, it took 2&1/2 hours of vigorous massaging before we arrived. 

Set up our tent and it felt like we were on holidays(just missing people).  We drove up to Cape Leveque for a day. As usual, gust was up, pelting us with red sand, otherwise it was a beautiful spot.

You can stay in these grass huts for $70 a night. 3 sides, a roof, picnic table & a cement floor shower in one corner,  looking straight at the ocean, very basic but worth it!

24/06/12  Packed up the tent and stopped in Beagle Bay to have a look at a Church decorated with pearl shells which was really pretty.  We knew we were getting low on fuel, but when the red light came on with 90klms of rough road left, we thought we would not make it back to Broome.  Luckily, they had graded the road.  We rolled into the petrol station, with only 1&1/2 litres of fuel left in our tank!

PORT HEADLAND TO BROOME

 

The scenary to Port Headland was pretty spectacular.  Very busy road, made up of road trains(4 carriages carrying iron ore) , miners’ 4WD’s and tourists.  We counted over 20 dead cows on the side of the road.  One roadhouse for 300klms.

Port Headland is the second largest bulk tonnage port in the world.  It is a working town with a red glow to it.  

Restocked again, and headed north to Cape Keraudren.  We put the tent up for the girls and they only came out to use the toilet!  It was great!

We caught a good feed of fish.

The sand-flies were fierce. We had to burn dry cow patties to keep them away!

At low tide you can walk out to the mouth or back up the mangroves, we found lots of turtles waiting for the tide to come back in.  We didn’t see any crocodiles(luckily).

After 5 nights, we moved on to 80 mile beach caravan park.  It is the biggest park we have seen so far, in the middle of nowhere, full of oldies & today was market day.  2 old ladies were playing the piano, book stalls & home made items.  The next day we drove along the beach and collected shells.  There is hundreds, the girls were very excited!

16/05/12  This is the road into Barn Hill. You can see why it’s closed in the rainy season.

We would stay longer here but the last shop was Port Headland (500klms back,11 days ago), so we have been on rashens with food & alcohol.  Luckily we could buy frozen bread & long life milk from the  2 roadhouses, otherwise we would have had to head straight to Broome.

18/06/12  Arrived safely in Broome.

THE PILBARA CONT…….

 

4/06/12  Packed the same lunch and off we went again, this time to the other side of the park to Weano Gorge.  50klms of corrugated red dirt road.  This gorge is narrow, slippery and deep.  We first had to step down the side of the cliff, then wade through knee deep water, to shimmy along one side, then spider walk for 20meters to reach Kermit Pool.  It was amazing, well worth the effort.

Kermit Pool, simply stunning!

Changed direction to find Hancock Pool.

Not your ordinary Sunday walk, we scaled down these slippery rocks by handrail.

Yeah!!!  We made it safely!  Now to get back……

Karijini is definitely one of our favourite places.  Very adventurous!!!!  Kirsty and Jade loved it and did not complain once!

THE PILBARA

 

We quickly restocked in Exmouth, thinking we would be staying at a place called Giralia Station, but when we arrived it was closed for the weekend.  Typical!  So onwards we pushed, to the next road stop which was over an hours drive further on.  Luckily it was ok, except for the red bull dust…lovely. 

Heading into the Pilbara and the scenery is fantastic.  It’s so nice to drive and have something to look at.  Red Mountains covered in spinifex grass which makes them look fury. 

Tom Price was very average, so we kept going to Karijine National Park. Dales campground is beside Dales Gorge.  Just a toilet, nothing else.  It is so peaceful and quiet. 

3/06/12  Up early, we packed lunch and were very eager to explore Dales Gorge.  At the lookout looking 80meters down to Circular pool, we knew it wasn’t going to be an easy walk. We scaled down the cliff side slowly, followed the semi marked path to the pool.  First ones there, we dived in and froze.  It was beautiful.

On to Fortescue Falls and Fern Pools.  Beautiful waterfalls, colours, spectacular scenery we have not seen before.

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