Holiday Mode

CABLE BEACH, Broome we are now in the holiday mecca of Western Australia. From what we have seen it looks like their version of Queensland's, Port Douglas and we love Port Douglas. As you can appreciate a lot of people head north to here to escape winter, who can blame them.

Last night we went to city beach to watch "stairway to the moon", a phenomena that happens when the moon rises at low tide and creates an illusion of stairs across the water, alas there was a bit too much cloud.

Hopefully the lifeguard doesn't have to do too many rescues or remove too many rogue crocodiles. We left Port Headland on Sunday and had planned on stopping the night at Eighty Mile Beach, we changed our  plans as didn't fancy taking our house on wheels up 10km's of red dirt corrugated road, so drove  7  1/2 hours right through to Roebuck Plains Roadhouse. Yesterday was only a 30 minute drive to here, so a very cruisy day.

More Iron Ore

PORT HEDLAND It takes 30 hours to load one of these ships at a rate of 10,000 tonnes per hour and  and once loaded the red part will be below the water. Around 800 ships per year are loaded here with the four new loading areas to be constructed.

It seems that every third vehicle on the road in the area is a mining one. Any new homes are steel framed and have coloured corrugated iron exteriors and have very large carports so wonder if this is to create a breezeway  if hit by a cyclone. Like the last few places, a lot of red dust.

A Bustling Place

DAMPIER just around the bay from Karratha and from here is the departure point for salt, ammonia, iron ore and liquid nitrate gas. The North West Shore Venture Company  visitor centre at their massive huge nitrate gas depot is very informative showing the processing from the wells off shore. Unable to get a photo that could reflect the magnitude of the site.

Rio Tinto alone  employs over 6,000 people directly and close to 10,000 contractors, alas there is a shortage of housing, if you would like to buy a home in the area expect to pay about $800,000 and receive a rent of about $1600 per week, would be interesting to know what it would cost for insurance with the high cyclone risk.

HEARSONS COVE, Burrum Peninsula a pretty bay with a shell shore and then the varying colour of the rocks, it just looks like someone has dropped tailings there, hard to believe that it is Mother Nature's work. Certainly the mirror image of  Point Samson.

Road into Hearsons Cove

RED DOG statue of this very famous dog born in Paraburdoo who used to hitch rides all over the Pilbara area, a book was written and now a film has just been made of his life, so watch out for  the self titled movie "Red Dog"

Karratha, a Long Way From Home

KALBARRI a very different town in the Pilbara. It is the base for a lot of the workers at the wharf at Point Samson where the iron ore leaves for overseas and nearby  Dampier which is the largest producer of gas as well as 40% of Australia's oil. The town is very well serviced with a shopping centre comprising, Woolworths, Coles, KMart and Target.

We are now the furthest we have been from home, to head home north would be 5485km's or south 5582km's. Now that we are heading north we are bumping into the same old faces every few days which is fun, Greta and Alan are friends of a friend of Dad's on the Gold Coast and we caught up with them in Exmouth and another couple  since Jurien Bay, John and Maureen also from the Gold Coast.

                                     

COSSACK one of several buildings left in this heritage town, that once boomed in 1872 with the gold rush and then pearling, it has been hit in the past by several cyclones and now most of the pearling is done from Broome. The town was abandoned in 1950.

                                     

CAPE LAMPERT one of the many big boys toys for loading the iron ore on to the ships sitting out from here.

POINT SAMSON, Sam's Creek couldn't get over the varying colours of the rock.

Check out the chains on the neck of this turtle outside Cossack backpackers, these are in place for when cyclones hit the area. Where we are staying the permanent vans have chains like this in place and straps across the top, very scary.

Back to Karijini National Park

DALES GORGE and Fortescue falls. Today it was an easy drive into the National Park on sealed roads. Once again lovely gorges and a great track down to the base of the gorge with shaped steps. This section was lovely but we came away feeling that what we saw the other day was more impressive.

FORTESCUE FALLS

FERN POOL upstream from Fortescue falls.

Along the Fern pool track.

Base of Dales gorge.

On Top Of Western Australia

TOM PRICE the town in the distance. Today we drove up to the top of Mt Nameless, with the highest vehicle access at 1016 metres, so magnificent views of ranges upon ranges. Tom Price is a "company town"  as it was set up by Rio Tinto to service the workers for their iron ore mine.

Can't fault the prices at the local Coles that's for sure. For anything major, including shopping for clothes etc, workers would need to travel about 600km's to Port Hedland.

Ranges upon ranges

RIO TINTO IRON ORE MINE the mining trucks look like tonka toys in the distance. Seven days a week, four trains per day, each 2 kms long leave here for the port carrying a cargo of over $5million of iron ore. The mine operates  24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Nothing like a bit of red dust.

Karijini National Park

OXERS LOOKOUT Spectacular views from here as four gorges meet. Photos do not do justice to the depth of the gorges which have to be at least 150 feet deep. It is really impressive walking to the lookout for the first time as the views are just breathtaking. You do not realise that you are driving at the top of this.

                                     

WAENO GORGE we walked down to the base of here and to the rock pools.

                                     

DRIVE INTO JOFFRE GORGE surprised that we never saw any wildlife.

                                     

JOFFRE GORGE there was some water flowing and it must look spectacular in the wet season.

KNOX GORGE was a bit different in that it had a lot of vegetation.

KALAMINA GORGE  an easy walk down to the base of the gorge and we wandered along for several hundred metres. Loved the way this huge rock was just plonked there.

KALAMINA GORGE the scenery changed as we walked along.

The roads in the part of the National Park that we visited today were all gravel and very corrugated, 108kms in total. Paul commented that once our trip around Australia was over he would be very happy if he did not travel on one of these roads again, however once we walked to Oxers lookout we agreed that the drive was worth every rut.

Picturesque Pilbara

HAMERSLEY GORGE This is the first gorge we have visited, which is sure to be one of the many spectacular gorges in Karrijini National Park. We walked down to here and there are several rock pools, the water looks tempting, but it is very cold and there is a sign recommending that you wear a wet suit in the winter.

Pool at the bottom of the gorge.

Did the earth move?

Hamersley Ranges.

Most of the road in was gravel and man there was some red dust in the air. Certainly no point in washing your vehicle whilst in the area.

A Big Day On The Road

We left Exmouth around 9am this morning and headed inland to the iron ore mining town of Tom Price arriving at 4.30pm. It was a really scenic drive through various ranges with changing colours. We even spotted a very healthy looking dingo so must be some good tucker around. The area has had some rain the last few days so there is a lot of new growth and we may just get to see some wild flowers in the next few weeks.   

Just love this kind of scenery, if this is a taste of The Pilbara, can't wait to explore.

Cape Range National Park

YARDIE CREEK is a gorge at the southern end of the park with sheer red cliffs and the only gorge in the park with a creek flowing through it. School kids these days sure do have some great outings as there was a group kayaking in the gorge.

OSPREY BAY one of many coastal spots to visit on the drive to Yardie Creek, normally great snorkelling but alas not today. Very impressed at how colourful the water was considering the weather and these kangaroos had a great spot.

MANDU MANDU GORGE a great walk through the rocky base, with the rocks like Pebble Beach. We spotted a few rock wallabies up on the gorge walls. There was a steady hike to the top of the rim and once we reached the top it poured and we got soaked, fortunately the day was mild.

Rock Wallaby

 

Grand Canyons

SHOTHOLE CANYON South of Exmouth is the turn off into here and you drive for 12km’s through the base of the Canyon with gorges surrounding you. We were lucky to wake to some blue sky and sunshine as it blew like you know what all night and rain was predicted.

View from the lookout of the drive into the canyon.

CHARLES KNIFE GORGE Back out on the main road and south of Shothole Canyon you drive up a very good road to the Thomas Carter lookout with great views across the gulf. Up here are power lines and a weather station.

Western Australia's health and safety, first time we have actually seen some sort of fence.

Up in The Gulf

EXMOUTH COASTLINE Where we are we don’t have mobile or internet coverage so drive just up the hill to the Lighthouse to text etc. This morning when we were up there, there was this huge cloud bank out at sea, it gradually drifted across land and some scattered showers by the looks of things.

SURFERS BEACH We are based at the Lighthouse Caravan Park with the beach across the road behind some sand dunes. Today we spotted a dugong and several schools of turtles just off shore.

PEBBLE BEACH one of the beaches overlooking the Exmouth Gulf, you can see how it got it’s name. The solid rock with the stones in it reminded me of lolly cake – yum!                            

Pebbles on Pebble Beach

Back on the Horse/Sand

NORTH OF CORAL BAY We had a great day out with Jan and Russ driving through a couple of stations and calling into different spots along the way with varied coastline. At one stage there was a black tip reef shark swimming about 4 metres off the shore and a few metres away a large turtle.

On one ledge overhanging the coast there were several goats and the large billy was on the top bank checking us all out. We also spotted a pair of bustards, emus and kangaroos, David Attenborough eat your heart out.

STUD RAM and he made us aware of that by stomping his feet. The breed here does not have wool, very strange.