June 2014 - Broome

Moving on to Broome, we camped under a big shady Mahogany tree in the Cable Beach Caravan Park.

Cable Beach in Broome is another of our iconic Australian tourist destinations, with its 22 kilometres of pristine white sand and the clear waters of the Indian Ocean.  It is said to be one of the most beautiful beaches in the world, and it takes its name from the communications cable which linked Broome with what is present day Indonesia and the rest of the world.

Broome Camel Safaris operate camel rides along the beach at sunset which is an experience to be remembered.  The camels are big gentle animals which are uniquely created with big feet that act as shock absorbers to spread the animals weight over a large area, so they are ideal for crossing sandy terrain.  You get into the gentle rock from side to side and the ride is very soft as compared to a horse (so I am told).  We rode on Aslan which was the biggest camel in the train, weighing in at 1,200 kilograms at an age of 32 years old.

With over 40,000 wild camels in a Australia it is uneconomical to breed camels for this work as they need to be at least 6 years old before they can be ridden.  Alison Bird is known as the “Camel Lady” of Broome and she started Broome Camel Safaris in 1994 with 3 camels she had mustered with cattle from the bush. Now days she can train a wild camel from the bush to a camel suitable to be ridden in about 3 months. They rescued a female camel from a defunct aboriginal centre but they didn't know she was pregnant, and soon after this beautiful baby was born.

Malcolm Douglas established a wilderness crocodile park here in Broome in 1983 as a research centre to gain a better understanding of these ancient reptiles.  The centre is open to the public so visitors can learn some of this knowledge and witness first hand how crocodiles react in the wild.  They feed their reptiles daily and we were interested to learn that crocodiles only eat about every 4 to 6 days, and as a large 40 year old crocodile only has a stomach about the size of a basket ball, they only eat 3 chickens when they feed.

We saw first hand just how agile these reptiles can be when a large male actually climbed over a 4 foot high fence into the area where the keeper was standing to feed it.  Luckily the keeper was able to make a quick exit.  All the old male crocs here have been “rescued” from their normal habitat as they have been animals that have caused problems to humans or farm animals.

They are very aggressive and territorial in the wild, so relocating them to wildlife parks such as this is necessary for their preservation.  It is a big responsibility for wildlife park operators such as this with relocated crocs as the crocs can easily live for 100 years and it is now the responsibility of the park operator to look after them for the rest of the crocs natural life.

It was good to see that this wildlife park is still operating after the death of Malcolm and the crocodiles are in good condition.  As well as the crocs, there are a lot of other animals and birds that are native to the Kimberly area on display here as well.

Broome has been regarded as the home of Australian pearling for a long time, and today it is considered to be the pearling capital of the world. The South Sea Pearls from this region attract top prices around the world as they are the largest and most lustrous gems from the ocean.  As we have looked at pearl jewellery many times and battled to tell the difference between the cheap ones from the market and the more expensive ones from the jeweler, we took a tour of the Willie Creek Pearl Farm to learn more about these lovely little gems.

Broome’s South Sea pearls are produced by planting a seed into either a silver or gold lipped oyster called Pinctada maxima.  As the name suggests this is the largest pearl producing oyster in the world, which can grow up to 30 cm in diameter and can weigh up to 5 kilograms.  An oyster this size would be 25 to 35 years old so there are not a lot this size found any more.  Once an oyster has been “seeded” by a highly trained pearl technician, it takes about 2 years for the pearl to grow to about 8 mm in diameter, which if it has good colour, shape and luster would be worth about $400 before setting.  After the first 2 years, the pearl is removed and a larger “seed” is planted so the oyster produces a bigger pearl over the next 2 years.  This process continues 3 times and eventually the oyster produces a pearl about 12 to 18 mm in diameter which is worth about $2,500.  They took us out on their boat and showed us oysters hanging from a long line where they sway on each tide, about 2 metres under water for 2 years while their pearl is slowly growing inside.  The oysters thrive in the nutrient rich waters around Broome, filtering over 80 litres of water per hour for microscopic phytoplankton.

During this 2 years, the oysters are removed from the water every 2 weeks to have their shells cleaned of marine fouling organisms to keep the oyster healthy while doing it’s duty. After 8 years of faithful duty to the pearl farmer, the poor old oyster ends up as meat and the shell becomes items made of mother of pearl.  Buttons, jewellery, furniture inlay, cosmetics and even iridescent paint for cars are made from the highly prized oyster shell.  Of course the sales pitch came next when they took us through their show room to see the final product.  Very nice, but we weren't tempted.  When pearling first started in Broome, it wasn't the pearl they were primarily after but the mother of pearl shell.  This shell was highly sought after for use in making buttons and other things like furniture inlay. The first pearlers to come to Broome used local aborigines to dive for the oysters, and later on many people from the Asian countries came to Broome with their own divers and equipment.

Heavy diving suits made of canvas and fitted with brass diving helmets were used.  Unfortunately a lot of divers suffered the bends from being down too deep for too long and then coming up too quickly. Between the years 1910 and 1914, 92 divers died from the bends, but the arrival of decompression chambers allowed divers who suffered the bends to be put into the chamber and the appropriate pressure applied which achieved spectacular results.

In 1915, after the chambers were introduced, only one diver died from the bends. The museum has a lot of old pearling memorabilia on display as well as some very interesting dinosaur footprints which are recoginised as the most significant in the world.

These tracks stretch for about 80 kilometres along the Broome sandstone coast.  These tracks were said to be laid down some 120 million years ago with more than 20 different species being identified. This one on show in the museum is from a small carnivorous Theropod.  The stone was cut from the rock at Crab Creek and sold on the black market.  The culprit was caught and the footprint was donated to the museum.

They say that if you can’t catch a fish in Broome, you should give up fishing.  It’s usually me who goes fishing and everyone else catches fish and I go home with nothing, well guess what, this is Broome and my luck has changed.  First try was from the beach at “The Entrance” and within an hour I had 2 nice Long Tom, the biggest one measured 680 mm. Now I had never seen these before so we gave them a go on the BBQ and they were very tasty.  Next day I went back to the same place just before low tide, and again straight after the tide change, I hooked a lovely silver trevally. My third outing brought me back to reality, I not only came home without any fish, but lost 4 hooks and sinkers on snags into the bargain.  Not to be too down hearted we headed down to the jetty the next day to give our luck a try on the rising tide. We were only there 5 minutes when Judy hooked something big, but unfortunately it took off around one of the barnacle encrusted pylons and snapped a 40 pound line like it was cotton.

Half an hour later my line went bang and I had a fight on my hands, it took off under the jetty and around the same pylon, but by giving it a bit of slack I was able to get it free and up onto the jetty.  A Giant  , commonly known as a GT around here and now I know why, it really took off quickly.  This one measured 565 mm.  A couple of fillets off this one made a beautiful meal of fresh fish.  Now I have said this before in this blog but I am going to say it again, there are some things that you see that will stay in your mind forever, and the Horizontal Falls up at Cape Leveque is another one of those things.

We took a 14 seat turbo prop jet sea plane flight with Horizontal Falls Seaplane Adventures at 6.00 am from the Broome airport, and an hour later found ourselves landing on the calm waters of Talbot Bay, just 500 metres away from the gap in the surrounding cliffs that makes the Horizontal Falls.  This company has various large pontoons and 4 or 5 large house boats moored in Talbot Bay to accommodate day guests like us as well as overnight guests who want the experience of a night in one of Australia’s most peaceful areas.  Coffee and biscuits were served on our arrival and then a change into our swimming gear for a quick dip with the sharks. This was 7:30 am but the water was beautiful and warm.

They have a large cage built into one of the pontoons and after the crew throwing a few bits of chicken into the water, sharks appeared from nowhere. This also attracted schools of other fish of all different sizes. Breakfast of bacon and egg roll washed down with more coffee followed, and then we were kitted up with life jackets for our next part of the adventure.

We boarded their 900 horse power jet stream boat and cruised through the untouched surrounding bays and creeks. One bay is named Cyclone Bay as it is so well protected by the high cliffs, the pearling luggers used to shelter from cyclones in this bay.  Now days they moor their platforms and houseboats in there during the wet season and come back every March to find them all still floating and in one piece.

The sediment layers in the cliff walls are very different in here in the way that they were formed when the pressure pushed them up from the seas many years ago. This area of Australia has some of the biggest tides in the world, and as a result of this Talbot bay has the only two water falls in the world that run horizontally. These two waterfalls provide a perfect demonstration of the awesome power of the Kimberley’s huge ten metre tides. We arrived at the first water fall in the middle of a rising tide and the water was fair whooping through.

The opening in the sheer cliff face is 20 metres wide for the water to get through into the next bay. The distance through the cliffs is about 50 metres and the difference in height of the water from one side to the other was about 1 metre. The skipper lined up the gap and kicked the 900 horsepower into gear and through the white water we went and down to the lower level of the next bay.  WOW!!.  We turned around to look at where we just came from, talk about shooting the rapids.  So that was easy says the skipper, now all we have to do is get back up the falls to where we just came from.  Now I thought we used lots of power to get through the rapids going down, but we must have only been at about quarter throttle, as the roar she let out going back up was just sheer power.  By this time all on board had white knuckles hanging on, so just to prove that he could handle the boat, he put it into a full power u turn and straight back down the falls again.  So that was the easy bit he said, now for a look at the narrow gap between the second and third bays.

This gap is only 10 metres wide and didn't appear as long as the first, but the same amount of water was trying to channel it’s way through, so the difference in the water levels was over 2 metres. I was pretty happy when he said that it was far too dangerous to go through, but not only that, the 900 horse power would not be anywhere near enough to get us back out.  He very skilfully let the boat back down to the top of the falls so we could all get a photo, and it took almost half throttle on the engines just to keep us sitting at the top of the falls without the current washing us further down.  A very quick trip back across the second bay and up the first falls saw us sitting back on the pontoon just as our seaplane was landing ready to take us back to Broome.

The trip back took us back across Talbot Bay to get an aerial view of the falls and then a low level flight across the Buccaneer Archipelago to see the hundreds of islands dotted throughout, then onto Cape Leveque, Lombadina, Beagle Bay, Willie Creek Pearl Farm and across Cable Beach before landing back in Broome.     Along with the extremely high tides comes the extremely low tides which causes another unique phenomenon.

Staircase to the Moon occurs when the full moon rises over the exposed mudflats of Roebuck Bay at extremely low tide, which creates the optical illusion of a staircase reaching up to the moon.  The tourist brochure advertises the time that the moon will come up and literally hundreds of people line the beach to see it happen.  Sure enough, just about to the second the full moon started to rise and the reflection across the water and mudflats gave that appearance.  The locals really embrace this occurrence and there is a beachfront market to mark the occasion with a real carnival atmosphere.  Funny what the full moon does to some people.
We were very lucky to have great neighbours camped beside us in Broome.  Robert and Kay are regulars in Broome having spent the last 7 out of 9 winters there, they were able to give us a lot on good inside information on where to visit while we were there, as well as places to stay as we travel around the Kimberly.  Robert and I spent a lot of great hours fishing, without a lot of success, but as we both say, we had a lot of fun trying.

Robert and Kay took us to one of their favourite fishing spots at Coconut Well, 20 odd kilometres north of Broome.  What a fantastic spot, beautiful white sand and well away from the hum drum of Broom, what a fantastic morning.
With the tourist season now coming into full swing, our site was pre booked for other campers, so after 18 nights in Broome we headed further north to Derby and let our adventure into the Kimberly continue.

May 2014 - Hamersley Ranges

From Nanutarra we left the North West Coast Highway and headed inland again through the Hamersley Ranges to Tom Price and the gorges of the Karijini National Park.  The rocky mountains and the red sandy plains make this a very picturesque landscape.  The rain out here in the past 6 weeks has brought on the wild flowers and the wattles are already starting to shoot.  There is grass everywhere and of course with good feed comes the breeding season for the roos and other wildlife.  There are 2 mining towns out here where Rio Tinto mine iron ore, and the first one that we came to was Paraburdoo.

Mining towns have come a long way over the years. Now they have all the facilities as well as nice green lawns and gardens which I am sure would make the place a lot more livable during those hot summer months when the temperatures often reach the 50 degree mark.

With the rain over the past weeks, red mud must have been everywhere and we laughed at the colour of the normally white corellas. Mining towns have very floating populations and the population can double during maintenance shut downs at the mines.  Accommodation can therefore become an issue so there is a lot of temporary accommodation units to handle the overflow.

Rio Tinto have just completed a new temporary accommodation site which also doubles as the local caravan park.  They have 20 or so 4 bedroom motel style huts mounted on semi trailers so they can be shifted from site to site as required.  The trailers are set up to carry potable water as well as empty tanks for grey water, hot water services, air conditioners, flat screen TV and even a pull out awning along the full length walkway.

A further 80 kilometres north east is Tom Price with another huge open cut iron ore mine.  They run a mine tour for visitors so we learnt a lot about Tom Price and the mining operation.  Iron ore was discovered on Mount Tom Price in October 1962 when Lang Hancock brought an American geologist out here for a look around. The geologists name was, you guessed it, Thomas Price who died of a heart attack 4 hours after the West Australian government announced that a mining lease had been granted for Mt Tom Price.(He was over 70 and had been ill for 12 months before the lease was granted).

From the moment of the announcement it was all go, and within 18 months the mining towns of Tom Price and Paraburdoo were built, along with establishing the mine, building the port town of Dampier and a rail link between the towns and port. It was originally thought that the ore would run out in 50 years, so everything was built around that time frame, however it has since been established that with modern technology, there is at least another 50 years worth of ore here.  Previous to 1982 Rio Tinto owned the town and only people connected with the mining operation could live here, but in 1982 they sold the town to the newly formed shire for the princely sum of $1, and the town then grew from 250 houses to 1,600 as it is today.  The town boasts an average population of 5,000 with 900 school age children attending either of the 2 primary schools or the secondary school.

Tom Price is the highest town in Western Australia with an altitude of 747 metres, and the highest point around there is Mt Nameless which is just over 1,100 metres high. The mine have their communications towers up there and there is a 4WD track to the top, where the view is 360 degrees for as far as the eye can see.

Rio Tinto also operate another 2 mines in the area from the towns of Wickham and Panawanica, and also have a 50% share in the Hope Downs project with Gina Reinhart.  The mine lease at Tom Price which covers an area 13 kilometres by 8 kilometres, produced 5 million tonnes of iron ore in 1966 and this has built up to 290 million tonnes in 2013 from all 4 mines.

Do the sums, iron ore was valued at $140 per tonne last year so that’s $40,600,000,000.  All this iron ore is blasted out of the mountain, sometimes 4 times a day, and then picked up by face shovels that weigh 300 tonnes and can pick up 45 to 50 tonnes of ore at a time in their 17 cubic metre bucket.

This machine clocked up 72,555 hours of work between 1994 and when it was decommissioned in 2010.  Average fuel consumption during this time was 8,000 litres per every 24 hours it worked. Any wonder why this mine alone burns 2 million litres of diesel every week.

The ore is loaded into Komatsu diesel/electric dump trucks that have a 240 tonne carrying capacity and a total gross weight when loaded of 400 tonne.  These trucks are powered by a 2,500 horse power diesel motor, and burn 20 litres of fuel every kilometre when under full power.  The mine operates 36 of these large trucks which cost $4.5 million each.

There is also a big crushing plant at the mine that reduces the ore down to 6 mm in size ready for loading on the train to be sent to customers in China and India.  The trains are 2.5 kilometres long and consist of 3 General Electric locomotives each with a 4,500 horse power engine, 236 rail wagons each loaded with 116 tonnes of ore.

At current ore prices, the 27,376 tonnes of ore on each train is valued at about $3.5 million, and there is an average of 4 trains per day that leave Tom Price.  To shift all this ore, Rio Tinto have 170 locomotives and 10,000 ore wagons that operate over 1,600 kilometres of heavy duty standard gauge railway track.  The carriages are coupled together in such a way that they can be picked up and turned upside down when they get to Dampier for unloading.

Karijini National Park is only 90 kilometres east of Tom Price, and as it boasts an abundance of ancient gorges, a day trip around the park turned up some spectacular views.  The main road around the park between the visitors centre and the west entrance is a well formed gravel road, but the roads running off to the gorges are atrocious.  We persisted, and it was well worth the view.

Junction Pool is where Weano, Red, Joffre and Hancock gorges all meet. There are 2 lookouts within 50 metres here where we stood 100 metres above the junction pool.  The rocks in the bottom of these gorge have been worn smooth over many years by water carrying rock, gravel and debris, which sweeps through the gorge after rain.  The trees seen growing in the gorge are river red gums which grow up to 20 metres tall and northern paper barks which grow up to 15 metres tall.

The head of Joffre Gorge can be accessed along another 20 kilometres of rotten road, but again well worth the effort. From the lookout you can see the water falling down into a very cold pool of water about 120 metres below. Surprisingly enough, people climb down the cliff face to swim in the pool below. This is why the SES unit in Tom Price is the busiest unit in the Pilbra as they are often out here rescuing people that fall off cliffs and break bones.

Back on the main road again, the visitors centre has been built from raw sheets of rusty steel plate which fits very nicely into the surroundings. From the visitors centre to Dales Gorge the road is fully sealed which makes for a pleasant change. Fortescue Falls, which is where you can see one of the very few permanent waterfalls in the Park, is then easily accessed from the car park. This area has a camp ground where visitors can stay and spend days discovering all the gorges in Karijini National Park.

Our original plan was to head back to the coast at Karratha, but the gravel road was said to be too rough for the caravan, so we headed further east and met the Great Northern Highway just south of Auski Road House, about 610 kilometres north of our old home town of Meekatharra.

I couldn’t resist taking this photo of the Landcruiser towing a double road train. The Great Northern Highway passes the Roy Hill turn off where Gina Reinhart is building a new open cut iron ore mine after recently raising 10.4 billion dollars to get the project started.

There are literally hundreds of road trains with 4 trailers hauling iron ore from already existing mines about 150 kilometres east of Auski Road house on the Roy Hill road back into Port Hedland. These trucks work 2 shifts in 24 hours so there is a constant hum of trucks going through the southern part of Port Hedland to the port. Port Hedland seems like one of the busiest towns in the Pilbra with all the infrastructure work going on around the south side.

They are building new roads, rail and overpasses to cope with all the extra iron ore coming in from the new Roy Hill mine which is due to start shipping iron ore by the end of 2015.  The Roy Hill project will even have it’s own port which has already had $230 million dollars spent on dredging 5.6 million cubic metres of material to clear a channel for big iron ore ships.

The new port facility will receive, stockpile, screen and export 55 million tonnes a year and be capable of storing 5 million tonnes of ore awaiting shipment.  A 344 kilometre railway line is being built from the mine to the port which will handle 5 trains per day each consisting of 3 locomotives hauling 232 ore cars with a total payload of 32,062 tonnes.  The estimates of this new deposit is that it will take at least 20 years to mine all the ore at the forecast rate of 55 million tonnes per year.  All this construction work going on means that the caravan parks are full of workers, so after a night in the car park at the golf course listening to trucks and trains all night, we headed north towards Broome.

To break the 600 kilometre journey, we stopped off at the 80 mile beach caravan park, about half way between these 2 cities.  What a great find, and a lot more than we expected. Nice grassed, shady sites with the Indian Ocean only 100 metres away over the sand hill.

Once again,a lovely sunset over the ocean to finish off the day.  Fishing from the beach is top of the list in this caravan park.

There are many campers here who come each year and stay for 3 months and spend their waking hours fishing.  Most of them have 4 wheel motor bikes with fishing rods strapped to the front, an esky strapped to the back and they ride along the beach to their favourite fishing spot.

There must be heaps of fish here as even I caught a nice Blue Threadfin Salmon about 450 mm long.  A couple of fillets off him made for a very tasty lunch. Wednesday nights are hamburger nights, just bring along a plate and $6 to enjoy a freshly cooked hamburger with salad out on the lawn chatting with fellow travelers.

A lovely way to finish a busy day fishing.

May 2014 - Ningaloo Reef

Coral Bay is another absolutely beautiful place along the West Australian coast at the southern end of the Ningaloo Reef, and like all the other tourist destinations, it has expanded to suit the influx of visitors wanting to come here.

We visited here with our 2 daughters about 20 years ago and it was just a gravel road which finished at the beach, with a pub on one side of the road and a camping ground on the other side of the road.  Today there are 2 caravan parks and a resort as well as 2 supermarkets and various other shops.  The town is said to be capped at 3,000 people, but during the last school holidays they had up to 5,000 people. Along with all the development came tour operators who do fishing trips, whale shark swimming tours, manta ray tours, glass bottom boat tours, 4 wheel drive tours and quad bike tours.

The reef is about 350 metres from the shore line which protects the bay and the coral is growing within 50 metres of the shore. Snorkeling over the coral from the shore is quite easy and is well worth making an effort to go out for a look.

Coral Bay Ecotours operates a whale shark tour which takes visitors out past the reef to swim with whale sharks, which are the world’s biggest fish.  These massive fish are filter feeders that visit Ningaloo Reef each year over winter, and they can grow up to 18 metres in length.

Yes!!, I DID take these photos AND they were taken without any zoom on the camera.  We really did get this close.  WOW!!

Funny how the worlds biggest fish feast on plankton which is just about the worlds smallest food. They can filter 1.5 million litres of water per hour through their gills when they are feeding on plankton. We took the tour and wow, what an experience.

We went out onto the reef in their boat and had a snorkel around the coral. Very nice, saw lots of coral and fish etc.  The water temperature was about 24 degrees and air temperature about the same at that stage.  The tour company have a spotter plane that goes up looking for whale sharks and they found one after a short while.

The boat stops about 10 metres from the whale shark and organised groups of about 6 people enter the water from the platform on the back of the boat for a swim with the whale shark. They are awesome. The one we swam with was 5 metres long and just gracefully swam around.   They only leave you in the water for about 2 minutes the first time as other boats have people that want to see them as well.

The second time in the water we were in for about 5 minutes and managed to get some great photos. These sharks are magnificent.  We were out there at least 2 hours and had the opportunity to swim with the whale shark 5 times and for longer periods each time.  

In that 2 hours we drifted towards Exmouth and ended up about 20 kilometres from Coral Bay and about 3 kilometres off shore.

Once we started coming back towards Coral Bay and got into calmer water, the crew served a beautiful salad buffet for lunch before they anchored near the reef again so we had another opportunity for a half hour snorkel over the coral. During the day we saw not only the whale shark but also dolphins, a minki whale and turtle.  The trip was topped off with a fruit platter and sparkling wine for afternoon tea.  This experience is an absolute “must do” when visiting the Ningaloo Reef at Coral Bay.

Exmouth is at the northern end of the Ningaloo Reef, and as the road had been opened again following the heavy rain that they had over the past 4 weeks, we decided it would be worth a visit.  Exmouth sits almost at the tip of the North West Cape and for this reason, a lot of travelers give it a miss as there is only one way in and the same way out, a distance of 160 kilometres each way.  We found it to be well worth the extra kilometres as there are so many beautiful beaches and canyons around the cape and we found the coral to be a lot more colourful along the reef here.

We decided to take an organised day tour around the cape with Dave from Ningaloo Safari Tours, and what a great day we had. Dave picked us up in his OKA 4wd bus and headed south along the east side of the cape to a gorge along Charles Knife Gorge road. He usually goes to Shothole Canyon but the road was still closed from all the previous rain.

The gorge is awe inspiring as it winds it’s way through the Cape Range National Park.  The highest point along this section of the range is 250 metres above sea level so we had a wonderful view out across the Exmouth Gulf.  Dave has many stories to tell about just about every point of interest that we drove past.  

I didn't know that the Japanese actually attacked Exmouth Gulf during the second world war and there are 2 or 3 memorials along that part of the gulf that commemorate the airmen that protected that part of our coast during the war. From there Dave took us back north through town with a look around the marina, canals and the homes being built around the canals. This canal development started 15 years ago and although it took a while to catch on, new homes are shooting up all around that area now. Further north of town is the Harold Holt Naval Base which was once known as Little America as it was built and run by the Americans during and after the war. We went into the non restricted part of the base and saw how it was set up just like a small American town with their own church, 10 pin bowling, baseball diamond, bar and grill, swimming pool, single officers club and single mens quarters. They even had to drive on the right side of the road. Further out are the High Frequency radio transmitters and towers, but the real important aspect of this area is the low frequency radio transmitters. This band is used for transmitting radio waves into the ocean for submarines to pick up when they come back up to 20 metres below the surface.  This area has ultra high security because of it’s importance to the American and Australian submarines in the whole of the south pacific region. The main 2 towers are 382 metres tall which is taller than the Eiffel tower in France.

Continuing south now down the west side of the cape is the Jurabi Turtle Centre which houses information about the turtles life cycle and how they return to shore here where they were born some 20 years later to breed.  Turtle breeding season is over the summer months, but it was interesting to read about the plight of the poor little things, with about only 1 in 1,000 making it back for breeding.  Traveling further south along the west side we entered the Cape Range National Park and passed about 20 beaches along the way where you are allowed to camp, provided you obtain a permit from the ranger at the park entry.

We stopped at the Osprey Bay camping ground for lunch which Dave supplied as a part of the tour cost.  A beautiful beach with water as clear as crystal.

After lunch we headed about another 10 kilometres onto Yardie Creek, which is as far as the road goes around the west side of the creek.  Yardie Creek is the only gorge in this national park which joins to the Indian Ocean and therefore has water in it.  Dave has a tinny moored in Yardie Creek and part of his tour is a trip on the boat up into the gorge.  According to Dave,

Yardie Creek is the only place in the world where you can see the Yardie Creek Black Tailed Rock Wallaby which live amongst the caves on the sheer rock faces along the creek. These are a shy animal, but we managed to spot 7 of them on our 45 minute trip through the gorge, as well as a pair of nesting osprey, some egrets, numerous short billed corellas and even a pair of “Yardie Creek Brown Feathered Emu’s”.(Dave has a good sense of humor)

By 3 pm the temperature had reached 30 degrees so we stopped at beautiful Turquoise Bay for a snorkel amongst the coral. Turquoise Bay has the best “drift snorkel” we have ever done, as the waves break over the reef to the south and flow through the bay towards the north. This takes you for about 200 metres along the reef without having to put in much effort swimming at all, you can just relax and watch the fish and coral go by underneath you.  This was all followed up with a big slice of home made carrot cake and date cake and washed down with a cup of billy tea or coffee.

Some of the best sunsets can be seen from the Vlamingh Head Lighthouse on the way back into Exmouth.

Dave told us how this lighthouse was built over 100 years ago as a result of the shipwreck of the SS Mildura which hit the reef on the 12th March 1907.  The SS Mildura had sailed from the port of Wyndham loaded with 498 cattle bound for Freemantle and hit the reef while confronting a looming cyclone.  Building materials and equipment were shipped in from Freemantle and a railway line was built up the side of the mountain so horses could pull the carriages up there loaded with that equipment and materials to build the lighthouse.  A small part of the railway line still remains today, a tribute to those men who built it over 100 years ago.  We had a great day out with Dave and the rest of the folk on the tour.  How else could one gather all this information in one day.

We left Exmouth and headed for our next overnight stop at Nanutarra Roadhouse which sits right on the banks of the Ashburton River. This was nothing like we expected. There was water running down the river which is fairly unusual for this river.  Water in this river comes from hundreds of kilometres inland in the Kenneth Range, and good rainfalls in there have seen this river run 3 times already this year.

The water has picked up a lot of red sand along the way which contrasts nicely at sunset with the white ghost gums that line the river bank. This goanna was out for it's afternoon stroll and walked straight past us while we were sitting under the awning in the evening.

The sunset here was even more spectacular than what we saw at Exmouth.

From Nanutarra we left the North West Coast Highway and headed inland again through the Hamersley Ranges to Tom Price and the gorges of the Karijini National Park.