Hi from WA! No we are not at Leanora Detention Centre, or kept driving into the Indian Ocean! It has been awhile so grab a glass of wine and strap in for another long one. We left you at beautiful Broome and the last 3 weeks we have been hitting it hard, snorkelling with the fish at Ningaloo, rubbing shoulders with Paul Kelly and mixing it with the oldies at Eighty Mile Beach.
So I might just back track a bit first, after Broome we decided to head an hour south to a place called Barn Hill a working cattle station that is right on the coastline. A little freaky as I only heard about this place by random from a sranger at a cafe in Brissy. Barn Hill has about 8000 cattle and it is grazed purely for the export market, but also has very basic camp facilities right on the edge of the western coastline. At $20 a night with water supplied and the most amazing rugged coastline we have seen yet it is worth a stop. The red sandstone cliffs hit the deep blue sky with the turquoise coloured water, it is a pretty spectacular scene. It's like stepping into a tourism ad for Australia. The stars at night are like diamonds here and decided to stay 4 nights. Michael liked the loos with a view, no roof at the amenities so you could star gaze while your saving the planet on the loo. We decided to leave our van here for a couple of days and head north to camp at Cape Leveque since Broome was booked out. Most of this road is red corrigated dirt or sand so we were advised to leave the van and just tent it.
So heading north and the school holidays around the corner we couldn't actually get into Cape Leveque and booked a place called Middle Lagoon about 40 min away. All this area is completely run by aboriginal communities and it is a bit of a drive in between each community. 3 hours of bumpy road and lots of airborne moments, free entertainment for the kids giggling away, we finally arrived . Middle Lagoon is run by Peter and his wife and his grandkids were playing with the kids in minutes.
Aboriginal kids are so funny, they are so free and the fastest tree climbers I've ever seen. This area is just beautiful and walked down the hill to an oasis of blue water so calm and peaceful. The next day headed to a little place called whale song cafe. Now Michael and I had not had a real coffee in weeks so it was like a beacon calling to us. It's remote up here there is nothing but red dirt roads, and came to a house that they had turned into a cafe. It overlooks the ocean and the reason for its name is this is where the whales come to mate every year, can you believe it, what a place to live. They had 3 kids so our kids were off in an instant, these kids get picked up by a bus every morning to travel an hour to school, gee we have it easy! Just as we were heading out Paul Kelly walks in, wow, I had been teaching the kids about the aboriginal land fight and had been reading "From little things big things grow". So for us to be meeting the man that wrote the song, sang the song and worked on the book it was a real surreal moment. So I grabbed the kids and we met him what a nice guy very softly spoken and incredibly charismatic. Took me days to get over that!!!!
Had a drive up to Cape Leveque and One Arm Point, so when you arrive at these places you have to pay an entrance fee but it is so worth it, it is so untouched and so beautiful. There is a hatchery up there and got to see all the great things that they are doing to preserve the turtles and fish. They grow tronchis shells here and export a huge amount to Italy to make pearl buttons. Now I'm not much of a camper so as much as this was a pretty part of the world I wanted to get back to comforts of the van so after a couple of nights we headed back.
On the way back we visited Bealge Bay where there is an incredible church made of shells, the photos don't do it justice. The aboriginals were held captive from german missionarys and this was what they did while held here. It is also the church featured in Bran Nue Day the movie.
So after a very long tedious day back to Barn Hill to pick up the van we headed south to Eighty Mile Beach.
Love,love,love this place. After so much driving we had really had enough so stopping off here for 5 days was exactly what we needed. This beach is 220km of uninterrupted beach, shells you have never seen before, as big as your hand. There are millions of shells here and everyone here collects them and makes them into mobiles so we had a bit of a go as well. The oldies put us to shame. All the oldies get up every morning and go fishing and catch king salmon, we didn't have any luck but the couple across the way gave us some for our last night and it was beautiful. The nicest people, every year the same people come here for 3-4 months to get out of the cold, and put on a concert. We were lucky enough to get invited and had a great night singing all the old songs. Eighty Mile Beach had a cyclone hit here at xmas time so all the grass and alot of the trees were destroyed, but they have worked like trojans to get the park back into order. Some of the regulars even bought along some grass to plant and watered it every day. It restored our faith in the grey nomads! This was the place that we found out 2 days later we had a new prime minister, felt completely out of touch!!!What Happened!!!
The weather here has been sunny and warm, but as we head south it is getting chilly. I think we must be the only crazy people heading south. Travelling through Port Headland and Karratha were just for supplies, heavy mining areas famous for it's salt and natural gas and iron.
We were excited about getting to Exmouth the window to whale sharks and Ningaloo Reef. We haven't met too many people our age that are taking the plunge and going around Australia, but met some wonderful people from Newcastle.We miss you Julia and Paul, will miss the card games and the laughs.
We stayed at Yardie Creek, which was central to most things, but I have to say if it wasn't for our friends we would have not stayed, the facilities were shocking. The toilets over flowed, the showers were so tiny you had to change in front of everyone. No power or water and $35 a night shoved down the back. We had car trouble on our last day and lets just say they were not very helpful. Exmouth itself is quite small but still cute. Went into the markets with Julia and not much to see!
AHHH Turquoise Bay!!! You can actually walk off the beach and snorkell and see the amazing reef fish, we even got to see and touch a turtle. The water is so clear and the reef is very different to the Barrier Reef, for one you don't have to spend 2 hours in a boat, the coral itself is alot more muted in colour but is in really pristine condition. I think what we saw here was much better than Coral Bay.
Unfortunately we couldn't get in there but Coral Bay was still fantastic. My favourite place, we all feel so lucky to be able to see such amazing things and the adventure is still as exciting as the first few months. I desperately wanted to swim with the whale sharks but at $400 and had to wait 4 days just thought we would move on. That can be the next trip!!!
We debated whether to go to Karigini National Park and our gorgeous friends Julia and Paul were heading up there, it would have been nice but felt like we were back tracking a bit so kept going onto Carnarvon. There is not much here but still a cute little fishing town known for its amazing produce so a good place to stock up.
Also took a shot of the satellite dish which took place to help put the men in the moon, not in use anymore but huge when up close. You have to make a trip to Morells- chocolate coated fruit, yummy. The mango chocolate coated ice-block was my fav!!
We are still having the best time of our lives. The school holidays are posing a bit of a problem everything is booked out but you just cope, free camp sites here and there. The kids are still loving the travelling and not really phased by the long days on the road, have to say the school work gets a bit tedious, but they are keeping up to date which is the main thing. It will be interesting going into the colder weather now, how we all cope being in the van a bit more.
There hasn't been any real dramas apart from Michael running into a timber divider and having a flat battery at Yardie Creek, I'm sure that place is cursed!!! So we will catch you up next time from the beautiful west coast.
TAM'S TIPS
Look I don't have any tips this month, just to enjoy the most out of life!!
The most amazing people are just round the corner and its so lovely to meet wonderful people along way away from home.
Good to just stop every now and then take it all in and be happy!!!!
TAM'S ON THE ROAD PLAYLIST (Thanks to the Shafers)
Xavier Rudd - Koonyum Sun
Bill's Music - Bill Granger TV Show Compilation
By the way, if you were wondering if we have gone feral, here are the pictures to prove it. Love the red dirt!
