To 31-Jul-06 (Broome WA to Carnarvon WA)

Some more stats

• We’ve hit a new high in petrol price paid - 183.9 cents per litre at Nanuturra Roadhouse. It’s about 50k west of Wooroconda where the road from Karijini joins the North West Coastal Highway and the next petrol station is hundreds of kilometers away in any direction.
• We’ve now driven 22,000kms, towed the van 13,000kms and
• We've stayed in 55 different places - 10 have been free campsites (no power or water).

BARN HILL WA (Barn Hill Beachside Station Stay)
The front cover of our Camps Australia Wide attracted us to this amazingly beautiful part of the coast just south of Broome.



This picture shows the ocean over the red land as it meets the beach sand.












EIGHTY MILE BEACH WA (Eighty Mile Beach Caravan Park)
We stopped overnight here and were treated to more beautiful beach scenes.


Spencer even managed to fit in a little beach fishing. Sadly, there was neither bite nor nibble, though the “casting practice” was enjoyable. However, it was a very pleasant way to while away the hour or so before sunset.









PORT HEDLAND WA (South Hedland Caravan Park)
This is a real working town where everything has a red tinge. The constant on-shore breeze ensures that red iron ore dust is blown off (during loading of the huge ships) and spread pretty evenly amongst the town, cars and inhabitants. Leave the car parked for a few days and it looks as though it has a red dust blanket. Luckily, we stayed in South Hedland and were far enough away to be free of the red dust.


We were fascinated by the Dampier Solar Salt Works too. Only 4% goes towards table salt, the rest is for industrial & home chemicals, etc. This picture shows the huge stockpile with some “salt islands” forming in the foreground.

We drove to Marble Bar for a day trip. The highest temperature recorded in Australia was at Marble Bar and they even have a digital temperature readout in the local park. Fortunately, it was only 29deg C on the winter’s day we were there. There is also a huge “bar” of jasper (originally thought to be marble & hence the town’s name) running across the river at Marble Bar Pool. It is part of a ridge and is very impressive. We also saw our first roadside Sturt’s Desert Peas on the way to Marble Bar.


KARINJI NATIONAL PARK WA (Dales Gorge Campground)
We stayed two nights in this beautifully peaceful national park campsite and thoroughly enjoyed the experience. We walked many kilometers and covered all the tracks available from this campsite - Rhonda said she was “walked out” by the end of the day!


This pic shows a bend in the spectacular Dales Gorge. There were beautiful swimming holes and falls down in the gorge – and there were only 354 steps (of the large variety) down into it!

We also joined in a Sunday Evening Church Service in the camp ground under the stars, led by Rev Judy Knowling, the Uniting Church Pilbara Patrol minister based in Tom Price. It was a delight to share with local and overseas people (WA and Holland).

There are also quite a few dingoes around this campground and they seem to be quite comfortable with tourists. One young boy in the campsite next to ours called out “Look Mummy, a doggy!”. Fortunately, Mum made the real position very plain – no patting here!


TOM PRICE WA (Tom Price Tourist Park)


This town was established to service the local mine and is fresh, new and attractive. We toured the open-cut Pilbara Iron Mine - both the excavation and the machinery were huge! We felt dwarfed by the back wheel of this loader.

We also drove to the top of Mount Nameless – a fun, steep 4WD track to the top where the views were breathtaking.





WOOROCONDA WA (House Creek Bridge Free-Camp)
A peaceful free-camp with an awesome view of the night sky, easily visible without any ambient light. We also met Laurie (the Lorry Driver) who reversed his semi-trailer down close to our van for his dinner stop. He was a very pleasant guy, though we were somewhat doubtful about the EXPLOSIVES signs all over his truck. He drove off after dinner and then we slept very soundly.


EXMOUTH WA (Exmouth Cape Holiday Park)
There are so many beautiful beaches and sights here and we’ve almost worn out the camera (look out . . . . there might just be some mammoth slide nights in Sydney next year!!).

We had lunch in a really neat bird-watching hide amongst many mangroves. We saw some birds though most had migrated north for the winter.


CORAL BAY WA (Bayview Tourist Park)
What an amazing place – pristine coral reef and really close to the beach. We thoroughly enjoyed the glass-bottomed boat ride over Ningaloo Reef.


Spencer even snorkeled amongst heaps of big Spangled Emperor fish – they were in front, below and either side as he swam. It was a real hoot to be part of a school of fish! Here are some coming up for a free feed – they seem to know that this is a protected area and they have no fear of humans.







CARNARVON WA (Marloo Retiree Senior Tourist Park)
Yes folks, we’ve arrived and enjoyed our first stay in a van park with “seniors” in its title – it was the first one in which we could book a powered site for 2 nights. There seem to be many others enjoying the warmer north and escaping the cooler, wetter south (where we’re heading very soon). The van park was very pleasant, comfortable & clean. We rode on the “Coffee Pot” train along One-Mile Jetty, saw the blow-holes just north of Carnarvon and the impressive NASA satellite dish.



We are planning a quick trip back to Sydney during August to catch up with family and, of course, to admire how Alesha has grown. We also hope to catch up with friends as time permits.

With best wishes & God bless,





Spencer & Rhonda



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