Time flies when you're having fun!!!

Monday it is 8 months since we left home today, where does the time go…it’s only an hour since we left the free camp and we are at Karijini National Park, reporting to the hosts who allocate us a site in the dingo loop camp area…nice…toilets, bbq and gas hot plates, tables and bench seats. Steve gets to use his Vet Affairs conc card, $7/adult and $5/Conc; woo hoo . After lunch we walk to Fortescue Falls,

we get to the lookout to see the falls and we take the decent of rock steps to the bottom

and we reach the falls and the swimming hole

but we are told of the Fern Pool a little further on for a beautiful place to swim and it was with an amazing walk through that part of the Dales Gorge with trees moulded in, around and through the rock walls.

Could have had a pedicure if we wanted

 

There is a huge timber platform with bench seats and a timber platform with a ladder into the water. Nothing better than a swim in the fresh water pool…or in our case a wash.
Tuesday is another walk into Dales Gorge to Circular Pool, we start the walk at the Fortescue Falls lookout but go in the opposite direction along the rim of the gorge with spectacular views of the gorge and more blooms.

and luckily for us a couple appeared out of no where, they came up the steep decline we had to go down into the gorge, we would have walked past it if not for them. This was the only sign at the top of the decent.

The steps were big rocks put in appropriate places but they went straight down the side wall of the gorge (I’m glad I am going down and not up). The rocks were big enough to put two feet on and no slippery gravel so I found it quite easy as long as your balance is good and you’re not afraid of heights because there is nothing to hang on to except for the odd small tree, then there was about 20minutes walk along this arm of the gorge climbing slabs of rocks to Circular Pool.

On the way Steve pointed out the crocidolite (asbestos) layers in the rock in its raw state all through this part of the gorge wall.

We were left to experience Circular Pool to ourselves after an older couple left and we sat in the peace and quiet and had a bite to eat…another amazing place.

Now was the return walk through the Dales Gorge to Fortescue Falls where we plan to have a swim. We walked along the water’s edge crossing the gorge floor back and forth sometimes on rocks and stepping stones placed in the shallow water. The rock formations and striations of ore and colours in the gorge were so interesting and amazing.

There are shapes and lines worn into the rocks from the water, I even found a smiley face in a rock….nature continues to surprise me.

The walk through the gorge was fairly easy along the creek and we made it back to Fortescue Falls by 12.10pm (3 leisurely hours). We had another glorious swim and talked a young English couple, Ollie and Shabby, working here on a visa in Perth and it turned out they were camped next to us. We took a drive to the info centre to find out about Cape Range National Park and we were able to ring the Info Centre at Cape Range but we didn’t find out anything we didn’t already know. If we don’t book we line up at the entrance and hopefully get a site in a non booking camp area. Back to camp and we drive out to the Circular Pool Lookout and the view was more impressive from the lookout.

We could see the circular pool and the water was so clear we could see to the bottom. I’m glad we made the effort to have a look. We decided to leave Karijini on Wednesday even though we haven’t seen it all, school holidays were coming up and we wanted to get to Cape Range for a week. We packed up and drove to Mt Bruce, where we had reception, so we got on the lap top to look at the Cape Range site and there are 13 different camp grounds, some to book and most first in first serve. We did a short walk up Mt Bruce to look at the Marandoo Mine Site

and then drove to Hammersly Gorge, it is a bit of a drive on the dirt but well worth it…colours, patterned rock walls and water holes for swimming.

We didn’t swim this morning…we should have. The drive was beautiful to look at here, it has been very green since we left Marble Bar with rocky ranges and pom poms of spinifex grass and the wild flowers lining the edge of the road. We drove for a couple of hours of dirt road and constant passing of road trains until we passed the Tom Price turn off and onto Exmouth to stock up on food and fuel and drive to the west coast of the peninsula and stay at Yardie Homestead caravan park for two nights. (Back on the coast and very windy.) Yardie is only about 5km from the National Park entrance so not too far to go to line up. 
From here we sussed out the area and worked out the plan for Cape Range National Park.

WA...What a beautiful place

Wednesday 11 September

We are leaving Broome today and decided to head into Barn Hill (a few people have suggested we stay here…so beautiful. We drive to the turn off and take the 10km into the station. There are lots of travelers arriving this morning and we line the car up and I walk over to book in but I have to wait my turn. I call Steve over and while we wait we walk around and the place doesn’t impress us much, ok to stay but it's early in the day and we couldn't be bothered waiting so we get in the car and drive to 80 Mile Beach Caravan Park. We did find out later that unpowered at Barn Hill if $22/night, so that may be why it is so busy. 80 Mile Beach is lovely, big grass spaces and we found a spot for 3 nights unpowered $34/night. Very windy so we went and hand picked a site to suit the van in the wind but at least the sun is out and the temps are not too high and we are under the doona again at night. Thursday we went down on the beach for a walk and I’ve never seen so many shells on a beach.

The beach is not patrolled and swimming is at your own risk and the sand is quite silty so the water close to shore is a milky colour and you can’t see into the water so we stay on the sand. Lots of things on the beach to look at…shells, broken off corals soft and hard and other things we could not recognize.

The tide was coming in so the lots of activity on the beach with cars, and quad bikes and fishermen/women. After lunch back to the beach to see if there were any big catches and the beach was covered up and down the beach with people fishing, so we sat on the sand and watched for a while and watched a few fish being caught but still pretty windy, we would need bigger tackle. We went to the water’s edge and had a blokes catch of a threadfin and catfish and a big star sinker and line big enough to tow a boat!!! Steve and I were wading in the shallows and we saw a shark fin only a couple of metres off the beach…ahhhh that’s why swimming is not recommended. We went up to the kiosk/shop (well stocked) and bought pilchards, star sinkers, and heavier line and got organized to fish tomorrow. Feeling all hot and sticky I decided to have an early shower and looking in the mirror I realized I got a bit too much sun today and I had bandicoot eyes from wearing my sunglasses…I looked like Rhonda in the AAMI commercial on tv (haha sorry no photos).
An older couple camped behind us on our second night (sleeping in the back of their suburu) from Carina in Brissy and they were bird watches and they were completing their travels around Australia (Broome to Perth).  Lovely couple the gentleman was up to 630 different species of bird sightings!!! We have met so many different people. Another night under the doona, we got news the temps in Perth are 16-22 and lots of rain in the south west. So we are enjoying the sunshine while we have it. Friday it is 16C when we wake but half hour later it is up to 19C, doesn’t take long to warm up. The wind is still with us and worse than yesterday…no fishing today, pillies will have to stay on ice for now. I got up this morning and people have got jumpers on…what the! It’s not that cold. Well no fishing so the van gets an airing out and the bed gets stripped and turns into a day of domestic chores. The wind doesn’t change, SW and not good for fishing for me any way; I’d probably hit someone in the back of the head while casting and knock someone out with the star sinkers we bought…safer for all if I stay off the beach. So we sit in the shade all day and do a lot of nothing. Steve cooked an awesome roast beef for dinner and it was ready early so I made a no bake lemon slice…yum. Blew a gale all night had a shocking sleep. Canvas shook, zip toogles rattles and the whole Tvan was moving through the night.
Being on the roads we have travelled it certainly takes a toll on the car and the Tvan. Steve has discovered the bushes on the tvan have had it after being replaced back in April by Track Trailer. Steve is back on the forum and finds a guy uses bushes that come in two pieces that can be bought at Repco (ie 4 pieces per shocky) so off to Port Hedland after our stay at 80 Mile. We are driving into a head wind all the way down the coast and we stopped at Pardoo Roadhouse for a snack and a cuppa. I came out to the car and a huge gust of orange dust came in off the road and totally engulfed everyone outside including myself, all I could do was close my eyes with my back to the wind and stay clear of the cars coming in off the highway. Then Steve comes out and says, ”did you see that big gust of dust come through, I stayed inside until it passed”. “Oh really”, I say as I’m spitting dust and my hair looks like I just stuck my finger in a power socket. This is one of the joys of travelling.
We rang Repco Port Hedland from here and found they had the bushes Steve was after, so we refuelled and we were off.  After our visit to Repco, refuelling again and bought some groceries we were making our way to a free camp on our way to Marble Bar. I worked out the mileage to the turn off for the free camps, we were getting close so I told Steve to slow down and there goes one free camp, slow down so we don’t miss the next one…vrrroooom…there goes the next turn off and there is the last turn off to the last free camp. Straight into Marble Bar and into the caravan park…I am not happy to be staying in another caravan park but at least we can have a hot shower and the place is so small we are not bothered by anybody, but I did then have a night of Steve snoring and to top it off we forget to put the rubbish away and I was jumping up at midnight to find something had clawed into the rubbish bag…another one of those joys of travelling…it’s all good Sunday morning Steve replaced the bushes on the Tvan and we were off to see the sights of Marble Bar, a few historical buildings in town,

out to Chinaman’s Pool

and Marble Bar Pool where the Jasper (rock) is...very impressive piece of rock

and then to the Jasper Deposit where we could did up our own little piece of jasper.

 

while Steve was digging I took some pics of the wild flowers and found this little bloke in the spinifex  (spinifex pigeon)

 

Next was Flying Fox Lookout with a view over Marble Bar Pool

and then to comet Gold Mine ($3 entry) which is full of history and gemstones and jewellery for sale.

Then a 2 hour off road drive back to the Great Northern Hwy, there are plenty of mines around here

so all we pass are a few workers in their utes and crossed the BHP rail and waited at the rail crossing for the longest train I’ve ever seen. Back on the highway about 2pm…ahhhhh bitumen….and we pulled over to have some lunch and we drive toward Karijini National Park, many people have told us not to miss this park but it was getting late and on the hwy it is road trains non stop and Steve pulls off to Albert Tognalini Lookout and we find a huge area of free camping on the ridge of a gorge, a bit breezy but beautiful so we stayed. 6pm the sun has disappeared over the Hammersley Ranges and we have to dig out the flanny shirts.

Cold again!!!