Perth to Broome and back

We hired Emma and left home early on Saturday 22nd of June as there was a severe storm forecasted to hit both Perth and Geraldton. The drive was quite nice; saw a beautiful sunrise overland as we took the inland route, casting a full rainbow over the threatening clouds behind us. Part of the drive was somewhat challenging though, as Emma’s lights and wipers were not the best and in some sections it rained torrentially.

We arrived in Geraldton around 10 am. I walked along Marine Parade, went shopping / found some quite nice and interesting shops including Art by the Sea selling art by local artists. They had some nice pieces made of wood recovered from beaches and flowers or corals made of glass – I wanted to get one but then decided against it in case the Gibb would break it. They also sold different things (including some beautiful scarves) printed with works by Lynda Howitt, a local artist whose works are inspired by the ocean.

From there I went to Geraldton museum where they have the usual display of local history and shipwrecks but they also had the Australian Geographic nature photographer of the year exhibition on. They had some very beautiful photos – of a bug eating a grass-tree leaf, of a kangaroo hopping in the snowfall, of a man-of-war below and above water (looking like an iceberg), of a honeyeater who’d just had a feed and was now shaking some pollen off its head by the same photographer who won Nature photographer of the year last year, Georgina Steytler.  Also an amazing landscape photo from Broome of sunrise reflecting in waterways, making them look like golden leaves on grey background. The other exhibits were also very nice. I learned that the Aborigines here lived in some sort of huts when the settlers arrived; they have on display a replica of the first plane that was used as a commercial enterprise / airline before Qantas; also a gallery about the many shipwrecks in this area (where there are so many reefs, difficult for the ship crews to see from the water, especially at nighttime when they can mistake the waves breaking off for reflection of the moon). They also have a gallery about HMS Sydney and Kormoran and the story on how they found them. The wrecks are quite deep, at 2.5 km down on the bottom of the ocean. But sea anemones grew on them, large, beautiful orange flowers poking their heads out of the grey metal or sunken boots. They also have a Mouser gun on display embedded in rocks – apparently there are many of them lying on the bottom of the ocean after being thrown away by the German officers on Kormoran when captured and they found it many years later, when looking for Sydney. And of course the story of the many shipwrecks – Batavia and the stone blocks for the arch that it was carrying but not only.

Luckily we hadn’t planned to camp this first night and stayed in one of the cabins in Big 4 caravan park, as it would have been interesting with the wind and rain!

On Sunday we went to some local markets and bought nice mandarins and very expensive bread, cakes and olives. We walked around Point Moore lighthouse and enjoyed the local beaches.

We left Geraldton around 10:30 am next day. First stop was not far from Geraldton at Horrocks Beach – allegedly voted the most beautiful beach of mainland Australia a few years ago and also the first place where we managed to get bogged so had to dig ourselves out. We drove to Kalbarri from there and saw Pink Lake at Port Gregory and the Blue holes (with lots of dolphins) on the way, but then kept driving to Hamelin Pool so did not have time to do any of the walks in Kalbarri National Park. 

We arrived in Hamelin Pool around 5:30 pm – just in time to put the tent up as the sun was setting. The caravan park looked somewhat dodgy, reception was pretty dirty, there were chooks roaming free and crushed seashells instead of grass. The night was ok, peaceful and quiet with lots of stars. We had a look at the quarry where they used to cut blocks made out of seashells – and all the buildings, including the house of the caretaker and the old telegraph station, built of the same blocks.

Next stop was Carnarvon to visit the Space and technology museum. At the museum they have a lot of stuff about the Apollo missions and the role Carnarvon played in the successful moon landing of Apollo 11 (50 years ago celebrated a couple of weeks after our visit). They had a simulator as well of the launch of Apollo 11 where they tried to recreate that sensation by sound and visual effects, quite interesting.

The rest of the drive to Coral Bay was ok and it was interesting to see how the termite mounds started dotting the landscape as soon as we crossed the Tropic of the Capricorn.

In Coral Bay we stayed at People’s Caravan Park the first night and it was mostly ok despite being packed, except lots of kids so quite noisy. Next day we went on a tour with a glass bottom boat to see the corals – brown and not as brightly coloured as the reef over east but still nice to see. We also saw lots of osprey nests in the towers or other higher places around the town. Then we went to Skeleton beach (no reef sharks in the nursery, but not the right season either) where we just sunbathed for a couple of hours (after digging ourselves out of sand again)! We also had a bit of a free show to watch as two other cars got bogged in the sand and a local bloke got them out. After a short afternoon nap we went to the beach again and I tried snorkeling (not very successfully). The water was quite warm in places, mixed with some colder areas.

That evening we stayed at a different caravan park, Bayview, and had dinner at a nice cafe where we had the best calamari ever (marinated then grilled). The night was not one of the best as some guy(s) got either drunk or high further from us, but kept shouting loud enough that I could hear it so kept me awake for a while.

Thursday we left for Exmouth, the town of the Big Prawn. On the way we stopped close to Learmonth airport to see the Krait and Potshot military memorial, as during WW II both the Australians and Americans used this place for some military action. It was also a target for the Japanese. The memorial is about a mission to destroy enemy boats by placing mines on them while disguised as local fishermen. The first time it worked really well but the second time it was a real failure and they all got killed – mainly due to miscommunication.

We checked in to the Ningaloo Caravan Park before setting off to see parts of Cape Range National Park. We drove past Harold Holt military facility first, then past the VLF towers to Lighthouse bay then to see the wreck SS Mildura (a ship transporting cattle that got wrecked on the reef), Vlamingh Head lighthouse and then a beautiful sunset near the Jurabi turtle sanctuary.

Next day we went back past the entrance into Exmouth to see Charles Knife and Shothole canyons. Then on to the other side of the peninsula, after a quick stop at a cafe, we headed to Turquoise Bay – with beautiful turquoise water indeed, some turtles and lots of fish. From there we went and walked Mandu Mandu Gorge – dry but beautiful and we saw quite a few birds.

Next destination was Onslow. The drive was interesting, with big red termite mounds dotting the landscape. The road leading to Onslow is very wide, obviously to accommodate all the big trucks going in and out of the town. The town is very small and there’s salt lakes on either side of the road with some big piles of salt in town. The caravan park was the best in the whole trip, probably because it has many longer term residents. It’s really clean and well maintained with manicured gardens and best showers and toilets by far! The beach also looks quite interesting, very red! There is the gas exploration with the pipe leading to town and also something else being carried in small carriages across a bridge, not sure what that is. There is a short but interesting walk where they explain about the history of the town, current industry but also flora and fauna.

After this nice surprise we set off for Karratha. We stopped at Nanutarra Roadhouse and Mesa A on the way.

We left Karratha early aiming to get to Broome before sunset. We had a mostly uneventful trip past Roebourne, Pardoo Roadhouse, Port Headland, Sandfire station (guarded by fierce peacocks), past Eighty Mile Beach and arrived in Broome around 6:15 pm. The only hiccup was the decision to refuel at Sandfire, where they have the fuel tanks above ground, and our friends’ car engine didn’t particularly enjoy the water that got in its Diesel filter. We stayed at Broome caravan park – also busy and not having the best facilities but at least the camping site was grassed.

Friday was a very early morning wakeup call (4:45 am) as we had booked to go to the Horizontal waterfalls. Unfortunately this didn’t happen because of the fog – luckily we didn’t accept to have it rebooked for next morning as it was foggy again. So we enjoyed some nice meals and The Good Cartel cafe, Matso’s brewery, went to see the dinosaur footprints and the sunset on Cable Beach, and did some shopping for our Gibb River Rd trip which started the next day.

On the way back from the Gibb we didn’t visit Broome again. We stopped at the BP station near the junction towards Broome to refuel, and the initial plan was to drive to Port Headland and see Staircase to the moon there. Unfortunately we didn’t find any camping spots so we decided to keep going to Auski roadhouse. It’s not the nicest place on earth, a bit noisy from all the trucks and the generator – but I actually had one of my best sleeps on this trip with the background humming rather than the early chirpy risers!

From Auski we went to Albert Tognolino lookout to have breakfast

then drove to Cue.

There was lots of roadkill on the road, ugly mining landscape and Cue is an eerie, almost deserted town (same as Meekatharra) but Queen of the Murchison was a nice surprise! It was clean, with nice country-style decorated rooms (the owners used to own / manage Emu Creek station in the Pilbara) and home-cooked meal for all the guests in the evening!

Last day was an early morning start, quick breakfast at the Queen again, then fast drive to Perth, only stopping at Bindoon bakery for lunch!