Russ Travelling Australia

Before we left Gladstone, Russ realized that the plug connecting the electrics from the car to the van had broken and he painstakingly had to connect the seven connectors to the car, first of all, working out where each one had to go, and then taping them in with duct tape, to the car, so that we had brake lights and indicators etc. It took him a couple of hours and the first test to see if lights etc. were working was OK.!

We are booked in at Drummond Cove, 10mins from Geraldton, but 160kms into the trip, we smelt a “hot smell” from the right front tyre, or from underneath the bonnet on that side. Pulled into a wayside stop to check it out and let it cool down and decided that it was so pretty here that we’d stay.

We had been enjoying the much improved countryside, from Gladstone on, but this stop is at Galina Bridge, which crosses the Murchison River, at 4-mile pool.

Next day we only had 100kms to go and the smell didn’t seem to be as strong, and one person we spoke to about it, suggested it might have been a large insect or picked up a bit of rope – it certainly wasn’t an electrical, brake or clutch smell – but one we couldn’t identify.

The scenery and flowers were absolutely spectacular on the trip to Geraldton, and we had an early start and had loads of time to take photos of them all.

Day 2

The wind is horrific and we can’t keep the gas stove alight, so had to cook breaky on the indoor diesel stove, though it doesn’t handle toast well – nevertheless, managed bacon and eggs on soggy fried bread, set up the TV (for the first time on the trip) and watched Stephanie Rice get a gold medal, amongst others! Made up some rolls and sent down to a river, found a sheltered spot and enjoyed the outing. We are here for a week, for a car service, shopping, washing etc. so we hope the wind settles a little. We are right on the highway also.

I’ve caught up with the blog at last, but I don’t think there will be many exciting entries for the next week., unless those pesky MM get up to some mischief and give us a run for our money!

Beautiful patches of wildflowers all the way through this treeless coast and after talking to some locals at Exmouth, who loved Gladstone, but were unable to get in, because the road was closed after 16 inches of rain, so we thought after 7 nights, we’d give it a go. Sure enough, road is open now, but rough in patches.

Our new MM was caught resting under this wildflower – we’ll have to make sure he has his seatbelt on and doesn’t give the others any ideas about getting out of the car!

Surprisingly, this is the other side of Shark Bay, all for $1 pp per night. Very shallow, but interesting to see the lengths people will go to, to catch fish. Here they have a license to net fish, under strict regulations, in the hope of catching deep sea mullet and the odd yellow-tailed bream, but that’s about it, unless a dugong takes their net out! The low bay at Gladstone, houses 10,000 dugongs who feed on the sea grass in the bay. The sea grass reduces the tidal flow, which increases the salt content, which then enable the stramatolites? to survive, across the other side of the peninsula.

Cold, windy WA forced Russ to erect a shelter, just so we could make a cuppa. what a difference!! Late morning we packed a lunch and headed11kms south to the lagoon, only to discover another camping area. the location was better than our camp but the area was set up with corrugated iron shacks and resembled a “Deliverence”, or Shanty Town effect. After lunching in the one and only shady spot, under a sheeoak, we drove back to the lagoon, where I happily paddled for ages. If only I had had a snorkel and goggles. I still saw green Brain Coral, sea anemones, red, pink and mauve coral and a school of whiting followed me around, eating things my feet were stirring up and some other smaller fish, with a mark like a thumb print on either side – maybe John Dory? This day made me realise how magic it is here, as long as you get into the sea, walk beside it, or fish.

On our way home we were entertained by a large pod of whales, this time just swimming along. 

At Quobba, they use helium balloons to take their casts out (up to 1 km!), to reach the Spanish Mackerel, and hope to bring them in before the sharks get them!  Another unusual event was the owner’s ultralite flight, right next to our camp – must be mad!

Headed north again, but not far only 80kms – thought we’d give another station a go on the coast. A much nicer drive in, with lovely wild flowers and a wider road. 11 kms from Quobba we saw the famous blowholes and they were extremely exciting, tossing huge plumes of sea into the air with a mighty noise. There were warnings everywhere about King waves and how they kill and there was a plaque to someone who was swept off the rocks. It was low tide and safe, but this thrilling place would be even more exciting at high tide.

A short drive to Quobba, which is a sheep station of 180,000 acres, 80 kms of coast and 17kms wide, running 9000 sheep. Camping and many forms of accommodation is their other livelihood. Once again, no trees, low shrubs and grasses, nothing startling in the area for camping. The Indian Ocean is the draw card here and it is truly magnificent. Set up, finding the best way to position the van, with protection from the Easterly, then the Westerly and later on the Northerlys!!!!

Walked both days along the beach, each day in the opposite direction and collected shells and dead coral for Rhys and Heath’s “Show and Tell”.

We put a sign up saying “Magno Men welcome” and one day, to our surprise, we saw ANOTHER MM arriving, waving to all our other guys, who welcomed him with open arms. “Can I stay for a while, please?”, he asked and what could we say, but “yes of course”. Many hands make light work!!

On the way home, on the 2nd day, we watched whales breaching and frolicking out to sea, but close enough for us to sea the flutes underneath the jaw of one whole. Loads of splashes and saw their blows as well.

We’ll stay here for 3 nights, then stay somewhere between Quobba and Geraldton, where we’ll have mobile reception.

We come to towns to stock up etc. etc. which is what we have done over the last couple of days – with a bonus of good competition bowls on every day, at the back of our site.  We can only watch them as we didn’t bring our bowls away this time. WA’s come up here for 4 months for the competition and there will be a mass evacuation tomorrow, as today is the last day of the comp.

We took lunch out again today, but were very disappointed with Chinaman’s Pool and 1 Mile Jetty. These areas in town are ‘their major attractions’, but are sadly uncared for and are not set up for tourists, so we bought lunch back home and watched the bowls.

RHYS & HEATH

The two magno men are new ones so we have 5 altogether now!!!!! Imagine what we thought when we noticed a couple of bright little fellows walking along a red sandy track. They needed a big drink, although they looked very clean and they have much longer hair than the 3 you lent us. We are going for another big adventure tomorrow and it will be fun to see if they get up to any mischief – or maybe we might find some more. Keep your fingers crossed and hope that we will!!

Today we drove out to Rocky Pool, another permanent waterhole of the Gascoyne River – seen on our inland trips. There were many people camped out there, although there isn’t a toilet or anything. Quite a lot of day visitors too.

Rhys and Heath – guess what happened? We found two more Magno Men out there!!!!!!!! See if you can spot the differences. We have decided to keep and feed them and we think they will be great company for our other 3 MM. What do you think?

We had a delicious lunch by this spectacular pool, in the shade of some extremely old meleulucas (can’t work out the spelling for that!) and walked the entire length of the pool, before setting off.

[Photos of Bullara’s accommodation, and the donkey we had to light for hot water]

We had plans to head for Coral Bay, but everything is booked up. We called in for a look and it’s a bit like Lakes Entrance – very touristy and everyone lined up as though a race is about to start. We continued south, through the most boring country so far – not a tree, shrub – nothing!

Drove into Woorarra Stn, along a single land sand track, heading 32kms to the coast, where the station offers camping. There is a caretaker on-site, so here goes! The track was a little rough and sandy in places, but everything was going well, until we met a caravan coming out. His van wasn’t offroad, so we had to drive up a 2 foot embankment, onto the verge and let him pass. Russ wanted me to take photos of it, but I had my eyes closed at the time!! Needless to say, everything was OK, though the descent was just as scary! At least I know now what can be done and it will be easier next time.

Over a dune and we saw the spectacular torquoise Indian Ocean, but not a tree or shrub in sight. Russ had to drive the K’van onto the white sand beach (not his favourite thing to do). We were greeted by the caretaker, who said the howling freezing Easterly would continue for at least 3 days and decided against staying there. Apart from the exposure to sun and wind, unless you had a boat and heavy fishing gear, there wouldn’t be anything for us to do, as idyllic as it seemed – it wasn’t for us.

Travelled to Minilya, along this still boring stretch of road and camped at a wayside stop on the Minilya River. At least there were some beautiful ghost gums, BBQ, table and budgerigars nesting in a tree hollow near us.

Set off at 8am for Carnarvon and we were lucky enough to get the last site – next to the bowling green, so we have booked in for 3 nights. We have reception at last and had a great chat with family, will fill up with good water, do the washing, defrost the frig etc. and catch up with the blog. I apologise for the layout of the blog, but my back doesn’t allow me to sit for too long and make all the necessary adjustments.

This family of emus came meanering through the c’van park at Exmouth and the other photo was where I posted the last blog!

We met Jean and Norm who caught a 21lb Blue Bone – their record catch in 24 years camping for 6 months every year at Exmouth! They also had a Cobb oven for sale, which we purchased, so now if fires are banned, we can still BBQ with 6-7 heatbeads + make bread, bake cakes etc. After staying a couple of extra days at Exmouth, waiting for the rains in the lower coast to clear, we then stayed at Bullara Station for two nights.

As soon as we drove through their gates, we saw larger shrubs, lines of Ghost Gums and our site was nestled amongst small ghost gums. We had a fireplace, septic toilet, showers and bore water, but no power.

The custodian, Richard & Jenny, are the parents of he present owners of the farm, who are away giving birth to their new baby. Richard and Jenny owned the station themselves for 36 years and the station was previously owned by Richard’s father (and others). They now have their own farm, further south, where they fatten the cattle, from this farm, for export.

The cost of diesel is making them reconsider their future as the roadtrains use 1 litre per 700 metres of diesel and they shift 900 head of cattle a year; each r/train holding 60 cattle per trailer. Each r/train has 3 trailers.

There were 3 fantastic dogs; a young kelpie pup, called Chocolate, an older ridgeback and a small housedog (with a huge personality). We fell in love with Chocolate – bounds of energy, a twinkle in the eye and great company on the two long walks we did.

The station is situated amongst the lovely red sand dunes, mentioned on the way from Karijini to Exmouth, so the first walk was to the NE to a large dune and he second was SE to a beautiful dune, covered in Forrest’s Feather flower.

Both walks were enjoyable and each for an hour or so, with a panting and playful kelpie. We’ll miss her and Bullara.

It is our third day in Exmouth and I’m sitting under a shelter, in a park in town, publishing this, and the previous two blogs, with an inverter coming from the car. Russ has been shopping and is walking around to find a place for lunch.

We are on the edge of Cape Range National Park, and were looking forward to getting a site there, but after going for a drive through it yesterday, we don’t like any of the sites as they are right on the beach and are extremely exposed. It is very hot here and I think, unless you are a mad keen angler, there’s not a lot of other things to do. We drove to Yardie Creek, at the end of the park and that was great, but you can’t book a site there – you have to queue at the entrance at 8am, and take what you’re offered.

The flowers in the park were fantastic though.

From here, we are heading south to the Coral Coast, after staying at a station for a couple of days. I’m not sure whether we’ll have reception there or not.

The country to Exmouth was through red sand dunes – covered in wildflowers, small shrubs and spinifex – stunning!

Thanks for your comments.