Broome - to - Derby, 222kms. - 31st May, 2022.

 Left digs at 8.00am to drive to Derby. We had planned to stop at the Willare Bridge Roadhouse for a night  but as we arrived there about 10.30 am thought we had time to go up to Derby for the night instead. Originally we had planned to go to Derby , then we decided to by pass it but now we are here. Not a lot up here but always interested to see these types of towns. It is a place very popular for the tourists as it is close to a few activities. One would be the trip to fly over or go by boat to the Horizontal Falls at Talbot Bay right up North of Derby. Way too expensive for us to go and see them.  But in saying that, that doesn’t mean we wouldn’t love to do it. A few days ago they had a boat accident out there but fortunately nobody was thrown out of the boat but everyone had injuries. Some minor and some more serious. Don’t know if it hit the NZ news. The falls are called Horizontal Falls as with the big high and low tides (12.8 highest) the water rushes through the gapes between the land forming a horizontal rush of water. They say it’s very impressive but we won’t see that. It’s also famous for its big unusual Jetty the shape of a horseshoe. Walk onto it one end and come off it the other end. Unfortunately they were doing maintenance on it so we couldn’t take the walk. Also the Getty is famous for watching the sunsets from. Again we won’t see that as we have had thick cloud over us all day but no rain. It’s looking like we might not get out of this cloud over the next few days. Bad for photos. Derby is also near the outback gorge country, Tunnel Creek and Windjana Gorge. To outback for our wagon. Derby has an interesting history. The town was bombed by the Japanese during World War ll, and played an important role in introducing the Royal Flying Doctors service to the Kimberley region. Derby is the land of the Boab trees, the well know one is the Boab Prison Tree. This is located six kms south of Derby.

Now well in the Kimberley land. Different colourings and now notice the termite hills are a dark brown not the red we have been seeing. There is a big community of them here. Lots of breading.

My photos come out so dark without that sun. We have now seen a river with water and clearer water as well. They get a lot of rain up here in the wet season (summer time). Which is uncommon for this time of the year.

Just to show you what a normal Boab tree looks like. They are shredding their leaves now.

This is the famous Boab Prison Tree which is an impressive 1500 year old. Looking very old and going rotten in many places. The tree is reputed to have been a rest place stop for Police and the Aboriginal prisoners making their way to Derby. Before Derby was established in 1883, Aboriginal people were kidnapped from the West Kimberley. The kidnappers, known as the “black birders”, were settlers who were connected with the pearling industry. They wanted divers and workers for the pearling boats. They rounded people up, put them in chains and marched them to the coast. Some may have held their captives at the Boab Prison Tree while they waited for a boat.

The prisoners brought to Derby via the Boab Prison Tree came from as far away as Fitzroy Crossing and Christmas Creek. They Generally walked from 24 to 48kms each day in chains, (poor buggers), camping over night at Stations waterholes or wells. Some would have rested at the Boab Prison Tree on their arrival into Derby waiting for their boats.

The Jetty is the shape of a horseshoe. Low tide was 9.00am this morning so when I took the photos the tide would have been three hours on its way back in. Next daytime high tide will be at 2.40 pm tomorrow. That’s the trouble having one night at some places as we miss out on seeing high tide.

This is a photo trying to show how it is horseshoe shaped. Circles around, and each end is attached to the land. The tide was three hours on its way back in, we would have loved to see the high tide which would be 9mts higher. Just didn’t fit in with our plans.

Same time three hours on its way in can’t see any sea water anywhere. I am standing on the causeway out to the Jetty. No water on other side of road and no sign of water there as well. Would have been great to watch it come in. But we have to be on the road early tomorrow big driving day but we had a shorter drive today.

Just a quick drive past these rustic art works around the foreshore. We still can’t see the water. Gosh it must be miles out.

This was my favourite.

Eighty Mile Beach - to - Broome, 29th, (276kms) and 30th May, 2022

 Left Eighty Mile Beach at 9.00am, a little later than normal due to deciding if we should move on after one night instead of two. We decided to leave and get up to Broome as rain was forecast for this afternoon. We continued our drive through the Great Sandy Desert up to Broome. We had booked into Cable Beach Caravan Park and after we had organised ourselves with power and drainage etc we went for a walk to look at Cable Bay beach.  Another beautiful white long Sandy beach. In 1899 Cable Beach was named  as a result of the telegraph wire that divides Broome and Jarva. The beach is 22kms long with its white sand and turquoise water of the Indian Ocean.

The above three photos are different landscapes again continuing through the Great Sandy Desert after leaving Eighty Mile Beach.

Arrived into Broome early afternoon. Checked into the caravan park for two nights. Then went for a walk to have a look at the beach which everyone raves over saying it is such a beautiful beach. It was a short walk from the camp but exhausting in this heat. Walked over the sand dunes and this lovely beach was before our eyes. That west coast white sand and turquoise sea.

Looking along the beach. The sand is much whiter than this picture shows. Must have been the angle of the sun. This coastline still has the very extreme high and low tides. It looks as though it is right out but it comes right up to the narrow strip of soft sand. We didn’t manage to see the high tide and would have loved to watch it coming in to see how fast it was. But of course can’t sit on the beach all day to see.

It’s now our next day, the 30th  and our only full day in Broome. We got away early to drive around Broome to explore as no sun today and it was looking very threatening out at sea. We started of at Gantheaume Point and note the hole in the rock.

Broome is like a peninsular with water both sides. Sun trying to peep through but it really didn’t happen. Lots of familiar rock formations just at the point.

Looking straight out to the Indian Ocean and it is getting darker thinking the rain will hit us soon.

Think these guys might be deciding whether to go fishing or not.

Just leaving and found this rock.

Now we have gone across to Town Beach. It was quite windy on this side blowing right in. The weather still threatening. Don’t you like these huge boulders. All round this area they are using them as breakwaters as I presume the big seas come in on this side. Even though it is a dull day the water still looks turquoise. Imagine how the colour would come out with the sun on it, but that won’t happen today.

We were heading out to the long wharf in the background. When we came across this war memorial. The artwork commemorates the attack on Broome, on 3rd March 1942. It stands as a silent legacy to those who lost their lives, and the impact on this remote Australian community.

Standing on Town Beach looking along the the long wharf. It’s longer than it looks in this photo.

Now walking down towards the wharf. Note more big beautiful boulders. Lovely colours.

Close up of the rock. Change from all the red we have being seeing so much of.

Now at the end of the wharf. A bit of fishing going on. You can’t notice it but the wind has got up a lot and getting very rough but still no rain. I was talking to the little boy fishing on the left. He was so desperate to catch a fish. His dad had them booked on a charted fishing trip this morning and it was still on after some warning yesterday it could be cancelled. Then heard they had to cancel it due to the heavy seas coming in and heavy rain. He was so enthusiastic about going out on the boat and had been trying for some time on the end of the wharf to catch a fish. After we had chattered about it I told him all good things come to those who wait. Guess what he suddenly had a fish on. He was so excited, and I was so thrilled for him.

Walking back of the wharf. Clouds getting darker wind getting up.

Looking back over Town Beach. Really black now but still the water is very turquoise.

Coming off the wharf  and looking up at the park and our van is sitting there in the middle.

Looking back up at the wharf.

This is looking over Roebuck Bay which contains four sunken historic flying boats shot down by the Japanese during World War ll. Apparently with the very low tides they have here, on a very low tide these planes can be seen and people go out and walk round them. But there are warnings that they must not touch the planes to preserve them.

As we were driving around Broome you could see where they are trying to improve the town and it is looking quite tidy but as soon as you leave the town centre it deteriorates. Lots of this red dust around and it gets into everything. You even feel that it’s in your clothes. Still the rain hadn’t arrived but big drops on the windscreen. Got settled back into camp, had our lunch and not long after that the rain came down and it hasn’t stopped since. Weather forecast looks terrible over at least the next five days through the Kimberleys where we are driving through for the next eight days. We were hoping for a heli flight over the Bungle Bungles on Thursday. 🤞Not paying for that if the weather is duff. We will get away early in the morning.

Port Hedland - Eighty Mile Beach , 28th May 2022.

 Left Port Hedland at 7.00am and travelled straight up to Eighty Mile Beach. We are thinking of having two nights here, we planned for two nights, but will see how the weather looks tomorrow. As we left early we arrived in camp at about 10.30 am. This camp lets you arrive from 10am. Therefore we got there early to make the most of the day. Spent a lot of the day catching up with two loads of washing to do and hang out,  cleaning and a few extra things that had to be done. It was so hot here probably mid thirties. Although the camp was near the beach there were quite high sand dunes around it which prevented any sea breeze to help cool us. So combination of no wind and hot sun beating down on us it was almost unbearable. Couldn’t even go for a swim as it had warnings for crocodiles and stingers could be here but very doubtful re crocs but better to be safe than sorry. The water was so warm as well. I don’t think I mentioned yesterday re the high / low tides that this coast gets from about Port Hedland up to Derby, north of Broome which has the different difference of about 15 metres. I think in this area it’s more like 12 metres. My photos show the water right out but we never saw the tide right in only half way. Which I will explain below. This beach is popular for its fishing. Lots of the campers had their fishing rods with them. In fact our elderly neighbour caught two salmon surf casting.

Leaving Port Hedland early morning so sun wasn’t up hence the dark photo. Interesting shaped hills.

We have left Port Hedland and are now crossing the Great Sandy Desert. Western Australia’s largest desert and Australia’s second largest. As you can see it’s not all sand alone, plenty of  small vegetation covering it. This part is so flat and goes on and on with its straight roads. Which of cause are great for driving these vast distances.

We have now turned down the nine kms to take us to the Eighty Mile Beach. Bit rough for the old girl, (not me) the van. She rattled and shook all the way. Had to take it really slowly. You can see the corrugations in the road and as we approached the camp, the proprietor was towing three big tractor tyres behind his Ute in an endeavour to flatten out the corrugations. Quite novel. This beach is way out and deserted between Port Headland and Broome, where the desert meets the ocean. It is the perfect stop between Port Hedland and Broome around half way.

But is actually nearer to Port Hedland. 250Kms north of Port Hedland and 375kms south of Broome. The beach is some 220kms long. Beautiful white sand.

Walkway from the camp to the beach

Looking up the beach

And down the beach. These two photos don’t show how far the tide is out.

High tide goes right up to the soft sand so there wouldn’t be much beach left at full tide.

This one shows you the best how far out the tide goes and remember there is a drop and fall of about 12 metres. So the water must rush in when it turns unfortunately didn’t see that probably happen at night.

We had been for a paddle keeping an eye out for two eyes that might be watching us in the water. 🐊 

It was so warm would have loved to have had a swim as I was melting.

Looking straight out to sea

Next Morning 29th May. Decided not to have two nights here as the rain was coming in today. So continued on up to Broome. Went down to see where the tide was just before 7.00am probably half way so still didn’t see the full tide before we left. It goes right up to we’re you can see the dry sand.

Karijini National Park - to - Port Hedland - 27th May, 2022. - 340kms.

We left the Karijini National park at 7.00am and just kept driving continuously, except to stop and make a coffee on the way, arriving in Port Hedland RAC caravan park about mid day. Before we settled into camp we stocked up our supplies before we had a good look around the town. PT was particularly interested in this place. A real boys town, it’s all about trains, planes, road trains and ships. The biggest industry is all the iron ore arriving to the ports set for places like China. All the ships are lined up in rows and rows sitting in the Port. Trains bring in thousands of carriages full of iron ore a day from many different places around Western Australia to be loaded onto the waiting ships. As well as trains transporting iron ore to the port the road trains are very busy up and down the highways towing four trailers of iron ore per truck. They were coming and going past us all morning. It’s billions of dollars trade for Western Australia. We spent most of our time down at the wharf in the best position to watch the ships going out. In fact there were 16 ships waiting offshore to enter port.  First we dropped into the Info centre to ask a few questions and they even had the timetable of all the ships names and times of departure, for those that were interested. One was due out in the next half hour so we waited for that to leave. All the iron ore comes from all the red rock in these areas, which you have been seeing in my blog. Big industrial town as they also have a salt evaporation plant and produce salt for the market which I have seen in the supermarkets. As I said a real boys town.

This truck has just passed us, with four trailers all the shape of this trailer full of iron ore or heading out to pick up a load from the different areas inland in this top end of Western Australia. Just imagine all this industry and income WA gets from such a big natural resource. We still can’t believe how many trucks we saw on the road.

This road train is overtaking us.

Now’s it’s our turn to overtake as we were going up a slight hill.

The long tracks go on for ever.

Taken while crossing over a bridge. Note the empty carriages on the left and full carriages on the right waiting to be unloaded onto the ships. We were told that there are a maximum of 250 carriage trucks per train and the all up train is 2.5 kilometres long with 3 locomotives.

Crossing over a dried up river.

This shows how long these four trailers road trains are. Can’t get the full picture up closer as don’t fit into the camera lens.  Each truck and 4 trailers amount to 74 wheels.

Now down on the wharf ready to watch this blue ship going out all full of the iron ore. Tugs all in position.

She is on her way passing us to go through the port entrance.

Now out at the entrance on her journey.

Standing on the wharf looking out to the entrance of the port.

Now went to see the salt ponds where they produce the salt.

Hugh piles of salt. Note sure how they clean it all when you see bulldozers 

driving all over the salt to shift it around.

Settled into camp and just before the sun set thought I had better go for a walk to see what’s behind the camp. Saw this lovely beach. Looking to the west as the sun was setting.      

Sun just setting on the eastern end of the beach

This is a copy of an aerial shot of our camp I found.

I am writing this on Saturday 28th our first day of a two night stay at Eighty Mile Beach Caravan Park.  All of the above happened yesterday the 27th. As we are here for two nights I will write about Eighty Mile     Beach tomorrow. Sorry girls this blog wasn’t of interest to you. Boys toys.