7 June, Eighty Mile Beach
Our intention is to now work our way down the coast to Port Hedland then head inland to Karijini. From there we hope to spend some time around the Ningaloo reef and Shark Bay before heading to Perth to visit family then heading back across the Nullarbor. S is happy to stay with us until just before Perth, then he will leave us to head inland and visit a childhood hometown of his father.
Many people have told us that we really must have a look at 80 mile beach, which is just a lazy 400 k drive from Broome. Just a tiny dash on the map, but quite a big distance, particularly when there is not a lot to see along the way. The Great Ocean Road this is not. Just miles and miles of not much at all.
Beth and I have developed quite a little travel routine. Up early in the morning for our walk, back in time to shower, have breakfast and pack up the trailer by 10:00, find coffee, then Beth takes the morning shift driving. We usually stop about halfway to our destination for a fruit lunch, after which I take over driving duties and we try to arrive in plenty of time to set up before nightfall. If there are any roadhouses along the way we usually stop for a toilet break and sometimes a little snack. This trip, I think we lingered over coffee (knowing it is probably the last good coffee for a while), dawdled through lunch and stopped at the Sandfire Roadhouse just because it sounded like the sort of place you needed to stop at. As a consequence S arrived at Eighty Mile Beach quite a bit before us and secured two nice sites near the beach. When we arrived though, we found that the site next to S to which we had been directed, was occupied by a dreadlocked teen (well he looked like a teen - he was probably 40) and his hippie style bongo van from which was emanating some beats to accompany the strange moves he was making with what looked like a skateboard deck atop an inflatable rubber ball. Beth engaged this young gentleman and suggested that perhaps he was in the wrong place. The young fellow trotted out an entirely implausible reason (which indicated that he could neither count, read, nor follow instructions- hmmm maybe not so implausible after all) for why he had set up camp here rather than 2 spots down where he was supposed to. Beth was less than impressed, but rather than force him to pack up the bongo and move on (which would have been at least a 2 minute job), she allowed him to stay and we set up in his designated space, but not before Beth delivered a withering glare which singed the poor boys dreadlocks.
Eighty mile beach caravan park is an incredibly well organised, neat and tidy park with green grass and well maintained amenities, and it is clearly a favourite amongst the grey nomad set because there were clean white caravans, floral blouses, purple rinses, wide brimmed hats and knee length white socks as far as the eye could see. Just to prove the point, when we arrived there was a bit of country music karaoke happening in a large grassed area in the middle of the park, which seems to have been set aside for this express purpose. Despite my resistance I think that I might be drifting into some semblance of grey nomadedness because there is a little bit of me that quite enjoyed watching old biddies belting out country songs and engaging in the caravan park culture, and there is an even bigger part of me that enjoyed the pie night (meat pie with peas and mashed potato followed by apple pie and ice cream) and the Devonshire teas on offer. The deep regret that I was going to miss the Parma night the next day also feels like a descent into greyness. But fear not, I am still resisting and I have not bought the white socks yet.
In addition to the caravan park delights, there is a splendid beach to explore teeming with bird life and providing the most beautiful sunsets I have seen so far. And 80 miles is no idle boast, there is plenty of beach to walk so Beth is very happy.
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| Sunset |
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| Beth on the beach |
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| My new favourite photo style. Sunset silhouette |
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| Seabirds hunkering down against the wind |
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| A pair of oystercatchers |
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| A fresh forest twice a day |
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| More sunset |
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| I hope the fisherman wasn’t still in his gum boots |
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| Sandpiper |
8 June, Port Hedland
Devonshire tea at Eighty mile beach sets us up well for our journey to Port Hedland, which is a veritable hop skip and jump away at 200 odd km. Bongo boy is still in the wrong spot when we leave and he looks like he has no intention of moving, so hopefully he is bracing himself for another withering glare from the next disaffected camper.
Port Hedland exists for one reason alone and that is to facilitate the shipment of about 1.5 million tonne of iron ore every day, mainly to China, and when you drive into town it is obvious what the predominant industry is. Although the thing that catches our eye most is the enormous pile of salt which looks like a pyramid in the distance. Presumably salt is an important chemical used in mining, so Rio Tinto harvest it from the ocean and make mountains out of it.
After an interesting time finding and then squeezing into our caravan sites just out of town, we head back into town to do a bit of exploring. Unfortunately there are no ships coming or going while we are in town, but we are able to walk out onto a viewing platform over the port and watch some of the berthed ships being loaded. S also spotted a dolphin in the water which helped to somewhat soften the very industrial setting we were observing. As well as the many ships loading, there were more than twenty offshore waiting for a berth and favourable tides. Beth’s brother, who works for the Pilbara Ports Authority refers to this ever changing pod of offshore ships as West Hedland.
The Port Hedland old(ish) town is pleasant and interesting, but we also need to reprovision, and the place to go for this is South Hedland about 15 km away. This is the main population centre here and boasts all you might expect in an urban centre, shopping centres, skate parks, compact building sites, petty crime…. We were warned that leaving anything unattended here was putting it at risk of either theft or vandalism, but we encountered no problems on our little shopping expedition.
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| A ship calving away from West Hedland coming in to fill up |
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| Bird at Pardoo roadhouse |
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| West Hedland |
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| Sutherland St Sunrise |
