Karratha

After appointing over the phone a service agent in Broome we headed on to a rest stop down the road towards Karratha for the night. A beautiful warm night where we had the generator going all night to keep the airconditioner on. It would have been at least 28-29 overnight. The next day a little sleep weary we headed down past Port Hedland where there were heaps of mining happening. It was good to see the growth but I am worried the infrustructure is a little behind to support the fly in fly out crews. Anyway it was good to view and we kept heading south to Karratha where we popped into the BIG 4 there at a discounted $42 per night. We were lucky enough to still have an opportunity to see the Stairway to the moon again, the last night and the photos show the result. Karratha was also the place we were able to get another service agent which was great too!

Broome - Cable Beach

We weren't quite sure on how to take Broome at first, it is in two obvious parts, the old Broome which is obviously quite run down in the back streets and new Broome which is effectively Cable Beach and the airport area. We grew to enjoy it pretty quick and stayed there for 5 nights working during the day and viewing the sunset at night. We went out for dinner one night which was pretty good but the sight we enjoyed the most was the sunset over Cable Beach. We were fortunate also to be there for the Stairway to the Moon but the cloud cover mucked that up for us a bit. The photos show the night sky.
Rachel found a friend who helped her hang out the washing or should I say guard it from all the backpackers. This little Spotted Military Dragon sat under the clothes line and occasionally ventured onto the hot stones but flicked his legs continuously as it was a bit hot at 39 degrees plus the extra heat from the stones. Rachel has heaps of photos of the little fella and since then we have seen a few of them either squashed on the road, me straddling them on the road or in the camp parks on the coast. Broome is good, very touristy and when we were there extremely hot, would be good in the dry season.

More Bungle Bungles and Argyle diamond mine

These photos are just a selection of what we took, not to mention the video.

Kununurra

A hive of activity, this very popular destination sits on the Ord river catchment area right next to Lake Argyle, a man made lake with the capacity in the wet season of 54 times Sydney Harbour. This massive dam supplies irrigation water to the growing Kununurra irrigation district. As we came away from Kununurra we heard on the radio that it won the tourism award for WA this year, well done! The new Australia film has used this area to film extensive footage, including the El Questro homestead. The tourism group in the area has just moved the homestead used for the movie to Kununurra to further enhance the tourism when the film comes out in November. Whilst we were there we could have done heaps of touristy things at quite a cost but opted to do a flight out to the Bungle Bungles over them all due to the work we both have on and the cost. As a place to visit, you can not beat the Bungle Bungles, this area discovered as a tourist attraction in 1987 is by far the most impressive mountainous structure in Australia. It beats Ulluru and the Snowy Mountains in way of expanse and beauty. We flew out at 6:00am and picked up some nice light from the morning sun and flew over the irrigation area, the Ord river and dam, over Lake Argyle's huge expanse, two cattle stations and arrived over the Bungle Bungles which is just on the edge of the Tanami Desert. As we banked unfortunately Rachel's stomach could not take it anymore but still we videoed and took still images of this spectacular place. The commentary was very good and we spent around 15 mins circling the Bungle Bungles before heading back towards Kununurra. Before getting there we passed over the Argyle diamond mind and skirted Lake Argyle back to the safety of the ground again. For me it was great to fly again, only wish we could have taken off the door of the 8 seater Cessna to get better photos. Rachel has decided to hang up here small aircraft flying boots for now though as she was quite ill for the rest of the day after the flight. We stayed an extra day for Rachel to recover and moved on to Broome. You must visit this area though, it is spectacular and one day we will spend more than 3 days there to really enjoy it.

Katherine Gorge to Kununurra

A big push today through to Kununurra was pretty plain sailing, it took all day but the road wasn't too bad. Crossing the border was funny, the guy was more interested in the van than what we had in the cupboards. Oh well we still did the right thing and cleaned out all the vegies and fruit prior to arriving at the border. The Volkswagen Touareg is definitely a joy to drive with the outside temperature up around 40 degrees it still cruised at 100-105 kms all day without going past half on the temp guage. It never moves and the aircon goes all day keeping me at 21 degrees and Rachel at 18-19 degrees.

Darwin to Katherine Gorge

The day started out pretty well, we were heading for Victoria River, a bit of a journey of around 550kms and not far out of Darwin Rachel's dad Graham rang us and suggested we go to Katherine Gorge as they loved it. Seeing it was not far off the track we decided to change plans and had a short trip of around 260kms to the gorge from Darwin. It was quite warm when we got there but then we were getting used to that. After unhooking and setting up we headed over to the visitor centre for some lunch and check out the tours, being there one night only and work on the go it was unlikely we could see much but luckily there was a sunset dinner cruise available for that night so we promptly booked that and raced back to get our work done before it left at 4:30pm. There wasn't a big group on board and we headed up the first gorge whilst the canoeists were coming back (no I didn't take the kayak off for a paddle, not enough time). Soon we were among towering cliffs and rocky outcrops. The informative cruise was excellent, we got to the second gorge and it got even better. We were supposed to turn around at the end of the second gorge but the guide was good enough to give us a freebie and we jumped onto a third boat for the third gorge cruise, how lucky were we. We arrived at the end of the third gorge and the view was fantastic. We soon turned around and went via another boat back to the first gorge where we jumped on board the dining boat ready for our meal. With a glass of champagne and flickering candles on sunset you could excuse yourself if you weren't stepping onto the set of and Australian tourist advert, with Aboriginal music and tables for two, seated watching the sunset drop through the gorge, changing the hue every second. We had a very enjoyable evening and were glad we didn't skip this wonderful place.