Coober Pedy

What an interesting place Coober Pedy is! The town is built around opal mine fields and does not have a lot of structure to it. There's a bit here and a bit there.....and it appears that people do not take much pride in the appearance of their property looking from the outside. It seems okay to have junk in your front yard and mullock heaps that are just left as mounds across the landscape. We spent the day wandering around town looking at Opal shops and we visited the Old Timers Underground Mine to learn a little about opal mining. We wanted to buy a piece of aboriginal art to remember our holiday and we saw many, many paintings that we liked that also had a nice price tag on them. The first night we were in Coober Pedy we went to a gallery that also acted as an orphanage for kangaroos and we watched a man hand feeding a couple of kangaroos and a joey that he was taking care of. In the gallery was a lovely aboriginal man called " Tommy Crow " that was painting some of his designs. We watched him for a little while and got a nice feel from him. He played the didgeridoo like no one I have ever heard before and we left suitably impressed by him.So we decided to return the following day to purchase one of his original paintings and he was kind enough to pose for a photo with us. We particularly liked his design as we have seen so many beautiful sunsets on our trip that we thought it appropriate to purchase some of his work.

Halls Creek - Tanami Track - Alice Springs

We left our campsite some 107 km from Halls Creek at 6.15am with the intention of going to the bakery and getting breakfast at Halls Creek before we commenced our journey across the Tanami Desert. Unfortunately we forgot that it was a Saturday and nothing was open, so breaky in the car was what was on the menu. But that's the beauty of being on a holiday, half the time we really did not know what day it was and nor did we really care what time it was. So we started our journey across the Tanami Road and it was not a memorable one. You can not get much more remote than travelling on that road. Our aim was to make it to Rabbit Flat Roadhouse to camp for the night. We made a detour along the way and went to have a look at Wolf Creek Crater which was an awesome sight. We did many more kilometres before I drove to give Chris a break from the corrugations. I had been driving for about an hour before we pulled up at the NT border for a photo only to find that we could hear the tyre going down. So we proceeded to change the tyre by the roadside. The downside to this was that we now did not have a spare tyre and we had about 120km to get to Rabbit Flat. We made it to Rabbit Flat and could not believe the conditions that some people choose to live in. The owners were lovely, but we were in the no mans land. The lady who owned the property gave us the warning on Dingoes approaching the campsites and snakes being active until dark so we were really excited about staying there. Chris did some tyre repairs, we had dinner and hopped into bed once again for an early night before we headed off on our second day of travelling on that dreaded road. We came across small sections of the road that were bitumen and we were saying that was to tease us for a brief moment. Ohhhh the relief from the corrugations was immense.....but then we would see the red dirt appear again and so on we continued, shudder,shudder,bump, and rattle on down the road we continued. We made it to Tilmouth Well for a drink and fuel only to be told by the lady behind the counter that we would now have bitumen all the way to Alice Springs. Yeahhhh! We made it and endured two days of shuddering along the road for 1000km. In Alice we stayed in a cabin at a caravan park and the kids were so excited to be staying in a real bed, we had our very own shower and toilet that we did not have to share with anyone and nor did we have to walk a long distance to use those facilities. And Chris could have a shower to clean those FEET..We had some time to wander around Alice as we arrived at around 3.00pm, but firstly showers were in store as we had again been a few days without facilities. For dinner we went to Bojangles Saloon. I ordered the outback mixed grill and everyone (except for Mel she was not game enough) tried Crocodile, Emu, Kangaroo,Buffalo and Camel for dinner . To my surprise we all thought that it was not too bad.

Bungle Bungles

After an early start and a 53km 4wd track into Purnululu National Park, we started at the visitor centre and decided which walks we would attempt. We started at the northern end of the park and completed the 2k Echidna Chasm & 5k Mini Palm walks. We then drove the 40k's to the southern end and did the 1k Domes & 3k Cathedral Gorge walks. Back to the visitor centre for a cold drink and then the 53k drive out back to the smelly campsite. We quickly made tea and then packed up everything but the tent and beds, and then off to bed ready for a 5.30am start for our first day on the Tanami Road.

Fitzroy Crossing - Halls Creek

We left Fitzroy Crossing at a reasonable hour and we decided to visit Geike Gorge on the way to Halls Creek. A short walk of only 5k's but most of the walk was about 300m from the waters edge. Chris & Lachie snuck down across the sand to the waters edge to take some photos hoping they didn't run across a croc or two. We then stopped in at Halls Creek for fuel and some shopping and then drove the 107k's to our campsite which was an overnight camp on the Great Northern Highway near the entrance road to the Bungle Bungles. We set up camp and then realised we were pretty close to the drop dunny and every so often we coped a great waft. Nevertheless, we were early to bed and up at 6.00am to begin our big day at Purnululu National .

Cape Leveque - Fitzroy Crossing

We returned back down the Cape Leveque - Broome road and marvelled at how disfigured the roads become. Graders work on parts of it but it still appears to be a hollowed out dry river bed that you bounce along. Quickly into Broome to re-fuel, grab some rolls for lunch and for Chris to vote. Then back towards Derby before heading down the Northern Highway to Fitzroy Crossing. We stopped here for the night in order to visit Geikie Gorge first thing tomorrow. We decided to stay at Fitzroy River Lodge and splashed out on some high level accommodation in the form of a Safari Tent. We had our own shower (with hot water) and toilet and felt really posh. The kids were so excited to actually sleep in a real bed. Our blogs are now up to date. Further postings when we get internet access again which will be a few days. On the home stretch now with only about 8 days to go.

Cape Leveque

Today was our looking around Cape Leveque day. We started at the Kooljaman Resort where we had coffee and cake then a walk down to the beach and a look at their beach shelters. This is a pretty place and looks good to stay at, but the beach was not quite as friendly and also rough due to the wind. The beach shelters are quite unique and offer a good alternative to a normal campground experience. After Kooljaman we went onto Cygnet Bay Pearl Farm which produces Cyngeture Pearls and is the oldest working Australian pearl farm. We went on a tour and learnt some history of the farm and the area, and also how pearls are cultivated. We were then shown some of the pearls for sale and the various shapes and sizes. The girls tried on a $52,000 pearl string and we also saw a single 22mm pearl valued at $72,000. From Cygnet Bay we then went onto Bardi Aboriginal Community at One Arm Point. They have a fish hatchery where they breed various local species of marine life including barrimundi, green turtles, clownfish, mangrove jack and trochus shells. The man running the hatchery loved to get people to feed the barrimundi. He would tell them they would gently take the small bits of fish from their hand when in fact they would suck the fish in with a load "boof" noise scaring the bejesus out of everyone. We brought a locally produced polished trochus shell which are unique to this area.

Middle Lagoon

We left Broome this morning about

8.00am for Cape Leveque. We had decided to stay at a place called Middle Lagoon - Nature's Hideaway. Unusual drive firstly on bitumen for 40k's then dirt / rock / clay / sand for the next 90k's. Back on to bitumen temporarily and then a 30k's journey from the main road to our camp on a very sandy track. When we arrived late morning, we chose a campsite on the ridge overlooking one of the beaches and taking advantage of the fantastic view. The kids had a swim in front of our campsite and enjoyed a play for the rest of the afternoon. It was very relaxing and we also got to unwind and do some reading. We also managed to walk around the campground and checked out the actual lagoon beach which was a beautiful horseshoe. The sunset was spectacular with a very vivid orange sky. Curried sausages for dinner with rice. It was idyllic and seemed to good to be true - which it was. Around 3.00am the wind picked up and tried to blow us back to Victoria. It bent the heavy duty sand pegs and we had the tent tied off to the trailer to prevent it blowing away. By morning we couldn't believe how much sand had managed to get into the tent and our beds even though it was sealed up tight. The wind was still howling so we ate our breakfast cereal sitting in the car because we couldn't keep the bowls on the table. It was a good day to not be at our camp on the ridge.