80 Mile Beach, Pardoo Station, Point Samson

Our little adventure since leaving Broome has taken us to 80 mile beach where we spent one night, to Pardoo Station where we spent a wonderful 10 days and now to Point Samson where we will spend a week or so. Have had some ups and some downs of late but really can't think of anywhere else I'd rather be right now (except of course at home with you Shas :-] ). The friends we've met we will keep in touch with, and hopefully they will come to Colac for a visit or we might meet them on the road again some day. Recently we've met Justin, Katherine and little Jed at Mary Pool (home is in Albury) and at Pardoo Station we met Dumpy and Robin (Albany, WA), Peter and Lorraine, Ron, and the Gray family (from Altona) - Brett, Georgie, Kyle and Emma and because of these wonderful people we stretched our stay from a few days to 10, only leaving in the end because we had no phone reception and I'm still waiting for Caz to have this baby!!

On the down side Chris lost his wallet at Pardoo with all his cards in it, so we had to sort all that out, then when we got to Point Samson we realised the hot water service was leaking and had to find someone to weld that for us. All fixed now, except it won't work on the power, only the gas for some reason. Stevo says "don't stress about it", so I'm trying not to, but you know me, I can't help but worry!

Cable beach (Broome)

80 mile beach, lots of beach but no fish for us!

Pardoo Station, loads of great shells, and the occasional dead tree!
At Pardoo Creek the kids went for a little walk and Laura got bogged in the mud...UP TO HER THIGHS! Would not have gotten out without Dad's help. Her brother was very supportive, as you can see.

Hey, check this out...a giant thredfin salmon from Pardoo!
Laura was a great fisher woman, she pulled in quite a few bream on this particular day. We also got a few whiting.

The locals at Pardoo were very friendly, especially this Jabiru who was there almost every day. Chris and I are fishing in the background.
A whale had washed up on the beach at Pardoo a few months ago and this was part of the skull we took the kids to see. They drew a big body in the sand behind it to imagine how big it would have been.
Emma and Laura collecting shells, they were inseparable and had a great time together. Even when Emma accidentally kicked Laura in the face and gave her a blood nose they were buddies!
Believe it or not this is Will (10) and his mate Kyle (13) looking to catch some live bait...the tall and the short of it you could say!

Because we decided to stay longer at Pardoo I had to nip into Port Hedland for some supplies. On the way I passed these "miners", about 20 or 30 spread out across the side of the road, some with faces and all wearing their hard hats!

So thanks to the Great White Hunter (Stevo) we now have a freezer full of fish - bream, whiting and salmon, oh and some shark too. Sure is nice to open it and see the results of Chris' hard work have FINALLY paid off!

The Kimberley Region

First stop after Katherine was Timber Creek for one night. Only went a few hundred Km's and I like to think I was easing my way into the whole leaving Darwin business, incase I wanted to go back! Caravan Park was basic but OK and although the pool was freezing we got in twice because the temperature has been in the high 30's. It was Father's Day and the kids gave their dad a t-shirt with a fish on the front.

Next day we moved on to Kununurra and W.A., where we spent 3 nights so we could take in all the sights. Spent a day going to Wyndham (and sorry that we did!), it was a total dive. Our first clue should have been the write-ups about it being an HISTORIC town, the second should have been the lack of traffic heading the same direction as us, and the third should have been the 2 second drive down the main street. But alas, we wanted to give it a chance so we went to all the recommended places...the port (which is a group of old meat works sheds and a locked area that is still in use), the Afghan cemetary (which was 3 piles of rocks without a thing written on them), the big croc in the main street (which was a ghastly shade of yellow and green), the largest boab tree in captivity (which was at the back of a tiny run down caravan park and was BIG if nothing else), and then on the way home we went to see the Prison Tree (a hollow boab tree where prisoners were once kept out in the bush and which took us over 22km each way down a rough 4WD track to find "the tree" and nothing else) and the Grotto (which would have been more impressive in the wet with more than a splash of green water in the bottom of it). The saving grace of the whole day was the little cafe where we had morning tea/lunch. Without that we would have given up and come back to the caravan park early I think. Chris and I had a laugh about it but the kids were less than impressed and said they never wanted to go to Wyndham again!!

Next day was a better day. We went to Lake Argyle for a quick look around the lake.

Unfortunately you can only see a tiny piece at the end where the water outlet is and we would have had to pay $200 to go on a boat ride to see a tiny bit more, but still nowhere near the entire thing, so we came back to Lake Kununurra and hired some canoes for a little paddle there instead. Laura and I were in one canoe and Chris and Will in the other. Will was terrified and held onto the sides for most of the ride, until we told him we were heading back, then he wanted to paddle and even got game enough to give me a splash with his paddle!!

Mary Pool was our next stop and it was a really sweet little camping area with lots of shade, right beside the river. Met a lovely couple from Albury/Wodonga (Justin and Katherine) who are travelling with their little boy Jed and had a great night chatting and trading stories.

Had to cross this bridge which was covered with water and could be a little scarey in the wet season I'm sure!

Willare was our next stop, just at the crossroad before you turn off to Derby. We stayed there two nights for a little R&R but couldn't swim because council had closed the pool. Spent one day checking out Derby and after our misadventures in Wyndham we were a little dubious about another small town but it was actually quite nice. Went to the pier but the tide was out so there was hardly a drop in the entire bay area, as far as the eye could see was mud. The tides can have a 7 metre shift, pretty impressive!

Found a prison tree in Derby too, but this one was right near the road and much easier to get to than the one in Wyndham (wish we'd known that at the time!). Apparently the prisoners were walked from here to Fitzroy Crossing which is hundreds of km's. My god, it's a wonder any of them survived!

Look what else we found...BP Colac (named after a ship wreck in the King Sound they tell me).

What next? Well then we got to Broome where we are presently relaxing. Staying 3 nights. Caravan Park is very tidy and the pool is glorious...check it out...

It even has a 25m lap pool so the kids can jump around and have fun and the serious swimmers won't get annoyed. Gotta love that!

Went for a drive yesterday and had a look at the local beach. Tomorrow we are off to Cable Beach and up the coast.

Laura at the beach in Broome.

Chris went fishing today but alas, NO fish! I stayed home with the kids and believe it or not, it was raining and I had to put on my long pants and a jumper. It got down to 22 degrees in the day, but it's even lower now so I will be cuddling up to the doona tonight. Brrr!

My mate Caz

Saturday saw Chris and Will leave on the bus and head for Katherine. Laura and I stayed to help Caz pack a few things and do some filing (boy, my secretarial skills are dodgy, I even ended up with a cut hand!). Then we headed off ourselves with all the animals: Wicket, a pregnant Suzie (who is due any day now!), Mumma cat and the 3 chickens (Stardust, Sparkles and the only hen - Pepper). We had a non-eventful trip, just the way we like it and went straight to Janelles to drop off Laura for a play with Micaelia. Will was already there so they could say a last "seeya" to the kids. We stayed at Meryl and John's and had a delicious tea with Caz, Craig, Janelle, John, Darren and Kelly and it was all going fine until I had to say the first goodbye...then I lost it a little. But what else did everyone expect? Those who know me expect me to cry at farewells, weddings, funerals, get togethers, hell any old time at all really!

Well it had to be done, and on Sunday morning at about 9am we piled onto the big blue bus and drove away from my mate Caz, to continue our adventure around Australia. It was dreadful to leave her so close to having her little bubba (only a few weeks to go), but I know Craig and all the family will look after her. I am so glad to have had the opportunity to spend lots of time with her and to catch up on life and news in general, which you just can't do over the phone. Until the New Year...chow for now Caz and thanks for everything :-)) xxx

Final days in Darwin...

Caz took some lovely photos of the family so I stuck one in here for you all to see, we don't have many good ones of the four of us. Here we are all swished up to go out for tea with Matthew and Shelly, and of course Caz. We went to The Jetty which is an all-you-can-eat place and the food was lovely.

This is another night we went out for tea to Outback Jacks. There is a massive croc on the roof which kept the kids entertained and as a bonus kids ate free on the night we went, super!

Unfortunately it was the last night I got to see Shelly and it was very sad to say goodbye to her (hence the red eyes all round!) I wish I had made more of an effort to catch up with Shelly while we were there, but she knows I love her anyway :-)

Gaz, Jen and the kids got up to Darwin in the week or so before we left. Would have loved another couple of weeks to catch up but had to make the most of the time we had. Took the kids to the waterpark and Will's friend Martin came along too. Kids had a great time as you can see.

Martin, Will and Hughie, in descending order!

Nikki and Laura ready and rearing to go!

Will and Martin, best mates.

Then our time in Darwin drew to a close and it was time for my last night in the most beautiful city I know. Went to the Beachfront for tea and drinks with the girls from 3A (the ward I worked in at the hospital) and had a really wonderful night. Lots of laughs and good memories to take with me, thanks a million girls, you are a super group!

Me, Lauren and Jess