Broome and surrounds

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Another blog for the week,
As we still had some time before Klaus and Yvonne’s tyres were to come in, we all decided to head up to Cape Leveque.
We were told that it was 4WD only but that it was just dusty and a bit corrugated in places. The kombi would make it easy.
First stop off on the dirt was Willie Creek Pearl Farm, the most remote jewellery showroom in the world. Inside the showroom was a continuous DVD playing, it showed how great the tide changes are.
After a spot of lunch (we didn’t purchase any pearls) we headed back on the dirt towards Quandong Point. This part of the track was good, a little soft in places but pretty well kept.
Quandong Point is a small isolated camping area overlooking the ocean, with a short 50m walk to the beach. We spent two days here swimming, fishing and collecting shells and really enjoyed it. It is here were the fishing started to heat up, with many bites and line breakages. All our fishing gear being too light weight (15 - 20pd). It was here we met another fisherman. Tom was about 11 years old with 50pd braided line and 5 and 6 O hooks. The fish still broke his lines and hooks off. The Spanish Mackerel, sharks and Threadfin Salmon are vicious in these parts.
After Quandong we headed up to Cape Leveque. It was 200km of ruff and severely corrugated road. You wonder how such a well know place around these parts can have a road that bad.
It took about 3 hours to travel the road. The kombi was being shaken around a fair bit (not to mention us as well) but made it the whole way in one piece. For the price per night (unpowered site was $32) you wouldn’t expect to have a site that was just dirt and sand with no shade and be over a kilometer walk to the beach.
After just one night stay we headed back down and stayed at a place called Djoodoon (Signet Bay) a small camp ground right on the water, this place was really nice with its own little bay and white sanded beach. It was still a bit more than we would have liked in terms of per night but we were the only ones there apart from the caretaker (Jeff), who was a nice guy and actually gave the boys some pre cut mullet as bait.
The drive in was on soft sand and quite narrow. The kombi was behind us when all of a sudden they stopped. They were bogged. Luckily for them we were there to help, out came the snatch strap and one quick tugged and they were out (all with the trailer still attach to the patrol and snatched off the back of the trailer).
Jeff told the boys where they could fish from and even fished with them one night as the fish were biting. Klaus caught a Barracuda, a Long Tom, a Flathead, some cods and two Mangrove Jacks. He threw back the Long Tom and Mangrove Jacks as they looked small. Mick caught a few Flatheads, a Mangrove Jack and a couple of Mega mouth Cods. We kept the flatheads and also threw back the mangrove jack for the same reason as Klaus. After looking at what Jeff kept and the sizes of his Mangrove Jacks we realized that ours were all legal.
We headed off the next day and the road was, if you didn’t think it could be, worse than the drive in, but was worth it after the fun times we had up there.
One night in Broome (the kombi got his new tyres) before we travelled down to Barnhill station for our last nights together. Barnhill is on a property (for those who have it, it’s the photo on the front cover of the camps 3 book), overlooking the ocean with big red cliffs. This was a nice place despite the lack of shade and the temperatures starting to get a lot warmer (now reaching close to the 40° mark).
We said our goodbyes and best wishes and promised to keep in touch before they headed down the coast and we back to Broome a few nights with a water front camp site.
Whilst in Broome we repacked and reorganized once again, did the Pearl Luggers tour and found where the dinosaur foot prints are (we didn’t get to see them due to the tide not being low enough).
From here we start our return leg by first crossing the infamous Gibb River Road, the Tanami Desert and back through Alice Springs and then to Marree where we will be meeting Ian to do the Birdsville Track and surrounds.
Till then take care all, it’ll be awhile before the next blog.


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