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When I was in my 20's a couple of men in Kalgoorlie got the idea to dam a creek about 12 kms from town and to turn it into a lake and water recreation reserve. It became an eventuality and Lake Douglas, one of the blokes names was Dougie Daws. There was never a lot of water in it over the years and the actual dam wall leaked, however it did provide a nice picnic and camping spot for the weekends. Also a lover's lane of sorts.
After the construction work was completed parts of the surrounding area were very barren but now regrowth has reached maturity and the area is a haven to bird life and there are plenty of shrubs just beginning to flower - most especially eramophlias.
The amount of bird song is amazing though these little critters are adept at ensuring they do not show their precious little bodies to anyone. We saw the biggest buck ever swimming on the lake. I haven't hauled out my bird books to identify him yet.
The road in to the site is shared with a mining operation and the first few kms are in fairly good nick,
but once you get past the turn off to the mine it deteriorates but will is not too bad - we have definitely traveled on far worse. There is a bit of a hazard as signs warn of trucks entering the road and by heavens they do. When we were about 400 metres away one entered the roadway without slowing to turn the corner, if we had been another 300 metres up the road we would have been in real trouble, so extra caution is required. On our way out we slowed right down and double checked if any trucks were coming only to meet one entering from the highway onto the bush road. When you are standing on the lake wall you can actually see the mining operations in the distance, it is getting very close to the reserve.
These days the area has been designated as a free camping site and is in Camps 7. We decided to go out and to have a look at what was available for future information. We were amazed at just how much camping space is available and not all in one spot. There are toilets, plenty of rubbish bins and
the area is very clean and well maintained. The main camping area is on the flat below the dam wall and there are many tracks leading off to other more secluded spots for one to three vans.
The laughable thing is that there is now a sign saying that all motorised water sports are banned on the lake! That was what it was built for. I know that someone stocked it with marron and they were thriving but I am unsure if they are still here.
We will be back here to camp in the future.
Tomorrow we are off to look around the town and do some tourist things - how odd considering we lived here for so long.
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