Blogs from Western Australia, Australia, Oceania - page 4

There's often a pivotal moment when a decision is made to travel to an exotic locale. For some it is prefaced by procrastination...others a whim...a spur of the moment idea acted upon...others gotta tick a bucket list. From a moment of vulnerability from a tennis match I never would have thought. Ours are usually spur of the moment..."I can do that" leading Denise and I on our David Hoo Tours in China ("your travel experts with minimal experience but major optimism"...that's me folks). A shock "Gooday" in an icy Pingyao walled city one Winter when all I was thinking was "How did I get us into this one?"...thus meeting Mike & Ros with whom we travelled to Mali & Ethiopia years later. An offer over a dinner table to drive me to a carved mountain in ... read more

From Derby to Wyndham is approximately 920klm so decided to take it easy over three days so that we can stop along the way. First stop was Fitzroy Crossing for fuel only and what a depressing town this is....aboriginal people sitting under trees everywhere, begging outside the roadhouse, the roadhouse itself had no windows but if they did they were boarded up, dirty toilets at roadhouse....not a nice place! We fuelled up and got the hell out of there! The 2 way road crossing of the Fitzroy River just opened again this week after being washed away AGAIN....it was all easy and had no trouble getting through. Then onto Ngumban Cliff Rest area, a free campground with toilets, rubbish facility and dump point, great spot perched up on the cliff, great for the sunset. Had happy ... read more

After two days on the lagoon between Marble Bar and Port Hedland, we headed off to stay in the G'Day Park in Port Hedland for a few days. Our first stop was the car/van wash and it took John a good half hour to get the dust off everything and it seems to be still oozing out of every crevice! Arrived at the caravan park and got all set up and looked across and down one and there were a couple we met at the Marble Bar Races....Toni and Mick..... we were so glad to meet up and we had a lovely time with them as our neighbors....happy hour 4pm each day for the 5 days! Port Hedland is a very industrial town everything is red, house roofs, roads, shops! A very spread out town, like ... read more

After our farwell to Exmouth dinner at Froth Brewery in Exmouth with Keith and Jo and a good nights sleep we set off for Tom Price. After six hours driving we pulled into a camping spot on the edge of the road about 100klm out of Tom Price. Then onto Tom Price for a night to replenish food supplies and catch up on washing etc. There is a Coles in Tom Price and the prices are really reasonable because Rio Tinto subsidises the freight for supplies to be bought into town. Friday onto Karijini National Park 100klms all sealed roads, school breaks up here today so were very lucky to get a spot booking at the end of May to get 2 nights at Dales Camp Ground and then another two nights at the overflow camp, ... read more

Thursday saw us push through to Norseman to fill up and then a further 90klm up the road to our stop for the night Widgie Tavern and Roadhouse which is on the road heading towards Kalgoorlie. You may all think why we didn't turn left and head down to Esperance and Albany, we have been there twice before and thought we would give it a miss this time and concentrate on the northern areas. So Widgiemooltha is in the Goldfields region of WA and there were plenty of mine workers in for beers and a counter meal, in fact I was the only female in the place! Friday saw us go through Coolgardie and onto Southern Cross where we fuelled up and had some lunch, so now being in the Wheatbelt area, there are nine regions ... read more