Allthegobro

Gutharraguda is a big place over 2.2 m hectares of diverse landscapes, so you can’t possibly see it all in 4 days and also sit around and just enjoy the fresh air. Gutharraguda is aboriginal for Shark Bay and means two waters. The peninsular on which we are based juts out and divides the Bay in two segments. Denham where we are is on the west coast and we see the sun set over water. Monkey Mia is on the other side and faces east towards the mainland and the sun sets over the land behind it.

On one of our drives around we called into Shell Beach. Now this is serious shell stuff. The little Hamelin cockle shells number in their trillions (or just a real lot it seems) and the beach and shoreline was just covered in them. They are up to nine metres deep in places. There used to be a quarrying operation here that cut calcified blocks of these for building purposes.

Shell Beach

Shells of Shell Beach

There are a number of buildings in Denham with walls made from these blocks, including the Old Pearler’s Cottage which now houses a restaurant. We lashed out and had a nice evening meal in here.  The camping ground had a number of its retaining walls made out of them. The quarry now only works to produce blocks when repair jobs are needed.

Old Pearler’s Cottage, the walls are shell blocks cut from deposits at Shell Beach

From Shell Beach we made our way down to Hamelin Pool which is right at the bottom of the Bay. Here the water is very shallow and salty. In fact about twice as salty as the rest of the Bay. In this environment Stromatolites have prospered. Sromatolites are microbiological structures that go back to the earliest times of life, about 3,500 m years ago. They look like small black blobs on stalks about the size of a football. Some of them seem to join up and form a maze type pattern. Fascinating place.

Stromatolites

After the day long Steep Point trip we decided to have an afternoon on the water at Monkey Mia and went for a sail on Shotover. The objective was to find dugongs, dolphins and turtles. Now there was a fair wind and this whipped the sea up a bit which made sighting the dugongs difficult. It was early in the Dugong season as well which didn’t help. We didn’t see any. One of the highlights was running over the top of a turtle as it surfaced under one of hulls of the boat. Made a super big crack when it hit. One of the crew went below to check for any damage…….to the boat not the turtle. We didn’t see the turtle again and the boat was ok. It was suggested that he/she warned the dugongs off. A few dolphins were also sighted. Though we didn’t see any dugongs it was a great afternoon on the water. We finished off with a complimentary sunset sail and watched the sun drop over the land behind some unusual cloud shapes.

On board Shotover

Sunset out on the Bay

We are now heading away from Shark Bay for Kalbarri, about 150 km  south.

One of the things to do when you are at Shark Bay is to go out to Steep Point. It’s the most westerly point on mainland Australia and marks one of the entrances to Shark Bay. Dirk Hartog Island lies across the channel. It was a full days drive from Denham, 430 km return. Now the first 85 km on the bitumen takes you almost back to the turnoff from the NW Coastal Hwy and on to what is called Useless Loop Rd. From here it is about another 100 km of gravel as the road loops around the bottom of Shark Bay and then up the coast to Steep Point. This section contained what could only be described as some of the worst corrugated road Allthego has driven on, bone jarring shaking for km after km, even with the tyres down to 20 psi. One stretch of about 8 km was just unbelievably bad, used by trucks going to and from a salt mine operation. Glad to get past it. The last 30 km is along a one lane sandy track that traverses the sand dunes and the shoreline out to Steep Point.

On the road to Steep Point.

Along the beach for part of the way

We didn’t see any cars on these tracks and all up saw only half a dozen all day and they were parked at Steep Point. National Parks say to allow 3 hours for the trip along Useless Loop Rd and the final section out to the point. It took us 3 and half. There were quite a few tent campers spread out along the foreshores, mostly fishing I would guess.

Beach just off the road.

It was a great view from the Point, certainly a wild and woolly coastline. A post in front of the Most Westerly Point sign allows you to attach a camera to get the memento photo of the trip’s destination. We sat down here on a rock and had some lunch gazing across the channel to Dirk Hartog Island and the surf crashing against its cliff lined shore.

Near Steep Point

At Steep Point

The return trip to Denham took just as long and it was sunset before we got back along Useless Loop Rd, returning in the dark to Old Farts Lane  at the camping ground. A sleep in was forecast for the next morning!

We settled into the Denham Seaside Tourist Village at Shark Bay after the trip along the Butchers Track. Denham is the major town, actually the only town on Shark Bay. We were lucky in  getting a site right on the beachfront along a short access way, aptly named Old Farts Lane. The couple next to us have been coming from Perth to the Bay and staying in this spot for the last 22 years for 4 or 5 months at a time, they were in their late 70s or early 80s. Limpets. A few others seemed to know them as well. It was a great spot with a view of white sand and blue water. A bit different to red dirt. It then sunk in that we had crossed the continent from east to west! To greet us the weather gods produced a nice blow that night, the van rocked a bit and the tied down awning held its ground. A little bit of rain. We awoke to a clear sky and much calmer weather.

Our spot beside the seaside

The sun goes down outside the front door

Off we went for a trip up to Monkey Mia to see the dolphins. Which we did. We have seen dolphins before. There were 3 of them swimming up and down the beach front, we had missed the last of the morning feeds at around 11.30. As if by clockwork they disappeared at midday, almost on the dot. They do this each day and then return again the next morning. All have names and distinctive markings.

Pelican giving a dolphin grief at Monkey Mia

Who’s looking at who in this close up?

On the way to Monkey Mia we stopped for a look at Little Lagoon. It is an almost circular body of shallow crystal clear water. From a distance atop a hill at the golf club it is deep blue fringed by white sand. By accident we came across a small patch of Sturts Desert Pea beside the gravel road into the golf club, the type that has a red pea centre and not the black pea centre that we have seen previously. They were the only Sturts Desert Peas we saw in Shark Bay.

Little Lagoon

Allthego dipping his toes in Little Lagoon

It goes without saying that the wild flowers are profuse yet again. But at the moment we have had enough of wild flowers and are keeping our eyes out for mallee fowl, kangaroos and emus. Emus it is and we have seen two mobs of them running away in the scrub.

Sturts Desert Pea

Emus are plentiful

We have now moved on to Kalbarri after 4 days at Shark Bay. So the blog is catching up. But there is more yet to come on the Bay including a day trip to Steep Point, the most westerly point of the Australian mainland.

Well we are now off to Shark Bay along Butchers Track. Why is it called Butchers Track, we don’t know. Maybe it’s because a butcher lived here ages ago, was he (or she) a meat butcher or a human butcher, we don’t know and as we set off we didn’t really want to dwell on the matter. All in all its 144 km along the usual gravel red dirt road to the North West Hwy which then connects off to Shark Bay.

Butchers Track

Emu tracks

It’s a modest drive along a good road. A little way into it a vehicle charged past us van in tow, a 100 kph or so compared to our modest 85 kmh. They disappeared into the distance. Half an hour later we pulled past them busy changing a blown tyre  and not requiring any assistance.  Allthego, always willing to help,  found this a blessing and quickly moved on. Homealone in her usual style warned Allthego about being half smart. Speeding rat bags etc etc. A bit later someone came along the other way. So they wouldn’t have been left stranded. Was the Butcher watching? They were the only people we saw on the track.

Flower 1

The track winds its way over a vast sandy plain with sand dunes cutting the road as we progress west. The road rises from a low point of 134 m to a high point of 324 m. It’s actually like sailing along, up and over the dunes. All the time we are surrounded by wildflowers in full bloom. Just amazing! At this stage we are not sure what the name of all these flowers is, so have just called them ‘Flower 1’, ‘Flower 2’ etc

Flower 2

Flower 3

Flowers 4

Flower 3

It was a great drive.

Shark Bay Welcome

We have arrived at the beginning of the Shark Bay World Heritage Drive and that is where we will pick up the story next time!

We set off from Cue for the Murchison Settlement along another back road heading north by north-west, it’s about 220km of good gravel. The scenery though is becoming a little repetitive. Red dirt roads, red dirt road verges, red dirt dust, red dirt covering car and van and  red dirt getting in the van. But there are lots of wildflowers to be seen. Homealone has just about had the red dirt but not the wildflowers.

On the road to Murchison

Carpet of wildflowers along the way

Along the way we crossed the Murchison River. This point is roughly about half way along its length. It has its source in the lands to the north of Meekatharra and flows south-west into the sea at Kalbarri, through the gorges in the Kalbarri National Park. We will be having a few days at Kalbarri later in the trip.

Murchison River

Gathering storm at the Murchison River

A storm was gathering and we needed to hurry along to keep ahead of it. We managed to do this and arrived in Murchison Settlement late in the afternoon. This is a small little ‘settlement’ of 20 or so people. But a great caravan park, plenty of green grass  surrounded by red dirt. The red dirt in this case are polo fields. It seems that people regularly converge here for the sport. All in all there are about 120 people in the whole Shire of Murchison (49,500 sq km) and the Settlement is its hub. The rest of the people are out on the surrounding properties.

Camp site at Murcheson, polo field at left

BBQ in the rotunda

A tree with yellow flowers

We had a day of R & R here in the shady grounds apart from a short 15 km trip out to Errabiddy Bluff which is the major nearby attraction.

Errabiddy Bluff

A small error has been noted in the last blog, many of my readers will have also picked it up but are to kind to correct me. It was not Jimmy Stewart who starred in Hitchcock’s North by North-West but Cary Grant. As always this blog is E & O E!

Flannel bush

We now head west, to Shark Bay. But we have decided on another shortcut along the Butchers Track route. One can only speculate on why it’s called the Butchers Track. We will see!

Cue is an interesting little town. There used to be about 10,000 people in this area back in the late 1800s early 1900s. Now 500 tops. This is one of the things that has struck us in these travels, the de-population of the east (not the west!). The people in these small towns we have traveled through rely on frozen bread and meat. There are no frock shops for the girls, maybe it’s now done online. Bells Emporium sells everything you could want in the way of groceries and bits and pieces. It’ all on the shelves behind the counter, like in the good old days. A few freezers are there though with the meat, quick meals for the prospectors in town, ice creams etc.

Bells Emporium

The Cue Rotunda

Always a pub. But their trading hours are from 4pm on and they might sell groceries as well. And there are no frock shops out here! Haven’t seen a hairdresser for the girls either, Homealone must be getting edgy!

We had dinner at the pub. We hadn’t had a steak for some days so both of us were attracted to the T- Bones. These were quite large and covered with sauce, the chips were pretty good too and the chief thought we needed potato salad as well. It was a substantial meal.

T-Bone & mushroom sauce at the pub

Allthego gone ……after the T-bone

The town is also proud of its old stone buildings. They are among the best we have seen on the gold fields.

The old Bank of NSW building is for sale, not sure who owns it  but hope it’s not Westpac!   The old  1880s Gentlemen’ Club is now the local Council headquarters.

Bank of NSW

Gentlemen’s Club

Steel cut outs are the go out in the west, I mean the east, for the tourist displays. Every town has them. There must have been a special on steel a few years ago. Murals are also big. The one in town at  the Civic Centre was a little different, it was all about people now and not historical depictions.

A mural at the Civic Centre

Some sheep on the Cue common

We enjoyed our stop here but now move back to the west, maybe it is North by North West, to Murchison Settlement. But it is Allthego at the wheel not Jimmy Stewart!

Leaving Yalgoo we headed north-east along a back road to Cue, from memory about 160km. It was good gravel and clay all the way. Along this stretch of road there were some interesting old mine sites and an abandoned homestead and woolshed complex. It was surrounded by an amazing carpet of violet wildflowers. Homealone also spotted what we think is young kite sitting in a dead tree beside the road.  It kept a keen eye on me as I tried to creep closer, eventually flying off in a rush of feathers to safer places.

We think this is a young Kite?

The road north-east to Cue.

A special place down a side track is a small meteorite crater discovered in 1920. It is apparently the smallest authenticated site in the world and is about 20 metres across and 5 metres deep; comparatively young at about 3,000 years. The meteorite people believe it was made of an unusual rock type  and because of its small size would have buried itself on impact then exploding, creating the crater. Quite a sight no doubt to the local indigenous people at the time.

The meteorite crater.

Abandoned homestead and woolshed.

Closer to Cue we come to Walga Rock. This is the second largest monolith in Australia after Uluru. It is a place of special significance to the aboriginal people of the area. A large cave has a series of fairly weathered  paintings. There is also a sailing ship outline on the rock wall that seems of much newer vintage. There is debate about who has painted it. It could be that it is not in fact aboriginal in origin but done by an early settler. There appears to be some lines of scraggly  writing underneath it, maybe arabic. Perhaps an early Afghan  camelier  has left a mark!

At Walga Rock talking to something that doesn’t answer back.

The ship at Walga Rock

The wildflowers surrounding us on the roadside continue to amaze in their diversity. Wattles in full bloom are every where, with splashes of everlastings and other ground cover type species. We have been able to identify a few of the more common ones from our small guide books.

A grevillea of some sort?

Carpet of flowers.

We arrived in Cue late afternoon to settle into the very comfortable Council run Cue camp ground for a couple of nights. Cue is midway between Mt Magnet in the south and Meekatharra in the north. The delights of Cue need to await the next blog!

We are actually going east to Yalgoo. Back tracking a bit because we have adjusted the itinerary. But also because in going east this is the way all the gold explorers did back in the 1800s, as well as the early explorers. Unlike in the USA where they went west. There is a Village People song that goes something like

Go West

Life is peaceful there

Go West

Lots………….. I can’t remember the rest……

Well it’s certainly peaceful out here and after going east for a bit we will turn back west, after going north to Cue. The Mullewa Show was  a great day out despite the rain. Here are some pics of the things mentioned in the last blog entry.

Mullewa show day foot races

A great carrot

Homealone thought hers would have come first maybe!

The winning flower display at the show

It was only 150 km back to Yalgoo and we stopped off in a very neat little caravan park, only about 10 established sites circling a grassed lawn (which is pretty rare out here). Expansion is on the cards as another 10 sites are just being opened up, but all on red dirt. Nearby Yalgoo is Joker’s Tunnel, carved out by early gold explorers. Homealone had a good look in. It was an eerie sort of feeling walking through it. The tunnel walls are not weathered and the different rock strata are a multitude of colours. All done by pick and shovel and some rudimentary blasting. It’s about 100 metres long. A big effort!

Dominican Chapel of St Hyacinth at Yalgoo

Who’s the joker looking in the tunnel?

Monsignor  John Hawes was also in these parts and this Chapel was also designed and built by him. Although in part restored it is no longer used and is fenced off.

Inside the tunnel

Another flower, pure white.

Yalgoo has this enormous race track. The start is on the far side and you can barely see the little set of starting gates. The annual April 2016 race day was postponed, by wet weather it seems. A revised date is not advertised so I expect it will be delayed till April 2017.

Yalgoo racecource

Welcome to Yalgoo

The internet has been dreadfully slow over the last week and we are now at Shark Bay and will be trying to catch up over the next couple of days.

We have been here in Mullewa for 3 days and have enjoyed it greatly. A very neat caravan park close to town  and amonst the wildflowers. Homealone has bought a couple of wildflower booklets and is busily ticking off the flowers as the photos are taken. Quite a process of identification, sometimes the actual flower doesn’t quite look like the book’s photo. The bush is alive with everlastings of all types and colours, wattles and a few bottle brushes and grevilleas.

Emu Tree

Everlastings

Apart from wildflowers, Mullewa is also famous for the work of a Roman Catholic priest in the early 20th century. Monsignor John Hawes, an architect by profession, was based here for 20 odd years and in this time designed and built with his own hands a number of churches in the Murchison region, including the Geraldton Cathedral. They have been described as architectural gems reflecting the natural environment in which they are situated. He left Australia before WW2 and died in the Bahamas, a Franciscon hermit. A strange end for such an active real world person. He might have just worn himself out, the energy all gone?

Church of Our Lady of Mt Carmel and Saints Peter and Paul.

Wildflower display at the Mullewa Show

A highlight of our time here has been a day trip out into the country to the Coalseam Conservation Park . The park was  ablaze with yellow pom poms, a total contrast with the white pom poms closer to Mullewa.

A pom pom among the pom poms

At Coalseam Conservation Park

The wreath flower is a special of this area. People go hunting to find them, which isn’t hard because there are sign posts all the way to their location , about 35 km from Mullewa. They seem to be in an isolated patch of country beside the road side. They do look great. A circular green plant which flowers at the edges. Looks just like a wreath!

Wreath flower

The weather so far has been great, sunny blue skies. Except for last night. The wind got up and the rain came down. It continued this morning putting a bit of a dampener on the opening of the Mullewa Agricultural Show. But by lunch time the sun was out and the Show’s activities were successfully underway. Some interesting displays of local produce,craft, photography and artwork were on display. Lots of prizes being given out, a very large deformed carrot secured a first place. As the day wore on the storm clouds gathered and the rain came down.

We now move on over the next few days to Yalgoo, Cue and Murchison Junction. The internet is a bit slow out here so we may be off the air for this time. we’ll see!

Well,  Sandstone seems to have two main attractions. London Bridge and Lady Di. London Bridge is the rock formation a few kilometres from town and Lady Di is the pie lady and she is right in town. We were in Sandstone for two nights . On arrival the town was blacked out for some unknown reason. No power in the caravan park and no water. It came on sometime after midnight. The local pub was serving under candle light.

Sandstone is an interesting little place on the edge of the goldfields. There are about 50 residents, 100 fly in fly out  mine workers and perhaps 40 people in the caravan park. Now a lot of the caravan park people have longish white beards, craggy features and a limited vocabulary…….they talk about gold prospecting and how many grams they found today but never where. It is quite a booming thing, this gold prospecting. People seem to come on holidays to do it and will come back next year as well. Mostly men, not a lot of women. They also play golf.

Homealone on the green at the Sandstone golf club, it looks to be in but stopped short.

Traveled out on the heritage trail around town. The main attraction is London Bridge, the rock formation. This has been a gathering place for townsfolk since the late 1800s and for the aborigines, many generations before. It is not yet falling down but is getting thinner.

London Bridge

The other attraction is Lady Di. She cooks pies on the street corner in one of those Breville pie makers. Supposed to be pretty good pies. She also sells bush dukkha, which is also pretty good. Allthego had some sprinkled on scrambled eggs. Two packets are coming home with us along with some special hot sauce. But back to the pies. Allthego was on the go and had a chat with Lady Di about the pies. A customer was also on hand and said the pies were excellent. They posed for a photo for the blog. She makes the pies each morning and does a good trade, particularly with the fly in fly outs coming on and off shift. She reckons she is known all over Australia.

Lady Di’s bush dukkha, rather good scattered on scrambled egg.

Lady Di and keen customer. Lady Di is at right.

A more conventional pie can be had in the hotel. But we had schnitzles. They have a fire going in the bar and you can eat there as well. A cosy spot. Chloe, the current  bar attendant, is from Norwich in England. She has been in Sandstone for 12 weeks, with another two to go before heading to Perth. Backpacking by her self around Australia, brave girl. Having a great time though chatting to all us nomads.

Chloe and XXXX behind the bar

The fire at the pub, kept the bar room warm

Allthego’s schnitzle with bacon, hollandaise sauce and a few chips

We have had a fairly quiet time here after a busy of couple of days on the road. Will now be heading towards Mullewa for the wildflowers and the annual Mullewa wild flower and Agricultural shows. Homealone is looking forward to seeing the farm machinery, discussing fertilizers and pest control solutions with product agents.

Until next time.

Now dear reader you might ask why “Inside Australia”. Well this is because we have had a cultural experience out here 51km from Menzies beside and on Lake Ballard. In 2003 the Australian taxpayer (perhaps there were some sponsors as well) appears to have funded Antony Gormley, a renowned British sculptor, to install 51 figures on the salt encrusted lake surface. Now it takes about a day to wander around the lake and see them all. We didn’t do this, saw about 7 of them in an hour or so; they are about 200 metres apart, or so it seems.

Jane

Fred

Now these 51 figures are all derived from laser scans of Menzies inhabitants. They are reduced , cross sectioned and played around with to finish up with what the sculptor has called “insiders”. I suppose they have been reduced to their bones and not much more. Males are distinguishable from females.

Fred again

Jane again

Now for the culture bit:

“The Insider reveals an attitude in a taut abstract shape formed by the passage of the person’s life. Out on the salt lake they become antennae in space in relationship with each other but also with the land and the limit of our perception: the horizon,” says Antony Gormley.

Now that is interesting stuff. Allthego took his camp stool out on the Lake and sat down and had a brief chat with one of these “insiders”. She didn’t have much to say. Went on about how wet it had recently been and how she always got a thrill out of seeing people out here on the Lake. She wondered why I was sitting on a chair. I said this was because she and her 50 mates were all standing up. Maybe Antony should have had one of them sitting down, would have added a talking point to the whole thing.

Allthego explaining the big picture to Bertha

The whole installation left one a bit mesmerised, particularly as away in the distance a mirage gave the appearance of water in the lake. Allthego thinks that maybe the message is about stripping away the trappings of life, engaging with the natural environment, rejuvenating the soul and moving to a higher plane and level of consciousness.

Or something like that.

An interesting day out and a long drive back to Leonora.

Since leaving the Great Central Road we have spent our time in Laverton and Leonora, in WA’s north-east goldfields to the north of Kalgoorlie. One of things that is good about this is that we have returned to something like normal diesel prices. Along the GCR the top price paid was at Warakurna, $2.40 l. On the Plenty Highway the Station owners got plenty at $2.00 l. We are now down around $1.40 l.

Allthergo checking the route. It was 4 degrees and he didn’t mind being seen in his Parra Eels’ blanket and Blues’ beanie.

It’s all about gold out here, with nickel thrown in for good measure. Laverton is famous for the Windarra Nickel Mine. For those old enough Windarra is the nickel mine that Poseidon NL promoted in 1969-70 and went from almost nothing to $280 a share within a few weeks. As with a lot off these situations Poseidon did not ultimately develop the mine as it went broke, others did. It is now almost 25 years since the mine closed and the area rehabilitated. Some of the old equipment has been left in place, but the whole site is now returning to a ‘natural state’. Many tons of seeds were planted and the landscape ‘moulded’ back to its ‘original’ form. It does look good. A bit of new exploration is going on in the area, maybe a new mine will emerge.

Poseidon NIckel Mine site

Mt Morgans Council Chambers

Laverton, like Leonora, is a bit of a shadow of its former self. Back in the late 1800s and early 1900s there were thousands of people on the gold fields. The town around the nearby old Mt Morgan’s Mine (not to be confused with Mt Morgan in Queensland) had 3,500 people there, only one building remains today, the Council Chambers. The old railway platforms are there also, leading off to Perth 550 km away.

John Aspinal’s grave. The 23 year old New Zealand prospector died from a lightning strike and was buried here in the middle of nowhere in 1896. The grave was discovered and restored in 1980.

The town of Menzies, where we went a couple of days ago had over 10,000 inhabitants in the early 1900s. The whole Shire of Menzies today number a little over 400.

Back in Leonora the main street is very quiet. But there are three pubs to keep the locals amused. In a sister town nearby Gwalia, there is a large gold mine, Sons of Gwalia. This is a famous old mine dating back to the late 1800s. It shut up shop in 1963 a few days before Christmas and the population left almost immediately, several hundred people. They left a ghost town, the remnants of which have been preserved.

Typical 1950s/early 60s shanty house at Gwalia.

Kitchen in one of the shanty houses

The butcher in Leonora, Neil Biggs, lived in the early 1950s as a young boy in one of these shanty type houses. He is known as Niggy, it took Allthego a bit of time to work that one out. We spent an hour so wandering around looking at this amazing little human landscape.

Biggs the butcher in Leonora, still uses a wooden chopping block. Lived as a young boy at Gwalia in early 1950s.

Up overlooking the open cut mine is the grand Mine Manager’s House. It was built by Herbert Hoover in 1898 when he was the Mine Manager at Gwalia. He later went on to become the 31 st President of the USA in 1931. Today it is a B & B.

Gwalia open pit

In recent years the mine has reopened. The old open cut mine pit is also one of those postcards you see from time to time. Deep. The mine today goes further underground to a bit over a kilometre, it takes an hour and half for trucks to come to the surface.

We now move on to Sandstone, a little bit further north and west and on the edge of the eastern goldfields, fields and heading for wheat and sheep areas. The wild flowers are also starting to emerge as we come into Spring.

All 1100 km of it, along mostly gravel roads, from Yulara to Laverton in Western Australia. We have had two stops along the way at roadhouses and have enjoyed the remoteness of location, the clear night skies and, yes, the rather chilly nights. The hot water bottles have remained in mothballs though. Campfires have warmed the bones before retiring under the donnas.

The road ahead for 1100 km to Laverton

Some steaks on the camp fire

The road has not been nearly as bad as the guide books paint. We have been lucky it seems. A manager at one of the roadhouses says they have never been better, usually not as good as this and certainly a lot better than 5 years ago (when the guide books were written maybe). Long stretches of smooth gravel and clay, not quite a snooker table, some corrugations and wash outs. The Isuzu and van have handled it well. Couple of minor problems with our rear vision mirror camera and the road just shakes the clip on mirrors, making them next to useless. This is not really a problem because there is not exactly a lot of traffic to worry about in these parts.

A little bit of water encountered, got through on the right bank before going to the left bank!

Weather balloon released at the Giles weather station at Warakurna

Have seen some interesting places along the way. Lasseter’s cave, where he holed up for 20 days or so, in the 1930s, before setting out and subsequently dying in the desert. He was still looking for his ‘lost’ gold reef west of Alice Springs and Uluru. He had originally ‘found’ it in the 1890s. The cave was a fascinating spot beside a river bed. Allthego had a dig in the dry river bed sands and about 20 cm down water started to pool. Maybe it was there when Lasseter was , maybe it wasn’t. Who knows now?

Allthego with the tyre changing equipment at Warburton Roadhouse, he could barely pick the hammer up

Lasserter’s cave, Allthego emerging

Our route has taken us through the Gibson and Great Victoria deserts. The landscape though has been awash with vibrant colours, particularly the yellow flowers of cassias. A small patch of Sturts Desert Pea also jumped out at us, these are quite scarce it seems.

Amazing, a clay pan beside the road in the Great Victoria Desert full of water!

The Giles Breakaways, not far from Laverton

The trees and bushes are also looking in great condition following the rains. Spinifex stretches for miles either side of the road, with their seed stems wafting in the breezes.

A camel giving us a good look

Some Sturts Desert Peas giving us the eye

We have spotted a camel and a few lizards, nothing much else.

The red dust though has been a bit of a trial in the house keeping duties. It just gets into everything. We are now in Laverton and will tomorrow head north-west towards Mt Magnet, stopping first at Leonora and then Sandstone for a few days.

We have now been at Uluru for a couple of days. After leaving Gemtree we made a quick stop in Alice Springs to replenish the pantry before moving a further 90 km south to stay the night at Stuarts Wells. This place has been around a while but is clean and neat. There were a couple of emus locked up in a cage around one of the wells, a few ducks and chickens as well. We made a reasonably quick getaway from here the next morning after having breaky in the road house, a big plate of bacon and eggs for Allthego and a likewise big plate of scrambled eggs for Homealone. Have to keep our energy up somehow.

Stuarts Wells camp site

Old man emu at Stuarts Wells

Arrived at Uluru around 3 pm and set up camp. The next day was pretty easy, basically wandering around the campsite area and catching sunset over the Rock.

Its a rock slide

Sunset at Uluru

The stop over here was really to see the Field of Light in the evening. This is an installation of light bulbs on stems. The Field was designed by a Englishman, Bruce Munro who has put together a number of these  things in Europe and the USA. He visited Australia 25 years ago and from there the idea sprung. It took till now to do it. His biggest one so far. It sits in a shallow depression about 7 km from The Rock. There are 50,000 of these lights which are computer controlled and periodically change colour. It is spread over an area equivalent to nearly seven football fields and is solar powered. Amazing, we wandered around the field for about an hour. There is no particular pattern to it. Makes you wonder about the Min Min Lights.

Field of Light

Tomorrow we head for Western Australia down the Great Central Road 1100 km of mostly gravel to Laverton. This is going to take us three days and we will be off the air for this time.

Leaving Bouila we headed off down the Donohue Highway to Tobermorey.

Just a short drive to our destination.

The road was written up as a pretty terrible, full of corrugations, bull dust holes and other perils. Disappointingly, there were very few of these. It seems that things have been on the improve. There was plenty of bitumen.

Its down this way.

And along here……….

But it was still a long and dusty drive to Tobermorey. Here the facilities were a little basic, when the station generator was going the lights were on and the shower water pumped plenty nice and hot. When the generator wasn’t on none of this happened. Allthego was caught short all lathered up when bingo, the generator went out. 10 minutes later it came on again and all was well for Allthego.  Now there is a Tobermorey on the Isle of Mull in Scotland. Nothing like this cattle station in western Queensland! But, like in Scotland,  there was plenty of green grass to set up on so it was a very pleasant stopover.

At rest at Tobermorey

Next morning we were off down the road to Jervois cattle station. We crossed into the Northern Territory and joined the Plenty Highway for the 220 km journey. Now this was all gravel with plenty of corrugations, but again not too bad. Wouldn’t like to have the family sedan on it though. A highlight along this stretch was stopping at a turkey mound (hope I have this right) beside the road. Now, in the natural world these so called turkey mounds occur where the water ‘leaks’ out of the artesian basin to the surface and forms ponds.. Graziers have humped these up above the surrounding plain to form mounds, these days adding pumps to assist the natural flow. They are havens for birds. We saw plenty of finches and a few parrots and ducks.

The Turkey Mound

This is a large Termite mound.

Jervois Station was a little more basic than Tobermorey. How much? Well it was a 300 metre walk to the facilities. And it was plenty dark too! But the showers were plenty hot and there were no generator issues. The highlight here was completing the Census and handing our paper copy to the station people for later collection by census staff moving along the Plenty Highway. Plenty of room for issues here.

Jervois facilities

Camp site at Jervois

The country side has really been great, the bush in plenty good shape but still needing plenty more rain this coming spring/summer.

Next morning,  we were off on the final 200 km leg along the Plenty to Gemtree. This took us past the Harts Range community, famous for its annual race day. It also has the only police station along this 800 km stretch of road. Two officers are stationed here to keep control. Enough said!

Gemtree is a camping ground, plenty of facilities. It specialises as a venue for gem fossikers. No grass, just that lovely red dirt surrounded by mulga trees. We were there for two nights. On our first night we enjoyed an absolutely tremendous camp oven dinner put on by our hosts. Plenty of roast beef, potato, pumpkin, onion, cauliflower, brocoli and gravy. Bit of cheese sauce in there too.

Among the Mulgas at Gemtree

The next day Allthego undertook a strenuous walk examining the various flora of the region. Homealone was holed up at the van immersed in a cross stitch. The walk took a little longer than estimated. Homealone became concerned as the return time passed, so she called out a posse to search for the lone explorer. The quad bike posse found Allthego striding up the final stages of the walk and transported him to the campsite, despite various minor protestations that it wasn’t really necessary. There was a bit of discussion after this about the necessity of it all. All’s well that ends well, someone said!

The night concluded over a camp fire with some tasty BBQ chicken kebabs and rice.

Homealone reckons there is plenty to see on the Plenty Highway!

As the night descended we reflected on the plenty of things we had seen on the Plenty Highway. One of the great Australian road trips. We now head for Uluru.