So good to back in Ozzy land! Other than the fact it’s a lot warmer here there is something about NZ that makes you feel that you have gone back in time! So we are back in modern day life! Darwin is a great place - its hot, red and has an atmosphere similar to the wild west! Some of the bars play Country and Western and full of cowboy wannabies! Its great. Our main aim here is to find a car that will last the journey to Melbourne that is approximately 12,000 km… so we searched the Backpackers notice boards, unfortunately there wasn’t much to go at. We took the 1st car that looked ok; a Red Ford Falcon with 334,000k on the clock… Wow this car has done Oz many times. Exchanged $1,900 with the lovely Dutch couple and off to the Rego department to change into our name and have the plates changed to the Northern Territory.
Left Darwin the following day heading South to Lichfield National Park for the night. The week previous a woman was taken from the side of one of the water holes within this park by a big crocodile so we both decided that we would stay clear of the waters of Lichfield National Park!
We drove South West to Katherine the roads are mad! I love them they are so different from driving in the UK. Dusty roads with the brightest red soil running along side with a scattering of dead Kangeroos and Cattle that have died of thirst! We also drove thorough bush fires that were literally a few feet away from the edge of the road! Scary. Also, every other motorist waves at you as you drive along these long, long empty roads! Kununurra in the Kimberleys next where myself & Lydia used to work in the Banana Plantations back in 2002 – bringing back some memories! This place hasn’t changed at all apart from a few more dozen drunken Aborigines lying on their backs under trees and on the streets.
The next 2500 km from Kununnurra to Broome were basically driving and nowhere worth stopping at apart from Aboriginal communities and dessert looking outback! Two days of driving we arrive finally on the South West Coast in the gorgeous town of Broome. We find a campsite with a swimming pool and set up camp for the next 3 days. The famous Cable Beach resides here in Broome – Wow it’s a stunner! We took a sunset walk down Cable on a camel had to be done! One of the camels was in training and had only been out of the wild in Alice Springs 6 months and already had the lady trainer on his back telling him what to do.
Eighty Mile beach was next, a days driving from Broome, this is where Andy got to use his fishing rod! So we camped just to the side the beach. This beach is quite something! It goes on forever you can’t see anything looking up or down the beach apart from sand and sea. Within 2 hours Andy had pulled out of the sea a massive Blue Salmon! That would feed him for the following 3 days. We then travelled down the coast to Port Hedland – a big coal mining town, we had been told to take a look a the harbour as it is an eye opener, they weren’t wrong, in the harbour was a boat from China that practically took up the entire harbour and all along the hedland was a queue of equally large tanker boats just sat waiting inline for there go in the harbour to pick coal and back to China. We stopped at Karratha, Exmouth, Carnavon, Denham and then Monkey Mia! Were the famous Monkey Mia Breed of dolphins live. We camped overnight and walked to the shore the following morning to watch the dozen dolphins that come in to feed from the rangers every day. As we left Monkey Mia a storm was brewing above us as we drove further down the coast, Kalbarri was under water when we arrived! Great weather for camping.
We stopped in a few cute little seaside villages on our way to Perth and finally arrived 4 weeks after we left Darwin. We were looking forward to Perth as we are staying our friend Tracey who lives here and Lydia was running V8 Car Racing event in Perth for the weekend. So we spent most of the weekend in the Corporate suite at the races watching the events and drinking free beer!
We traveled to Margaret River with friends Shelley & Kevin and spent a day wandering about the vineyards – drinking lots of gorgeous FREE wine. As soon as left Margaret River the temperature dropped! Camping was becoming a very cold thing indeed as we followed the coast through the stunning coastlines of Esperance & Albany. Albany had had a shark attack the previous week so the beautiful blue, sparkling waters were not to be entered as the white pointer sharks had been spotted swimming the shores everyday since the attack. Usually in these circumstances the shark would be destroyed but as this type of shark is endangered they have to leave them alone despite the legless man still in hospital.
The Nullabor Dessert was next 1200km from Norseman to Ceduna with nothing but half a dozen road houses and dessert. So we completed half the 1st day with an overnighter in the car at the side of the road and completed it the following day arriving in Streaky Bay by dusk.
Barossa Valley vineyards we hired bikes out and again had lots of free wine. From Adelaide it was supposed to take us about a week to get to Melbourne but we had had enough of camping in the cold at this point, so we drove a straight 13 hours all the way back to the comfort and warmth of Lydias house and gave them an almighty surprise!
So this might be the last chance we get to make any blog entries between now and October. As the travelling gets a little more remote in Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, and Laos! Thanks to all who've taken the time to read about our travells, and we'll see you when we're back in the UK
Beverley and Andrew x
