Here is a bit of a catch up on our travels.
We left Broome after 3 months stay and turned South, our first stop was 2 nights at Barn Hill. With walking on the beach and sitting around, Sunday night was roast night for $15 each. Very nice meal and we meet lots of people, also had a craft market as well, jewelry, wooden jewelry boxes, scarfs and stuff.
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| Setup at Barn Hill |
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| Sunset at Barn Hill |
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| Beach decoration |
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| Beach and cliffs at Barn Hill |
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| Waiting for the tide to come in |
From Barn Hill our next night was at Pardoo Station then onto Marble Bar for 2 nights. We had a drink in the Iron Clad pub and met the locals, looked around at the mine at off course the Jasper (Marble) Bar pool.
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| Sign to let you know where you are |
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| Iron Clad Pub at Marble Bar |
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| All that remains of the Comet Mine |
On our drive round the area, we saw the solar plant that powers the town, the Coongan River had an interesting water flow (Flying Fox) devise strung across the valley. The valley floor seem to be full of Jasper rock but you couldn't get down.
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| Coongan River Valley |
We then went onto Marble Bar Pool for a bit of a look, this pool was beautiful, still with lovely reflections of the surrounding hills and trees. We did the usual and took a bucket down with us so that we could see the Jasper wet. Wow the colours.
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| Pool at Marble Bar Pool |
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| Colourful Jasper at Marble Bar Pool |
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| Wet Jasper at Marble Bar Pool |
From Marble Bar we continue on our way through Port Hedland onto a free camp for the night. We had not seen much in the way of road kill till the road into Marble Bar, but once it started there was a lot of it , FREE RANGE GRAVEL FED BEEF, the truck must just keep hitting them. After our free camp we went onto Tom Price for a few more days to visit Karijini National Park. We drove to Hamersley Gorge & Weano Gorge area, past the Eco Resort ($30 a night, no power, no water) which we had though we may stay at for a night or two, no way were we going to take the van on that road after our drive out. We had a nice coffee & cake at the resort for morning tea. The lookouts at Weano Gorge and Hancock Gorge are fantastic. Next time we will walk down into them.
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| Junction Pool Lookout, Karijini |
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| Iron rocks at Oxer Lookout, Karijini |
We also did a mine tour of the Rio Tinto Iron Ore Mine, big trucks, big hole, Mt Tom Price gone to China. The ore trains are huge 2 K's long. Red dust every where.
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| Car park at Rio Tinto Mine |
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| Rio Tinto Iron Ore Mine |
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| Whats left of Mt Tom Price |
On another day we drove out to see Hamersley Gorge, 70km this included 46 kms of gravel. We got to the turn off and noticed a sign to notify trucks if you are driving into the gorge so we did, had to wait for 2 trucks to come out, but the drive down into it was great, one lane wide, black top, red cliffs of rock towering above us then out to the flat plains again. We turned round and did it again back to the turn off so as to go to the gorge the we came to see. What a pretty pool at the bottom after you climb down over the rock steps 100 mtrs, then of course back up.
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| The road to Hamersley Gorge |
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| Road through Hamersley Gorge |
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| Folds in the rock at Hamersley Gorge |
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| Pool at Hamersley Gorge |
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| More of Hamersley Gorge |
After leaving Tom Price we went to Dales Campground for 2 nights and went walking to Circular Pool, but the best was Fortescue Falls and Fern Pool, walking to it over rocks and through paper bark trees with water seeping from the rock walls of the gorge that had maiden hair fern clinging to the rocks.
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| Fern Pool at Dales Gorge, Karijini |
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| Fern Pool |
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| Fortescue Falls, Karijini |
From Karijini we headed to Newman but more on that next edition of the blog. We have managed to keep up with our walking about 3 km's most days. The van and truck are so red with dust and you can't wash them anywhere. Hope our blog finds you all well as it leaves us.
Cheers
Marilyn & Ian
