Jul 2008

Still no change in the weather, and from what we can see it will be windy till Thursday they are suggesting. Decided to kick back and enjoy reading the last book we’ve got to finish off before leaving Broome (its one of Terry’s great collection). Bill Bryson, Down Under.

We were due to both go for a paddle today, but the winds picked up overnight and shook the van around all night. We awoke to whitecaps all across the bay. Shame. I was really looking forward to having a paddle and visiting some of the great islands all within an easy paddle of where we were.

We decided it might be better to head off to Kooljaman early in the hope that as they were in the next bay back, that they’d be a bit more protected. Wrong! The weather was blowing day and night.

Met some lovely people from Adelaide today. They were staying in the lovely upmarket tents at Kooljaman. Hope to catch up with them back in Broome. They also offered us a room in Adelaide if we’re heading that way! How lovely. The joy of travelling and chatting with someone for 10 minutes and they offer you a room!

Sunset the Kooljaman way…

This place is really heaven on earth. Surrounded by about 5 or 6 islands, all within an easy paddle, remote, secluded and also not packed out in the middle of school holidays. This is really relaxing, in the truest sense of the word.

Steve took off to Sunday Island kayaking. He had a great time out paddling around the islands, throwing a line and generally enjoying himself immensely.

I lazed by the TV, enjoying the greatest reception we’d had since we left home, but not mobile or NextG internet connection, well I didn’t try to connect too hard!

Got a late start today after food shopping and travelled up the dirt road to the Dampier Peninsular. The trip was 230kms in total with 90kms in dirt ranging from boggy narrow roads through to almost sealed parts with reflectors either side of the road. The van got a huge shaking, but made the journey well up to the sealed part, just before Beagle Bay.

Arriving at Beagle Bay we checked in at the office to find that most of the town were away in Broome for a funeral. We then headed out the Beagle Bay Mission Church. It was built in 1909 by German Missionaries. I cant even understand how they found the place, let alone why they decided to build there. But Beagle Bay became one of the place that the stolen generations were moved to over the years. It’s a nice orderly and tidy town with sealed roads, nice modern buildings and a lovely old church. The church has an alter made out of pearl shells, and most of the walls and floors are decorated with pearl shell. Its quite cute.

Next we moved on to Lombadina. As it was getting late, and due to the funeral in Broome, the office had closed and the shop also wasn’t open. We were searching for a lady who’d driven out to Chilli Creek to check on campers. We headed out to find her, but the turn off to Chilli Creek was impassable without a 4WD vehicle. We headed back into Lombadina and ran into some other tourists who told us there was a great campsite about 40kms up the road, past the Cape Leveque turn off. Its called Gambanan Camping. Website link: http://www.aboriginaltourism.com.au/tourism.asp?data=010C07044D05040202004B7043545D4E484D58474359405814454556534453464878555D4359545C5A545B19635E45405D4A5A1274484350465C52575454434E

It doesn’t appear on any of the maps we have (3 in fact) but turns out to be heaven on earth. Its very remote. Its also dog friendly! Its very basic with sandy tracks, the odd water tap and its pull up where ever you want. The shower/toilet block is up to 1km walk away! But the most amazing part is they have a meeting place “shelter” that they set a camp fire up in each night for the 20 or so visitors to sit around the campfire and have a chat. The owners all chat and share with the visitors, its very unique. They also make spears while they’re sitting round the fire, for their fishing.

We settled into a lovely relaxing breeze under the shade of a few large trees. The sunset was stunning and peace and tranquillity was everywhere.

Today we launched our kayaks at Town Beach and took Midget and a fishing line into Dampier Creek. We launched just before high tide and managed to get quite a way up to Streeters Jetty, we couldn't reach it, but we could see it. It was only a 4.5m tide.

The trip into the turquoise waters of the creek was nice and pleasant. I managed to catch a fish with the line trailing behind the kayak. Midget nearly had a fit seeing the fish splashing around and when it came out, she almost fell in trying to get a hold of it. It was so much fun. We were trying to release the unknown fish and it managed to get off the hook before we had to tackle it. Midget spent the rest of the trip home on fish guard, standing dutifully on the bow of Steve's kayak (I guess you had to be there - sorry forgot the camera!).