We’re in Broome. This has to be the nicest of civilised places during the months June – September. Originally, we planned to by-pass Broome this time round, but when we heard Cable Beach Caravan Park had some short term vacancies, we decided to call in after all. This is to be our third night here and we’ve booked another two. After that they need the site, so we’ll be reluctantly leaving then for Kunnunnurra. We’ve promised ourselves that next time we’re here, we’ll make sure to stay at least six weeks to give ourselves a chance of feeling like we want to move on, rather than have to move on!

Cable Beach, ah!!! what can i say to describe it. Glorious, beautiful, inspiring, spectacular – photos, while showing it off beautifully don’t allow you to hear the gentle ripple of the waves as they meander into the shore, and photos don’t let you feel the gentle breeze as it wafts over the sand and sea. So, I’m not going to add any photos of gorgeous Cable Beach. Besides any website will be displaying accurate photography. It really is as beautiful as the best of photos, if you haven’t been here yet, what are you waiting for!

Cable Beach van park is huge with 450 van sites. There’s lots of trees for shade and the ablutions are clean with generous sized shower cubicles. Theres a beautiful large shaded lagoon pool, but it’s a bit on the cool side. The ocean is warmer.

We’ve been for a few lovely long leisurely walks on the beach, and went for a bit of dip in the ocean yesterday. We’ve even been doing a few yoga stretches on the beach – told you it was inspiring… Today, if the waves are like they were yesterday, (nice gentle granny surf, with just enough power for a bit of a push) we plan on taking our boogie boards down. We also may try our luck at fishing from the jetty later.

The fish cleaning area in the van park is probably the best I’ve seen anywhere. A hose to wash the scales into large drain area, newspaper provided for wrapping your fish scraps and a huge freezer to place the scraps into for collection. Very civilised – just hope we catch something to get the experience of using it.

Later today, we plan on packing some nibbles and taking a drink in our esky down to the beach to watch the sunset over the ocean. Broome is famous for it’s sunsets and the fame is not unwarranted.

Now though it’s time for our Sunday Brunch, bacon, egg, tomato, mushrooms, asparagus and spinach, with indian breads (we’re out of normal bread and don’t want to make a special trip to the shops just yet to get any).

We found out yesterday that Cable Beach has some short term vacancies in the caravan park. Normally they only take bookings for a minimum of two weeks, and are normally booked months in advance. We’ve booked for four nights and are moving there tomorrow.

Paul’s fishing day out on the boat went a treat. Amongst other fish, Wally caught the largest Golden Trevally to date, and Paul caught a big Barracuda. No-one knew what the Barracuda was, so we had to use our fish book to identify it. Once identified, we realised Barracuda carries a warning of being prone to Ciguatera, and shouldn’t be consumed, except from Western Australian waters. Yeh!! as we’re in WA, we gave it a try last night. It tasted okay, and we had no ill effects, so have frozen some for a couple of meals. Last nights dinner was Rock Cod, a small piece of bat fish and small piece of Barracuda. Tonight we’re having Trevally, and we have frozen Trevally, Sweatlip, Barracuda and Batfish. Enough for about 15 meals in total.

This is our 9th day now at Barn Hill Station and I think we’ll probably be here about another 9. The fishing here was supposedly great before we arrived, but since we’ve been here they seem to have gone off the bite, and not just for us. Others are struggling to catch them off the beach as well. Someone said it’s because the water has cooled down a bit. So far we’ve caught one ok sized Queenie, and that was good eating, but nothing else that’s been worth keeping.

However, Lucy and Wally are keeping us supplied with enough fish to supplement our protein supplies from their boat fishing and they still seem to be catching plenty off shore. The people with boats agree on a time to leave, and all go out in convoy for the sake of safety.

Wally is hoping to go out tomorrow and is taking Paul, which is something I’m sure Paul’s looking forward too, as so far, whilst my fishing has been pretty grim, Pauls has been even more dismal. Mind you, he does spend valuable fishing time rigging up my line and helping retrieve anything I do catch, so my catches are really joint efforts.

Someone once said to me prior to us leaving our Perth jobs that I had ‘red dust fever’. Well we’re certainly getting any hankering for ‘red dust’ well satisfied. At the days end we’re both looking really bronze tanned, but most of it disappears once we’ve taken a shower. I’m sure half of what remains could still be scrubbed out of our pores and we’d be close to Pakeha coloured again. Pakeha is the Moari word for ‘white person’.

One thing up here that’s not in short supply is fresh water. After the 10 km trip in initially, a trip into Broome one day, and another to Eco Beach meaning two more return trips on the red dusty road from the highway into the station, our ute was looking more red than white. Paul attached the water to his car cleaning broom this morning and gave it a good wash. I should have taken a photo of it at the stage when he had the front door cleaned and half the back door washed. The difference was hilarious.

We’re still thoroughly enjoying it, and despite a never ending battle of keeping red dust and insects out of the caravan we don’t have a hint of being ready to move onto more civilised territory yet. We do want to get onto Kunnunnurra, Katherine and eventually Darwin though this season so we won’t be able to stay here for too much longer. We can see why people make the drive to here from all over the country, and stay put 4 – 5 months each year. Some of them even plant little vege patches on their site. There’s something about all this red dust that gets into one’s blood, and 4 – 5 months of it a year wouldn’t be at all difficult to live with.

We’re about to set off down the beach for a walk, a swim, and to take some photos. The beach here is stunning with red cliffs against pale golden sands and clear, deep water. The sand’s firm and there’s lots of rock pools at low tide that make for interesting walks. Dotted here and there along the red cliffs are some impressive rock formations. It is a beautiful beach.

Arrived here around midday yesterday after a 4 hour drive from the Cape. It was hot when we arrived so we chose a shady site with 10 amp power that allows us to run our air con, which we were grateful for last night. The unpowered sites though are overlooking the beach, and are positioned so as to take better advantage of the breezes, so perhaps it would have been worth it to have taken one of them, especially as they’re $13 cheaper a night. Never mind, this is where we are now and probably will be for the next week.

We’ve been here less than 24 hours and Maurice, whom we shared a few happy hours with at the Cape has also arrived and is camped next to us. We’ve also met up Jack and his dog, Jill whom we were camped next to at Lyndon River, and have been very pleased to once again meet up with Lucy and Wally.

We first met Lucy & Wally at Lucky Bay in Esperance, then again at Bremer Bay, again at Walpole, again in Margaret River and now again here. They are beginning to feel like old friends now, so it was a welcome sight to see Wally at our door this morning dripping wet after his morning dip in the ocean. Guess that’s one really good thing about our little Travelhome, it’s easily recognised, so Wally knew there was a good chance it was us when he’d heard a Travelhome had arrived yesterday. I’d been looking forward to Barn Hill and now with Lucy and Wally here, I’m doubly looking forward to the rest of our time here.

After spending the first three nights in free road side places we reached Cape Keraudren, about 160 kms past Port Hedland where we spent the next five nights.

Cape Keraudren is in a nature reserve so camping is basic and cheap. It cost us $10 to get into the reserve and another $9 each night to camp there. There is no power, and the only water is bore water which we could pick up from the ranger station each day. There are drop toilets, but no showers. What it lacks in facilities though is made up for in nature’s rewards. I woke up each morning in time to watch the sky turning deep red, orange and yellow over the ocean before the sun finally appeared as a fiery ball on the horizon. It was such a peaceful way to start the day.

The tides are huge, and while we were there high tide was around mid-day. By around 4pm the tide had receded a few hundred metres leaving behind hundreds of rock pools on the sea bed. Walking out on the damp sea bed is amazing, watching octopus, crabs and a multitude of other sea life left behind by the receding water. It’s mind boggling to think we were walking around on dry land were only a few hours before the water there was most likely about 6 metres deep.

One of the campers we met there travels full time like us. He said people often ask him what he does all day. His answer is that he does nothing all day, but it takes him all day to do it. That about sums up what we do as well.

A typical day at Cape Keraudren went like this.

5.30am – wake up and watch the sun rise.

6.30am – make a cup of tea and take it back to bed, maybe do a sudoku, or read for a while.

7.30am – get out of bed, breakfast, coffee, a bit of tidying of ourselves, washing, and the van, another suduko or two, by which time it’s around 10.30am and time to get the fishing gear organised.

11am – wander down the beach as the tide comes in to throw in a line, or if we’re not fishing, go for a walk or a swim. We fished on two of the days there, and Paul pulled in two good sized thread fin Salmon on the first day, and on the second day we each pulled in one only.

1pm – return to camp for lunch and to clean up our catch and ourselves by which time , if we’re lucky we’ll have time for either a bit of a read or a game or two of cards before it’s time for happy hour.

Happy hour is often anywhere between 1 and 3 hours and it’s where campers meet up and over an afternoon drink or two, share stories of where to go and what to see. It’s an important part of life on the road not only for information sharing, but also for the commeradie. After happy hour it’s time for dinner and shortly afterwards, bed. Doing nothing all day is certainly knackering so we’re usually tucked up by around 8.30pm, but will usually watch either a bit of TV or a DVD in bed, and if we’re lucky we’ll keep our eyes open long enough to keep track of whatever it is we’re watching.

So, as you can see in a typical day we don’t do much, but it manages to keep us occupied for the whole day.