Kimberley Trip: Heading North.

Over 7,000 kms driven in 3 weeks! And it was worth it. Australia is not a small country, this is what it takes just to make it to the top of Western Australia, the Kimberley. If only we had more time to take it all in, to visit all the magnificent sights, colours and ancient history, to have time to explore more, walk more, swim more and wonder more. 

The really long drives were just to get up there and home again. It took 3 1/2 days each way. Five cars and seven people started out after meeting up for a night at Payne's Find enjoying a dinner of Rack of Lamb cooked by Thor at the Roadhouse/Tavern. I shared the driving with Ross but the other cars had lone drivers. The trip up was more than a means to an end as we drove though some amazing country sharing the journey with good friends. 

"The Camel Train" ready to head north

Much fun was had talking to each others on the CB radios.The radios not only provided a means to chat, joke, point out the sights along the way and quote Monty Python and the Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy, they are essential safety tools. Particularly when travelling on dirt roads the

responsibility of the lead car was to warn the others of oncoming vehicles, road trains, holes in the road and cattle crossing. On the highways communicating with the pilot vehicles in front and behind trucks carrying huge oversize loads let us know when to pull of the road to let them pass or when it was safe to pass them. These loads heading for the mines in the Pilbara included pre-fab houses, giant Haulpak trucks and tyres 2.5 meters in diameter.

Pulling over for an oversized load to pass.

We drove up through Newman, Nullagine, Marble Bar, Pardoo and 80 Mile Beach. At Nullagine, a small past gold mining town, population under 200, the sign on the petrol pump said " fuel coming soon". 

Taking the short cut to Nullagine.

Crossing the De Grey River

Marble Bar Pool showing the bar of jasper cutting through the hills.

The only camels we saw on the trip, masquerading as termite mounds.

Sunrise at 80 Mile Beach

Not all of the group drove. We picked up four of the party who flew to and from Broome and three others joined us in Kununura: two from Darwin and one, our eldest daughter, who flew in from two months travelling in Europe, just to do the Gibb River Road. 

All photos by Robyn Hamilton