Port Headland in a nutshell

With no sign of the rain backing away and the rumours of road and gorge closures we opted to continue onto Port Headland.  It would have been great to spend a nice few days in at Dales Gorge but the reality was that it wasn’t exactly the most young kid friendly place and the rain was going to ruin it.  The drive back out and past Karajini was again spectacular and this really is a place you must come and see for yourself. Even the last little bit before we arrived at the service station was just one last glimpse of awesomeness before we headed away from the national park.

One last bit of awesomeness.

Excuse me caravan get out of my picture.

The WA version of Devils Marbles????

The drive to Port Headland felt like it went forever.  I think the overcast clouds didn’t help as it made it feel like 4pm yet it was really only just after lunch.  The road trains along this road too were probably the most we have ever seen and they were all huge.  We started to catch up to one that had four trailers so opted to just sit back on 90 km/hr as we didn’t want to attempt overtaking it.  Mind you about 30km out of Port Headland we had an issue with a big truck (again 4 trailers) obviously having problems and was slowing right down to let everyone past.  I felt for him as there isn’t exactly a big enough space for him to pull over for ages and the truck behind us was a bit rude. 

We were waiting our turn to go around and the truck behind us pulled out and went, even though there was no good clear line of sight and a ridge ahead.  It was quite dangerous really just to save a bit of time.  Eventually the truck driver with the issues told us we were right to go and off we went, overtaking our first truck with four trailers.  Such an achievement, probably lessoned by the fact he wouldn’t have been going more than 20km/hr. 

Driving into Port Headland was certainly different.  This place is built to handle a high level of traffic it seems and yet there wasn’t any.  Still everything flowed really well and I am guessing they are forward planning. 

The information centre provides details of all the ships coming and going.

Picking up flowers.

Finding the caravan park was easy, getting into our site a little harder but still not too bad really.  The road is really narrow with not much room but Jason handled it well and the longest part was deciding where we wanted to unhitch to make rehitching easy (when there is a jump up we try and avoid the tyres being partly on that). We then set up, did some school and washing and finally chilled for a bit.  Out the back of our caravan we are built up overlooking mangrove and flood areas but when it got dark all the lights came on and wow it was such an impressive view.  So after dinner we ventured out for a night drive to check it all out.

Kayla then had us up the next morning at 5:19am!!!  Way too early for my liking and she was not a very happy girl at all!  Whether she had a bad dream or not we will never know but it took us a while to get her to calm down but of course then we were wide awake and the noise even woke Hamish up.  The one benefit about being up so early is that we managed to get some school done and headed into town at around 7:30am for a nice coffee and something more to eat because we could and well we knew it was going to be a long day.

After filling our tummies we then ventured down to the information centre to find out that it is not open on Sundays so instead we picked up the map and pamphlet that they leave at the front door for people like us (great idea) and decided to head down to the lookout where we could view the big ships being loaded.  Most are mainly iron ore but they also do salt and a few other things.  We even got to see a big ship brought in by the tug boats and watched it go past before then seeing one guided out of the port.  There we also saw a ferry bring crew in from the boats to have a break on shore.

I can't tell if he is excited or not.

Watching the tug boats bring her in.

They take her down further to turn her around before docking.

 

The kids weren’t into the boats as much as us but at least there was a playground right there so they were pretty happy having a play there for a while but eventually they got over it.  We even bumped into a family we had met at Osprey Bay so the kids got to have a play with their kids before we headed back to the caravan.  By now it was 11am and Kayla fell asleep on the way home.  I was so happy as I knew that if she did not have a nap today we were going to have one very unhappy toddler on our hands later in the afternoon.  Hamish and I did a bit more school, made jelly and baked a cake whilst Kayla slept. 

Watching one of the smaller boats.

One has come in and now one goes out.

The weather was on and off showers for most of the day and when Kayla woke we enjoyed a late lunch and some painting fun.  Most of the afternoon was just spent chilling in the van.  Jason cleaned out the car during showers of rain and I focused on school and other jobs since there wasn’t much else to do in this weather.  Then around late in the afternoon we started to get ready for our Seafarers tour of the harbour.  I was really excited for this as we would get up closer to the huge shipping boats. 

The tour starts in their building which is provided for all the workers on the boats.  There is a bar, shop (food, clothes and souveniers), internet, interpreters and more so they can all have a reprieve from life on a shipping boat.  They pick them up off the boats by ferry and take them back to the centre where they can choose to stay there or they also run a bus to the shopping centre.  It is all done quite well and it was amazing hearing of what these people (some paid and other volunteer) do.  Especially for Christmas where they do them all up packages and put on a nice big meal for the ones that come to shore.

We are off on the tour.

This boat was nearly fully loaded.

About to pick two more up.

And drop a few more off.

 

After a quick presentation and explanation of their work by the tour guide we then boarded the bus with the sea farers and headed out to the boat.  It is such a small boat compared to the big ships and everyone on the tour goes up to the top deck.  I am guessing that is so we don’t get in the road of down below nor try to smuggle ourselves onto one of the boats.  We then pulled up against each of the ships and dropped off and picked up sea farers.  Some of the ships are fully loaded so are quite low in the water whereas others have just come in and are so much higher (around an eight metre difference in height). 

Unloading some of the water.

Kayla doesn't look too sure, but she did really enjoy waving to everyone on the boats.

Just a little closer.

Tug boats in action.

Being so close to them you really do get that sense of how big they are and how big the port is and there are still more docks being built (one by Gina Rinehart) and even more proposed!  We were really lucky on our tour as we not only had a guide but a local resident who works in the information centre and her husband who drives trucks in the mines.  So any questions were answered and you really got a full understanding of the operations.  There were also only three groups on the tour, so 8 of us all up including the kids. 

It was really magical watching the sun go down on it all.

A different sunset.

Tug boats pulled in for the night.

Such a small boat in amongst the big ones.

The lights are starting to come on.

By the time we got back to the caravan it was dark so we whipped up dinner and tried to get the kids to bed at a semi reasonable time.  One thing we did learn is that it hardly ever rains in Port Headland (apparently).  This is unseasonable weather at the moment.  I am starting to think that a lot of our trip has been through unseasonable weather and that we might definitely have to go back through Longreach as it doesn’t rain there so surely if we visit it will!

Sometimes you feel like you just can’t win.  Kayla had a great night sleep and wasn’t up too early at all but of course I couldn’t sleep well as the rain was getting heavier, so just after midnight I got up and made sure all the chairs and scooters were well undercover and wouldn’t get wet.  The problem then was that I was wide awake and couldn’t get back to sleep.  Eventually though I just gave up trying and got up and caught up on the blog before trying again.  Nothing seemed to work and I just resigned to the fact that I was not going to get back into a deep sleep.  Around 6:30am Jason and I went outside and packed up the awning so that it was no longer flapping around.

Then it was time to start the morning so that we were all ready and organised for Hamish’s school lesson at 7:30am.  I was a bit worried how on earth I would entertain Kayla as normally I would take her for a walk around the park or down to the playground but in this weather we were not going to go outside.  Luckily she was pretty much happy to just lie on the bed with me.  After the lesson Jason dropped off the car to have the windscreen replaced and I did a few more school lessons with Hamish.  I think we were all hoping that the weather would clear so we could get out for the day, mind you we really just had a list of jobs to do.

Finding things to do on such wet days are hard but we baked another cake, caught up on washing and watched tv.  Around lunch time the weather fined up nicely and the car was dropped back to us.  The kids got their scooters out and were enjoying the freedom.  Before long though we packed them up in the car to do the food shopping and stock up on supplies (beer) in preparation for the trip up to Broome.  There is the State of Origin on this week so we must be all prepared for that and ensure we are somewhere that has good tv reception! 

The local salt mine.



Of course it isn't a blog with a picture of our car!

After running around to a few different shops with a quick trip back to the caravan to unload the groceries, we were finally back and started the preparation of cleaning out the car and packing up the snack bag.  Just doing some of the jobs the night before helps us get away at a decent time and means we don’t have as much to think about the next day.  As the afternoon rolled by more and more people rolled in, and by the sounds of it they were mainly coming from Karijini as they were going to close the main campground due to all the rain. 

We met the guy who used to own the caravan shop where we bought ours from.  I was going to be smart and say we had obviously funded his trip but didn’t.  I did find it funny how they sold Coromal caravans and yet he has bought a Jayco!  There were a few kids down on the playground so Jason took the kids down whilst I swept out the van and packed a few things away.  Honestly I can’t believe how dirty our caravan can get, but at least it doesn’t take too long to clean it out.  When we get up to Broome though I am going to have another cull as we are running out of wall space due to all of Hamish’s school work so I might have to take some down and send home.

Port Headland has surprised us and we have enjoyed our stay here and found the ships so interesting.  I definitely think it is worth a visit if you want to check them out.

 

Still all smiling.

What do you mean I can't touch.

Sun is going down.

Yep I am not too sure about this.

 

Karijini National Park in one massive day.

Well with heavy rain overnight and quite an overcast morning we had a sudden feeling that our plan to move to Dales Campground in Karijini National Park was probably not going to be the best move for us.  Most of the many gorges in the park have lookouts, however there were a few walks that Jason and I wanted to do and you can’t do them if there is rain around.  So the decision needed to be made as to if we go out and risk a miserable camp in there or sit out the bad weather in Tom Price as it was meant to be sunny by Monday.

Just a little puddle to contend with.

Spectacular drive.

Looking out over the National Park.

It was so hard to work out what was the best move as originally the worst of the rain was meant to pass over whilst we were in Tom Price so it seems to be continually getting pushed back, so what happens if we sit here until Monday and it still isn’t good weather.  Then we had heard from Ian and Gwen that it was a bit muddy the morning they had left the campground but on the flip side we really wanted to see the place and do all the walks we had planned.  In the end we decided to book into the caravan park for one more night and spend a full day out in Karijini National Park seeing as much as we could.  It was mainly trying to get Jason to have the opportunity to do the Hancock Gorge walk as it is one he had wanted to do for some time.

Obviously we couldn’t hit the road until 8am as we needed to check with the reception of the caravan park that it was okay if we stayed another night.  There were no dramas there and if anything I felt we had made the right decision to stay as she said a person had checked in the day before, moving from Dales Campground as their site had become a bit flooded.  Jason and I probably wouldn’t have minded but I think the kids would have gotten bored and obviously our solar panels would probably not charge in the cloudy weather.  Before heading out of town we stopped in at the mechanics to see if there was something we could get to prevent our lovely crack in the windscreen from spreading further.  Jason also wanted a tyre deflator that was a bit quicker than the one we already had.

Hmm this crack is ruining my photos.

 

Unfortunately the windscreen repair kit Jason bought would not help us this time around as it said it couldn’t be used on cracks over 10cm in length and ours would have to be at least 20cm, if not a bit more.  Though the biggest factor was that it needed sunshine to dry it… hmm that might be harder to get.  Whilst it wasn’t raining it was still overcast with the odd little drizzle.  Still we weren’t deterred and headed to Coles to try the next tip a friend gave me, contact.  Hey it was worth a try and with the dirt roads we were about to go on we were willing to try anything.  It did look funny with the contact on it but the main thing was it didn’t affect Jason’s line of sight so we continued on and out to Karijini.

The drive out to Karijini is over 50km until you reach the start of the National Park and then it is a further long drive in to any of the gorges.  Our first point of call was Hancock Gorge as this is where the walk was that Jason really wanted to do, but it was also one of the gorges that had a dirt road in so we thought we would focus on those ones in case the heavy rain came and we couldn’t get in.  I had to admit I was a bit nervous about what state the road would be in as it looked like they had received heavier rain out there but there was no need to worry, the road was in a great condition really and you just had to take it nice and easy.  We also took it a bit slow so not to upset our lovely cracked windscreen.

I wasn’t sure what the gorges were going to be like but if the scenic drive in was anything to go by we certainly weren’t going to be disappointed.  As soon as we arrived Jason packed his little backpack with the SAT phone (just in case) and headed off on his walk.  I noted the time as it was only meant to take two hours so wanted to know roughly when he would be back.  The kids and I then took our time to walk down to the two lookouts.  We could have driven closer but we had the time to fill in and it was only 800m down a track.  At one stage I was a bit confused if I was on the right track and it wasn’t too obvious.  Being close to a cliff edge I opted to walk along the road with two little kids.

I felt a lot more secure there and we continued down the road until we saw the path more clearly and returned to it.  The lookouts were spectacular.  First we came across Oxer Lookout which the first thing I noticed was the massive gap until the railing which could (like Kalbarri) easily let a kid slip under.  Mind you there wasn’t much point really as the railing didn’t go far so unsupervised kids could easily just walk off the ledge a bit further on.  I am really surprised with all the money out in the area that they couldn’t spend just a little bit more money on the safety side.  They have warning signs but I think a little bit more would go a long way. 

Pretty flowers.

Off on a walk we go.

Spectacular views.

The walkway to the lookout.

Jason is down there somewhere.

 

There was also a memorial for a local SES volunteer who had died there rescuing an injured tourist.  Apparently a flash flood washed him away.  I wasn’t worried about Jason before but now I really was.  There was no rain around but I had no idea how far away the water comes from nor how long it takes to come down (so could it take a day or two).  I think their warning signs are there to cover any people suing but really I think they need to provide more clear information as if a local SES member can get caught out I can only imagine how easy it would be for tourists.  Still it was such a sad story for an obviously very brave man.

Down the bottom of Handcock Gorge.

I don't know how Jason did this.

The colours in the rocks.

More of the pathway.

Imagine what it would be like after heavy rain.

Tranquil at the moment.

No you are not there yet.

Glad we didn't take the kids on this one.

My favourite photo.

A nice little pool area.

Looking back up.

The ladder out.

 

Next we moved onto the second Oxer Lookout which was again an absolutely stunning view and was a little more protected once you were on the actual lookout.  Here you could see where three gorges all met up and it was such a drop down.  Being a bit scared of heights I pretty much took my photos and got out of there, even just leaning over to get some photos freaked me out a bit.  This place is just amazing and is some of the oldest rock formations in the world.  I definitely couldn’t wait however to get back up to the carpark where I could relax a little more with the kids.  Obviously I was carrying Kayla and I just had to instruct Hamish to walk closer to the left or right as the path wasn’t wide enough for me to walk beside him holding his hand. 

Back in the main carpark we enjoyed some morning tea before just sitting in the car and waiting for Jason.  Another couple came back from the walk and I asked them what it was like and they said amazing.  I then said how they would have seen my husband to which they replied no.  Oh dear that can’t be good.  Not that I needed to worry as only about ten minutes later Jason returned from his walk.  He said it was amazing and that it was definitely not one to take the kids on (class 5) as he had to scramble over rocks and wade through water that came up to his chest, not to mention that he had slipped over on a slippery rock as well.  We then quickly drove up to the lookouts so Jason could see them and then headed back out to the Karijini Eco Retreat.  There we quickly stopped for a coffee.  It really wasn’t worth it as it was just instant coffee and we should have just kept going whilst the weather was good.

We had been lucky and the weather seemed to be clearing a bit so we did start to second guess our decision not to move out to Dales Campground.  Though we reassured ourselves we would have spent half the day packing up, driving out and then setting up.  After our coffee we stopped in a Joffre Falls.  This was an amazing view and you were glad for the rain so that it was running and you could take it all in.  Then it was back in the car to continue on the dirt road down to Knox Gorge where we just did the lookout.  We just took it in turns whilst the kids stayed in the safety of the car.  There was another big walk later on that we wanted to take the kids on so didn’t want them to get over walks before then. 

Do you feel safe.

So peaceful.

Obviously the red dirt has washed down.

 

From there it was back out and another 29km or so of dirt road to reach the Visitor Information Centre and Dales Gorge.  The road was pretty good and other than big muddy puddles and a little bit being slippery it was still way better than I expected and we just drove to the conditions.  At the Information Centre we had a quick look around and I organised for a new yearly pass sticker for our car.  Obviously with getting the windscreen replaced on Monday we are going to lose that sticker and there are still quite a few national parks that we want to visit.  Thankfully the ladies were really lovely and the process was really easy to get a new sticker.

Now it was time to head into Dales Gorge with a quick stop to look at the campground.  The kids were coming on this walk with us.  I thought they would really enjoy it and to tell the truth they loved it.  I on the other hand was worried out of my wits with them and the drops and lack of safety rails.  There were two warning signs as we headed off from the carpark.  One being the normal cliff edge one and then there was an asbestos one!  Wow, did I really want to do this walk!  We of course missed the first turn and walked a couple of hundred metres before second guessing the track.  Jason went back to double check and called us back.  I thought that track was bad, but what we were meant to take was worse. 

Yes we took the kids on this one.

Making our way down.  This is the only place I would let go of Hamish's hand.

Half way down.

From the top of the waterfall.

The kids and I waiting back up top.

Down the bottom.

Guessing Jason was getting creative.

It was large steps down and a poor little fence held by pegs down the side.  I carried Kayla down as that to me was the safest way and Jason helped guide Hamish down.  Getting up and close to Fortescue Falls would have been beautiful and relaxing to sit and watch it but getting down to the bottom looked a bit slippery and dangerous for our kids.  So Jason went down the bottom and I stayed with the kids.  This was not a good move as of course the kids did not want to stay still and just sit there when there were all these rocks to climb over.

I was certainly not enjoying this at all.  Thankfully the walk to Fern Pool was a lot easier and safer, yet for some reason WA National Parks has rated it harder and risker than the one we climbed down.  Who on earth rates these things? I am guessing it is someone who sits at a desk in Perth who has never done the walk.  Once at Fern Pool I really wished that we had brought our togs and some floatation devices for the kids as it really did look inviting.  Even if I had them in the car I don’t know if I would have been keen to go all the way back up to get them.

Making our way to fern pool.

This walk was really nice.

Yay, we made it.

By now it was time to head back up, especially as Kayla was just trying to run everywhere and constantly falling over.  Jason got the task of carrying her back up whilst I guided Hamish back up.  Once back up on top I could admit it was a beautiful place but I just felt like I couldn’t relax and enjoy it.  Way back in Port Lincoln SA we had crossed paths with another family and the mum had told me how she didn’t feel she could enjoy Karijini as she was worried about her young kids.  I didn’t fully understand what she was saying, but now I totally get it. 

Fern Pool.

See there are ferns.

Dad and his kiddies.

There was one last look out that we had to knock over and that was overlooking Fern Pool.  It looked so impressive and it would have been awesome to walk down there.  However after the last experience we were not keen to take the kids down there so headed back to Tom Price.  We will definitely be back here, either when the kids are older or without the kids as there are so many more walks that we want to do.  Had the weather been better we might have still come out here and done them on our own and then swapped, but with the weather predicted to get worse we felt we had done all we could do and decided to move on.

Looking down into Circular Pool.

Hamish is showing how we all feel.