The Nullarbor and Beyond

After leaving Esperance we stopped at the small town of Grass Patch. Back in the early days it was a service town for goldfields traffic going to Norseman. Today there is a grain depot there, which had several piles of golden grain outside protected by tarpaulins. The town’s pub was built in 1927 and the old store/post office that was built a little earlier is being restored. We called in at Dundas rocks, a rest area in our camps book and from the name we thought it might be an interesting place. We discovered it was the site of an old town although there is little to show for it. The town was abandoned almost as soon as it began as the riches promised at Norseman, just 30 kilometres away, overshadowed the nearby gold find. There were some granite rocks there but we were more interested in a salt lake that was beside the road. We discovered that when you walk on the salt it sounds like walking over dry snow, it is bright white like snow but it isn’t cold like snow. (photo - salt lake)

We stopped at Norseman and got an information brochure on the Eyre Highway (aka Nullarbor Plain) and got directions to the Beacon Hill lookout over Norseman town. From here we saw large areas of salt lakes and in the direction of the Nullarbor as far as we could see the land was flat. There is a working gold mine in Norseman and it produces around 100,000 ounces a year, not a bad income at today’s prices.

We took 4 days to cross the plain, driving about 300 kilometres each day before finding a place to camp for the night. We spent one night in a roadside rest area and the other three at different roadhouses along the way. It is a good road, flat terrain with lots of long straights and the occasional curve to break the monotony. The longest straight is 146.6 kilometres. There wasn't much traffic on the road and most of that we saw were roadtrains carrying freight west. For most of the way the vegetation varied from low scrub to well wooded areas and the occasional grassy plain with bushes here and there. It is only for about a 40 kilometre stretch, around the Nullarbor roadhouse, that there are no trees at all, instead a sparse covering of grass and low bushes.

Once we were near the SA border at Eucla we travelled close to the sea and stopped at some rest areas for a look at the cliffs and the ocean of the Great Australian Bight. Here there are high weathered and crumbling cliffs, a lovely blue sea and waves incessantly thundering in at the base of the cliffs. The Bight is a breeding area for the Southern Right Whale but we were about six weeks too late to see any whales here. (photo- cliffs of the Bight)


At Eucla, where we spent a night, we visited an old Telegraph Station built in 1877. The one remaining building, built of quarried stone, is slowly being covered by the sand dunes. There is no roof and the rooms are well filled with sand. (photo - half buried building)


At Penong we stopped to photograph a collection of windmills. The town has dozens of windmills that pump water from the Anjutabie water basin to supplement the town’s rain water supply.



At Ceduna we passed through the fruit fly quarantine check. Being pre-warned of this we had cooked up our spare apples and tomatoes and after a quick inspection of the cupboard in the caravan, by an official, we were on our way again. We then spent a couple of nights at Smoky Bay. After five one-night stops it was nice to stay put for a change. The camp manager lent us a couple of crab nets and we spent an evening on the jetty crabbing. Over a period of a couple of hours we caught six "blue swimmer crabs" that were big enough to keep and caught lots of small ones that we returned to the sea. The six crabs gave us enough meat for one and a bit meals. (photo - blue swimmer crab)

We are making our way south down the west coast of Eyre Peninsula to be in Coffin Bay for Christmas. Here we will meet up with friends, Tom and Mary and also Steve who is joining us for a few nights. We stopped at Streaky Bay where we had a lovely campsite on the foreshore. The bay is very shallow so going for a swim entailed walking out for quite a distance then sitting down to enjoy the water. It was just deep enough to float! From here we did a couple of short excursions to explore the nearby cliffs and beaches. Many white sandy beaches, high eroded cliffs and some interesting rock pools. We also came across a huge area of white sand dunes where we had fun, climbing up some of the bigger ones, jumping down them and throwing sand into the wind. (photo - sand in the wind)

We went to see the seals at Point Labatt. The information said they could be seen frolicking on the beach, sleeping on the beach is a more apt description. We spent quite a while watching half a dozen young seals playing in a rock pool, their actions could be described as frolicking. On the way back to Streaky Bay we visited Murphys haystacks. These are “Inselburgs”, rocky formations formed by the uneven weathering of crystalline rock. Apparently these rocks were mistaken for haystacks, they were on Murphys property hence the name Murphys haystacks. (photo - some of the "haystacks")

Venus Bay was another nice relaxing place with a camping ground on the foreshore. Here the water is deep enough for swimming and the jetty is great for fishing. We had one evening when we caught just a rock cod (returned to the sea) but with a change of bait we ended up with two Silver Trevally, a King George Whiting and a Herring the next night. From this we had one nice meal and another one is in the freezer for later. We went for a walk around the south headland walking trail and saw about ten dolphins making their way back out to sea from the entrance into the bay. The next day we went to the same spot at around the same time and saw more (the same?) dolphins. These appeared to be feeding as they crossed from one side of the channel to the other, not far from our vantage point.

Life's a Beach

After staying at Pemberton we continued east along the coast spending a night at Walpole and visited a nearby forest with Tingle trees. These are eucalypt trees that grow to 70 metres and have a large buttressed trunk. The bases of many trees have large holes and some have so little trunk left at the base that you wonder how the tree can still be alive and stay standing. (Photo - Al in Tingle tree)

We found a delightful camping spot at Parry Beach. A small camp set amongst trees and with flush toilets and solar heated showers it was a bargain at $7 per night. We managed to catch some fish here but thought they were too small for eating so either threw them back or kept them for bait. Later we observed a couple filleting their catch and saw that the size considered OK for eating is much smaller than we are used to. You just need to catch quite a few of them.

Our ongoing troubles with our truck rear wheel oil leak seemed to be continuing and as the mechanic at Northam was happy to have another look at it we decided to go back there. We set off north again and spent a night at Broomehill, where we found top notch facilities at the Shire caravan park. They let us leave the caravan there for free while we carried on to Northam, where we stayed with Jill’s nephew.
It turned out that the apparent oil leak was residue from the before the last repair so didn’t take much to fix. The mechanic at Avon Service Specialists also took a look at the wheel we weren’t having problems with and discovered a leaking oil seal but the oil was being contained by a dust seal so we didn’t know about it. We are very lucky he looked, as it would have only been a matter of time before this wheel would have needed attention. We were very thankful that at last we had found a mechanic who took the time to think about the trouble we had been having and finally, after two other outfits had tried, find the cause of it all – the wrong sized rubber seals had been fitted when we had the wheel bearings replaced back in June.

We had a quick trip back to Broomehill, collected the caravan and carried on to the Stirling Range National Park. Here a range of mountains, about 65km east to west, rises out of the surrounding plains. From starting points of about 400 metres we took a walk up two of the mountains, 780 metres and 1095 metres. As we made our way up the mountains we came across a variety of wildflowers. At the tops we had great views of the coast about 100km away and over the surrounding plains. (Photo - Al near top of Bluff Knoll)

Along the south coast there are many beautiful beaches and we have visited a few of them over the past two weeks. Bremer Bay, on a peninsula, has about half a dozen beaches in close proximity to one another. One day we visited several looking for a sheltered fishing spot. We found a nice spot on some rocks and over an hour or so we caught eight small fish, enough for a couple of meals. Jill caught a small shark that was sent back to the sea. (Photo - Al with catch of the day)

Quagi Beach was a gem of a camp spot, only toilets and cool showers provided but at $2 per person it was good value. The camp area was set amongst a Banksia forest with each camp area well separated from the next. The Banksia was in flower and there were birds everywhere, mostly New Holland honeyeaters, some Western Wattle birds and Willy Wagtails. The beach was interesting with different types of rocks at each end, gneiss and limestone. Our fishing here wasn’t very successful with us feeding lots of fish and only catching a couple.

On our way to Esperance we passed lots of truck and trailer units transporting grain. It is harvesting time and the trucks are carting the grain to various depots. At the depots there are sheds, silos and large outdoor grain heaps covered by tarpaulins. We have been amazed by the extent of the grain growing area in WA and have discovered the area they call the “Wheatbelt” is about the area of the South Island of NZ . 90% of the WA wheat is exported.

We stopped at Esperance for groceries and carried on to Duke of Orleans Bay, about 80km to the west. Here there is a series of white sandy beaches with clear blue water. Getting from one beach to the next may entail driving along the beach to a headland then across a sandy track to the next beach. The sand is very fine and generally beach surface is hard. In one day we visited six different beaches. Again the fishing wasn’t very successful but it’s always fun trying.

Our last beach stop along this coast was in Cape Le Grand National Park at Le Grand Beach. It is a great National Park camp, a few metres from the beach, tucked in behind a sand dune with good spacing between campsites. Provided are flush toilets, solar heated showers and a camp kitchen with gas cooking facilities and hot running water. This is the first National park camp we have found with all these facilities. Within this National Park are several beaches, all with rocky headlands at one end or the other. There are several large granite domes within the park and we climbed Frenchman Peak, one of the taller ones at 262 metres, giving great views over the Recherche Archipelago with it’s many granite islands. We are now poised to head east and across the Nullarbor plains.
(Photos - Le Grand Beach. On top of Frenchman Peak. Christmas trees recovering from fire.)