Coral Bay 16 - 18 October 2013

Well, Coral Bay may look like a sleepy little coastal village, but it's been action a plenty since we arrived!

We started with the obligatory walk around town. Ten minutes later we were back at camp perusing the tour brochures, and five minutes after that we had parted with the necessary readies for a  ATV quad bike sunset tour that very afternoon and a Manta Ray Experience cruise the next morning.
The quad bike tour was heaps of fun. I think Hazel has added one to her christmas list :-) Up and down and round and round the dunes we went, stopping off to snorkell at Five Fingers (which was a bit choppy and cloudy but still worth it), try to see turtles feeding on seaweed below the cliff tops (did see one briefly in the swell), at an old aboriginal midden site and atop a tall dune to watch the sunset. While we were waiting for the sun to do it's thing Hazel spotted a plastic chair on the next sand dune over, so the tour guide sprinted off to collect it for her to sit on. Very regal.

There's a chair in there

Her Maj

The guide was very good - he picked up every it of rubbish we saw and took it back to town, so the company name "Coral Bay Ecotours" would appear to more than just a slogan. Good to see. Then it was back to town central in the twilight, dodging kangaroos along the way.

Up at sparrows the next day for the Manta Ray cruise. Once everyone was fitted out with wetsuits, fins and masks we all piled onto the bus for the short ride to the jetty and the good ship Kurni Ku. This was no three hour cruise on the SS Minnow! We cruised out to the first dive site on the edge of the Ningaloo reef and it was all overboard to see the sights. Heaps of coral, fish and green and loggerhead turtles.

Loggerhead Turtle

Green Turtle

Then it was off to find a Manta Ray. They have a search plane up every day to look for them, but sometimes it can take a long time, and sometimes there are none to be found. Luckily for us they did find one after 2 and a half hours and we steamed off to meet it. Along the way we saw several dolphins, an eagle ray and a Steve Irwin type Sting Ray, and the amazing sight of flocks of birds diving on bait fish which were also being pursued by bigger fish which were jumping out of the water in their efforts to catch a feed. These fish in turn were being pursued by a seal or a dolphin (we weren't close enough to tell which). Anyway, we arrived at the Manta Ray site and had three drops from the boat to snorkel over and behind the magnificent beastie as it fed. Unfortunately, the water was rough, and a bit murky at this site, and the Manta mostly stayed deep, but hey, we were swimming with a three metre Manta Ray!!!!!!!!!!! How cool it was.

From here it was off to another part of the reef for the last dive of the day. A much more sheltered area with crystal clear water. Just magic.

Saw a couple of tough trucks the next day which might just satisfy Stan's requirements for a go anywhere motor home. They had come all the way from Germany, so you would have to put up with the left hand drive:

Exmouth/Ningaloo 11-14 October 2013

After an overnighter in a free camp which had more red dust blowing around than we had seen through the entire Kimberley and Pilbra (well at least if felt that way at the time), we arrived in Exmouth with no idea where should stay. East side, West side, caravan park or Cape Range National Park? There were too many choices! Finally decided on a compromise solution by staying at Yardie Homestead park which is just outside the National Park on the west side of the cape. For all the right reasons - close to the snorkeling; hot showers to wash off the salt and sand; flushing toilets; not too far from town; power; sheltered, grassed shady sites; reasonable rates.
Fail.
We would have been much closer to the snorkeling had we stayed at one of the sites within the Cape Range NP. The good shower block has a busted water heater, so the only hot showers were in the skungy, ex-portaloo type ablution block, and the water was very salty. It was a long way from town. There was power, but not enough to heat an electric jug or toaster; No grass, little shade, and no protection from the very strong winds which ripped through all night long. And, to top it off, it wasn't that much cheaper than the premium parks right in Exmouth.
Anyway, we survived the night and set off for the National Park and Ningaloo Reef. The beaches, and fantastic turquoise water just go on for ever and ever. Stunning. Went to Turquoise Bay for a snorkel and saw more fish in twenty minutes than we had ever seen outside a fishmounger's before, and right in close to shore. Fantastic. Even better, my mask sealed just fine over the beard, so no need to shave it off :-) No pics of the fishies though - we were just too excited to be finally here and seeing the reef, and forgot to take the go-pro out. Oh well we will be in Coral Bay soon and that is supposed to be even better, with a chance that we can swim with manta rays! Can hardly wait.

Sorry about the smudges - I cleaned the lens, honest :(

Gave kite surfing a go - not bad for a first effort ;-)

Bewdifool

We drove as far down as Yardie Creek which is at the southern end of the park (not to be confused with Yardie Homestead Caravan Park which is just outside the northern end), and saw proof positive that hire vehicles cannot go everywhere and anywhere, for what did we spy but a Britz motorhome about 50 metres past the sign informing all who cared to take notice that the track beyond was four wheel drive ONLY! The Britz was up to the door sills in sand and going nowhere fast, and from the smell of burnt clutch in the air, it wasn't going far even after they were towed back out. Two suitably embarrassed and apologetic french tourists were only too happy to be on their way with tails firmly between their legs. She drove out, but it was odds on that he drove in. Hilarious!!!!!!
Once again, no camera was to hand to capture this, but I'm sure you get the picture. The other kodak moment we failed to capture was a kangaroo in the public phone box outside the park visitor center. It was looking at the phone as if it was trying to work out if it had enough change in it's pouch to phone home, but alas, by the time we had the camera out and turned on, the roo had skipped town (boom, boom).
Next day we decided to move to the town side of the cape and in the way stopped off at the Vlamingh Head Lighthouse. This was also the site of a WW2 radar station. The support tower for the rotating antenna is still there, along with some of the sandbag wall which protected it. The sandbags look to be well on the way to petrification. There are also views of the Very Low Frequency radio communications towers which were installed by the US Navy in the sixties and are now managed by the RAN. Thirteen towers almost 400 metres high, with foundations up to 17 metres deep. These things were an engineering and technological masterpiece when built, and they are still in use today.

WW2 Radar Tower

If you look closely you can see the VLF towers on the horizon

Stopped off to see the remains of the SS Mildura which ran aground in 1907. The captain appears to have taken one shortcut too many...

And, last but not least, a kodak moment we did manage to capture - the emu who came to lunch!

Tom Price 09-10 October 203

Gee, this is a cold place! Woke up Thursday morning after a night under the doona (yep, a bloody doona - all night - and pyjamas!!!!) and had to go searching for a jacket to fend off the chill. It must have got down to at least 18C overnight! We had definitely acclimatised to Marble Bar which was well over 40 every day we were there (it was already 39.5 when we drove out of town at 10:35 in the morning).
SHOES! We had to squeeze our feet into shoes so we could go on the Rio Tinto mine tour. Really felt weird and uncomfortable after two months in thongs and sandals. OH&S running riot once again - even though the only place you get off the bus is in the car park at the lookout over the original main mine pit, closed footwear, hard hats and safety glasses must be worn! Perhaps they are worried that one of the planes carrying the FIFO people in will crash on someone who is not adequately protected.....
The tour was good value tough. Cheaper and longer than the one in Port Headland, but soooooo much better. Baz, the guy driving the bus, had a really dry sense of humour and actually knew a lot about the mining operation, the specs of the various machines, and the costs involved.
So, since I haven't really tried to bore anyone senseless with numbers 'til now, here are some stats:
Rio Tinto have 14 iron ore mines in the Pilbra and expect to be able to continue mining here for anywhere between 24 and 150 years;
They have 36 large dump trucks at Tom Price that can carry 240 tonnes of ore at a time. They have a 2500hp diesel/electric engine, have a 4920 lt fuel tank, have a working life of four years and cost $4.5 milion dollars each. There are also 6 smaller trucks which can 'only' carry 100 tonne at a time, but no-one talks about them much;
There are over 1 million bearings supporting the conveyor belt systems used to transport the ore from stock piles to crushers, washers, trains and ships etc. One section is over twenty kilometers long and runs a single continuous rubber belt (that's one big lakka band!);
There is 1600km of heavy duty standard gauge railway track;
There are 48 trains running on the tracks every day, each one consisting of three 4500hp locos hauling 236 wagons, with a total length of 2.5km (a bit shorter than the BHP Biliton 3.2km ones, but still pretty impressive) and a total load of 27,376 tonne per train with an average of 4 trains from the Tom Price site alone a day. The trains take approximately 90 minutes to unload, which is done by turning two wagons at a time upside down over a hopper.
Everything is simply massive, costs huge amounts of money, and is covered in red dust, but I hear the profits are pretty good....

 

Drove up Mount Nameless (You can walk, or even run, but c'mon now!) to get a bird's eye view of the mine site, town and surrounds. It is a really steep rough 4x4 track, which takes around 30 minutes from bottom to top. To give some idea of how tough a drive is, it takes around two hours to go up the walking trail, but the record for running up (yes there are people stupid and/or fit enough to do that) is a shade over 16 minutes. Anyhow, we made it to the top and the views were pretty good I have to say. It is the highest point in WA you can drive to at 1016m, and you can see for miles and miles and miles. In fact I could see our place from there. You know, the one in the caravan park at the foot of the mountain.