Tom Price, Kaijini National Park And COLD water

Showered, shaved bla bla bla we continued East towards Cheela Plains Station, stopping just shy of this we hit a free camp which turned out to be a gem, probably a dozen of us in there, so quiet, sky TV from our table and felt safe.

Having had a series of not so quiet camps we had the best sleep for probably close to 2 months, it was $44 cheaper than the station stay and superior in every way… “Silence Is Golden” and that night we were billionaires.

Tom Price, this is actually the name of the town, nice place and a mining based place, setting up at the caravan park then off into town to tank up on fud.

Icecream was in order so in the carpark before the 30 degree heat could melt them we had a scoff, two dudes came along and looking at the bike.

One guy said, are you from NZ?, we said yeap, he said…whats ya name?, I  told him and he said “you are from Wanaka”, me…yeap, it was Steve Trevathen ex fireman of 29 years in Wanaka.

We had a great yarn about life for both sides of the ditch which was really cool and great to catch up on things and where life had taken us.

Our two nights over here we were getting set to leave however on getting out of bed we discovered the pusher tyre on the bike all the air had gone to the top which was less than ideal.

Up on the centrestand and rotating the wheel I couldn’t see any intruders, using our new pump I inflated the tyre then checked the valve, it was blowing bubbles, same problem we had had on the other wheels.

Behind us at the camp a Landy driver and Harley rider who we had chatted too (UDF), he said no worries got some spare valves so we put a new one in the tyre and he have us a spare, our faith in Ozzie for good bastids back on deck again.            

Not having to remove the pusher wheel is an epic saving of time and swearing so I thanked the moto Gods for the shitty valve and said don’t do it again please now we have replaced all three.

Karijini National Park…the place to see in the Pilbara region, again we couldn’t get a booking so we stayed in a free camp just shy of the park.

Camp fire, flat camp on red dirt (all red here) and a quiet space with our closest neighbour maybe 100m away, awesome spot again, we were supposed to stay at the Eco retreat but with nothing available….the bush camp pattern of quiet, fire, sky and safe becoming more apparent to the expensive caravan parks etc.

The day saw us go up and into the NP with gorges and view points showing us some of Ozzies top scenery.

Dales camp for the next round, we piled outa bed for our coffee only to have our cooker shit itself and blow fuel out from around a joint, luckily we were on red dirt which doesn’t burn that well…lucky….FFS…always something.

Some more cool stuff.

Dales camp this time we were in, got two nights. Again, stunning gorges with swimming holes and lookouts and we again bumped into Brittany who we had met on several occasions prior.

Swimming is not really my thing and I hate cold water as it makes my joints ache but I had to get in as an American Lady had got in and said I must or I would be beaten…gezz I hate peer pressure …so I did, wasn’t too bad, only six broken ribs and my nuts hidden in the back of throat…next time I go for a wizz I will need a magnifying glass.

Karijini is probably now one of our more favourite spots, excellent all round, tops of the gorges to finish off.

 

Bullara Station And Some Mist

Bullara Station, highly recommended, impending bad weather so we decided to stay there two days.

On arrival we got site 29, the weather till looking pretty good, the forecast predicting up to 15mm.

Although everyone was skeptical as no rain had fallen in 14 months the BOM showed a thick rain band over 2000km long, we did put our tarp on the sidecar to keep any rain out.

Great move, at little o’clock in the night down it came and with a backbone, the morning dawned with lakes all around us, our tent was fine from the top but the rain tide had come up enough to cover our tent footprint and go beneath the tub, we were dry …but not by much.

You are welcome guys, only takes a moto to turn up to bring on the rain…around 30 – 40 mm in the end they (we) had so worthy. 

At one of the kitchens there is a cool as sculpture covered in bottles, every year people add to the collection, once yearly it get cleaned off for new bottles...except this one which stays.

Message in a bottle, read this, simple but moving.

Some other interesting things in a groovy place

With Exmouth on our list we hit it not realizing what we were in for, only 90km so an easy day, getting to Exmouth we discovered we had just hit peak season, no unpowered camps sites available, only powered sites and $70 north.

Also an extremely touristy town it became apparent that if you have not booked EVERYTHING (including a fart) then it wasn’t happening.

Supermarket, grog shop and servo we decide to wing it in the National Park.

At a camp which we will not name we pulled in, the camp host asked for our booking, we explained that we did not have one and were hoping for a cancelled spot etc.

After a few minutes chatting she says, (off the record) you can always ask the guys down in the camp if someone will share their site (on the record) as you are visiting your friend and your friend has said no problem.

Off we tootled to find a new friend, a Swedish fello by the name of Ely said hey no worries, we said we only have a small tent and moto which was cool by him…we were in thanks to some rule bending and sensible thinking.

Happy hour at 5pm, we were there at 4.59 so as not to miss the action of a stunning sunset and good bastids to sit and yarn with.

Our torch was dead from not having a charge cable after some legend stole it, I asked Ely if he had one we could borrow…he did…wohhoh lighting again.

The following day we got onto our site that we managed to book and bag so we were there 100% kosher, after our morning walk up to the gorge we came back to a surprise at the tent, a cable with a note on it saying a gift from Ely as he had a spare, this absolutely made our day, shit being given to us rather than shit being stolen from us.

After our two nights here we headed back to Exmouth, all the snorkeling trips etc fully booked and with rough/high seas not many had been out so a waiting list was forming, we decided we could do this elsewhere anyway so headed back to Bullara station which again made for a good midpoint stop.

Clocking in we got exactly the same camp site so we knew exactly where to go and where to position the tent, new neighbours and no rain being the only difference.

Just the one night we watched the sunset from …well Sunset Hill.

 

Kalbarri to Bullara Station

Ok, rant over….like fuck!!, the amount of shit we have had to go through and the amount of shit we will still have to go through with insurance means lost time to enjoyment and I view this extremely dimly…that Ural shovel is waiting to get blood on it.

Now the rant is over ...on to Monkey Mia, 400 km on the knocker…not a lot in between so we hit it north.

Our mid point stop welcomed for gas, piss, let out gas, fud and relax, I was feeling a bit second hand with a small headcold (Near death experience for a dude tho), I had to shake a centrepede out of my jacket who was trying to freeload a ride.

On the way we met a dude on a 2 stroke MZ and had a good yarn, very cool machine.

Gasing up some chucks pushed in and went the wrong way 😊.

Monkey Mia Resort, a very cool place and welcome stop to destress from previous events.

RAC park was very nicely done and was MASSIVE, some beautiful sunsets from a sun laden beach with Dolphins cruising the shallow waters and Turtles gracefully doodling past.

If it gets any better than this let me know where (apart from the super friendly flies), temperate and nice.     

We talked to a number of people (UDF) who had passed us and even some we had passed (they were of course parked), actually Nigel from Scotland said our bike was constipated…we hadn’t passed anything in weeks.

Enjoying our day off it started with dolphin watching, followed by coffee and sun.

Skippy had a funny with charging system so I investigated but could not find anything, also our centre stand rubber buffer had come adrift so I glued that back on, not bad in 20000km.

Emus, they are protected here but they steal fud from ANYONE who leaves it unattended for a micro second, they even piled into our neighbours cruiser with the door only partially open so I chased them out with our fishing rod, another new comer had his steak on the bar b q only to have it snatched off the bar b q. in a micro flash.

From here inland to a station stay and north again, we were supposed to be picking up a parcel for our stove for repairs in Exmouth but FedEx who have been most excellent in screwing up everything are sending it on to Broome….1400 km north of us, they are legends.