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.