Thursday 14 December – Started my next novel “A Dog’s Way Home” by W Bruce Cameron. Thought this book would be a good choice seeing we are on our way home to ours.
Baxter Rest Area
Ok so we are on the road again. 7am said the watch when I woke to check it. Paul was up off to the loo and when he returned it was all stations go. I hung on for a further 15min, not wanting to get out as it was still cold. Once he had the breakfast ready though, I couldn’t hold out any longer. Dressed, bed and breakfast done, we were ready to roll. 730am not bad. No not 730am at all, 5am!
Shortly before 6am we completed the 90 mile straight and by 615am we had pulled into the Balladonia Roadhouse for fuel, a fifth of today’s journey behind us already.
The next 200km were a breeze. The road was clear, wind was down and there was little traffic about I was fascinated with the Great Western Woodlands and the colour of the trees. Some of them have quite a pearlescent sheen to them in hues of copper and green, while others are vivid white standing out dramatically against the other muted tones.
20km from Norseman and my phone began pinging, internet and phone cover yippee. I got got busy trawling through all of the messages and emails, finishing just as we pulled into the BP for fuel again. I was after a loo, but they were all out of order, so we continued into the centre of Norseman and used the public loos instead. 200km to go to Esperance and a couple of hours of driving ahead of us.
The next part of the journey peeled away quite easily and we were back amongst familiar buildings. Just after 11am we pulled into the Esperance Seafront Caravan Park, where we had stayed during our January visit. We could see that it was quite empty and we would have no trouble booking in for a few nights. After paying the fee, an expensive $40.50 a night, we drove through the park and found our site. The set up of the van ensued before I went off for a shower.
Feeling refreshed, I returned and Paul went off to do the same.
After Paul finished his lunch, we drove into town so that we could replace all of the fresh produce and a quick walk around. We returned a short time later and I had my lunch. We rested up for a while, Paul reading while I watched a DVD.
Bored with sitting around, we donned the walking shoes and made for the centre of town. We stopped to admire the beautiful blue water that is set off by the vivid white sand. We then crossed the road to walk up the lookout for a view along the main drag. This was closed last time we were through, so it was great to be able to take advantage today.
We returned to the beach side path, following it to tanker jetty. This jetty was closed to the public last time we came though and now a few sections are missing. We wondered if they had been knocked out by a winter storm. We walked through the various parks, watched the graduating primary kids celebrating with some water play at another jetty and eventually walked all the way around the bay.
Paul got busy ringing some of his colleagues to see how they were fairing after finishing the school year. There were plenty of grumbles about the Principal, but above all they were glad to be calling an end to 2017.
We made our way back to the van for just after 4 and then drove to the Settlers Hotel so that we could watch the basketball game between Cairns and Brisbane. It is such a dive of a place and became more so when a skimpy bar maid turned up. Though I must say I had seen girls wearing less on the beach in some place we have been.
Mum rang and we had a brief video chat about our plans for the next few days. I think she was a little surprised that we would be there so soon and stay for so long. She also thought Brad would be upset that he would be arriving after us now.
I returned to watch the rest of the basketball, Brisbane coming away 1 point winners. We returned home at 630pm and I got straight into making dinner as I was starving. We ate and did the dishes, before heading to the front of the park to access the Internet, but I was foiled as there was a password needed and I didn’t have it.
We returned to our spot and made ourselves comfy. I finished off the blog and then found the password for the net at the bottom of the park info sheet. I was too beat to go back down, so figured I would catch up everything tomorrow morning, including syncing my watch to WA time.
I didn’t stay up much longer opting to head to bed at 830pm ready for a good night’s sleep.
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