Day 21 - Tuesday 24 July - 80 Mile Beach here we come

Day 21

Tuesday

24 July

Port Headland  - 80 Mile Beach

It had been another noisy night, that had us reaching for the ear plugs once again. Unlike Karratha’s industrial area, where we were fighting the clang of spanners, hammers and drones of 24 hour workshops with noisy machines running all night, here it was the iron ore trains rattling by. Once the plugs went in, the noise was dampened and we managed some sleep. 

I was awake at 6.45am and by 7.15am we were up and getting ready. With breakfast complete, we were readying the cab and pulling out by 7.50am. This time we turned left and the sign said Broome, only 600km away, not that we were travelling there today. Our destination was 80 Mile Beach about 250km away. Our initial plan was to be here for 3 days, but as Brad wanted us to drop in, we had to alter it to one. I guess if we like it we can return on our way home. 

The drive up was nothing spectacular. Once again it was flat. One outcrop or rocky hills took my fancy, especially as part of it looked like a claw. The vegetation is far scrubbier up here, with taller, spindly bushes along the roadside, rather than the low grasses that we drove alongside up to Karratha. We noticed there was a greater number of road kill here as well, mainly because they can be disguised by the growth. 

We had more cows to deal with on this stretch of road, most of them are happy to stand to the side and chew away at the long grass, but we did have a couple that thought it was greener on the other side. Paul beeped the horn whenever we went past some, but they never flinched. 

We turned off the smooth NWC Hwy at 10.15, following the sign to 80 Mile Beach caravan park and were confronted with a dirt road and corrugations galore. 9km later and still intact, we arrived at reception and booked in for the day. We had a great big grass site to drive thru and were able to set up just the way we like it. By 10.45am we were ready to explore. 

We walked the path to the top of the sand hill, admiring the view and the lucky bugger sitting on the bench enjoying the life, only to realise after it was our neighbour from home, John and Thelma was just coming up the beach, shells shoved everywhere. 

We chatted for a while and then continued our walk around the park. It is quite a large place, which would cater for a number of people. We returned to the van for lunch and then decided we should walk it off, so we headed up the beach. Thelma had given me the shell collecting bug and I was off scouring through the various shells that lay strewn across the sand. 

The beach was alive with many little critters, lots of sea snails leaving their trails behind them and a number of small crazy crabs. We walked a fair distance up the beach, so few people out, you felt like you had it to yourself. The beach went on and on in both directions, it was quite lovely, however at this time of the day the tide had taken a fair chunk of it. 

After walking for a fair time, we made our way back. Paul was chasing little crabs for bait and adding them to the bag faster than I could add shells. We returned to the van and cleaned up and then went up to reception for the happy hour icecream, $3 scoops. Every man and his dog was in the line by the time we got there, but we joined the end and were glad to come away with our scoop of deliciousness.  

We ate our icecream, talking about our options and deciding to stay on for an extra night. I sent an email to Barn Hill rearranging our dates and then sat about reading my book for a while. We did a walk of the park, to keep up the steps and I stopped to take a photo of a couple of zebra finches basking in the afternoon sun.

At 5.30pm, I joined many of the tourists on the beach to watch the sunset, another perfect one. I returned to Paul and we had dinner, before playing cards for a while. We went for an evening wander of the park, finding Thelma once again. She invited us back to her van to check out the shells she had collected from the beach, so many! We chatted for a couple of hours, more than we have ever spoke at home and then by 9pm, we were ready to head bac to the van and to bed.