Wednesday, 14 May 2014

Crossing the SA/WA Border to Esperance


Crossing the SA/WA border 
The girls loved crossing the Border and spent some time jumping back and forth between the two states. 





Crossing the 90 mile straight I was happy to get to the end of this one!





Newman Rocks
Pulling into a free camp we where pleasantly surprised to discover this place had a great view of the scrub for miles. We ending up spent 3 nights here and managed to build a pretty impressive rock tower one afternoon. 
Homeschooling with a view!!


Kalgoorlie
Arriving in Kalgoorlie after a long drive across the Nullarbor we set up in yet another Free Camp site. During our time in Kalgoorlie we visited the Super Pit lookout and was lucky enough to be there when they blasted one of the sides of the pit. The Pit itself is just massive and it's hard to take in how big it really is.
We also visited the Gold Museum and visited the Metropole Pub, which has a mine running under it. They have installed a glass panel in the floor so people can view the mine from the top. Whilst there Ella lost her second "Top front tooth!" 
We also visited Hammond Park (super cool playground with lots of animals roaming around) and a park where the girls got to climb up inside some of the trucks that are used inside the Pit which they found quite cool. 




Bromus Dam
Leaving Kalgoorlie we took a short detour to Coolgardie (not much to see here) before making our way down to Esperance. Along the way we pulled into Bromas Dam with the intentions of spending one night here.. Well, we just fell in love with this place! 
With endless areas to set up camp, fire pits and a massive dam with a rope swing, yabbies, fish and even a giant piece of Polystyrene that the girls (and myself ;)) could all float around on we spent the next four days playing in the sun! Come night time we had some great campfires and cooked our meals over the fire. 



After four days it was time to leave though and make our way to Esperance.

Esperance (so far)  
Arriving in Esperance two days ago we have set up at a great little spot known at "The Yabby Farm." It's basically the back of a couples property and they have set it up for people like us to camp in. For $20 a night we have power, HOT showers (these are few and far between when free camping, so it's luxury for us! Lol), a free washing machine and the guy brings us firewood each night for us to use. Such a great place!! 
We have met another family who are also staying here and travelling Australia with their two children. The girls love playing with their two kids, whilst Gary and I are enjoying spending times swapping stories over a couple of bevies around the fire at night. 
We have visited some really beautiful beaches whilst here that have the whitest sand and crystal clear waters. So pretty! 
The weather has been good to us also, with sunny warm days.. Hopefully it sticks around whilst we are down this bottom end of the Coast! 




We plan on spending a couple more days here before heading to Lucky Bay (40km east of Esperance.) Lucky Bay is known for having Australia's whitest sand and Kangaroos are often seen lazing around on the beach! So looking forward to it! 

Friday, 2 May 2014

Koonalda Homestead




Yesterday we visited a truley awesome part of Australian history which I feel deserves a post of is own.. 
Koonalda Homestead. 16km off the Eyre highway, 100km before the WA border we travelled down a bumpy dirt road, dodging Wombat holes and driving through large muddy puddles, it was a long 16km before we finally arrived at this amazing part of our Australian history.
The homestead, built out of old railway sleepers was used to service the traffic crossing the Nullarbor before the sealed Eyre highway was laid. Consisting of the main homestead, a shearers hut, sheep shearing shed, gas station and a car graveyard, it has been officially closed since the 1970's and has been abandoned since 1988. Since then it has been maintained by the Nullarbor National Park and travellers are welcome to stay the night for free either in the homestead or anywhere on the surrounding property. 
Nearby to the property is a blowhole and a sinkhole, which may be worth a visit also, but we didn't bother to check these out. 
The plan was to arrive in the afternoon and stay the night, but after stopping at various lookouts along the Nullarbor, the day had crept up on us and we weren't keen to try and find this place in the dark. So unfortunatly we did not get to stay the night here, but instead we woke early yesterday morning to explore the Homestead. 
The girls and ourselves just loved this place and more than reccomend it to anyone who is travelling this way to check it out!!