3 STATE...3 MONTH ADVENTURE

...what follows is a letter written by Mandy to let you know a little about our 3 month holiday. Obviously she wrote the letter just after returning.........we made this web site up quickly so all our friends could see something of what we did........

<WEBMASTER'S NOTE......HYPERLINKS TO APPROPRIATE IMAGES HAVE BEEN INCLUDED.....SOME LINKS HAVE SMALL SEPARATE STORIES!! >

WELCOME TO TEAM 4X4 READERS!

Dear ALL,
We arrived home about one week ago and it certainly has been all go since then. We have had lots to do on the car, let alone all the washing and ironing etc.......
We left on our trip on 7/7/97 and drove from Adelaide to our first night in the bush north of a town called Glendambo. We camped next to one of the many salt lakes in that area. The kids had a ball as we saw the first of many emus and had the first lot of many toasted marshmallows on sticks over the camp fire.

The first few legs of the trip were rather hurried as we had to meet some friends ( the 5 Bears! ) at a place called Fitzroy Crossing, the start point of our trip into the Great Sandy Desert of Australia and in particular to Stone-Axe cave. We believe no white man had been where we went for approximately 50 years and (from our research), a grand total of about 10 white people at the most had been there since colonisation of Australia. Our route to Fitzroy Crossing took us up the Tanami Track which is quite a good dirt road, built to service the mines and now used as a short cut to the Kimberley area of Australia from the southern states.

Once we left Fitzroy Crossing with our friends we headed into the Great Sandy Desert (via Christmas Creek), where 9 days, and many kilometres through sand hill, spinifex and desert country later, we came to the closest approach to Stone-Axe Cave. After packing lots of water, fruit and sunscreen, we put on our hats and set off across the desert. We had a return walk of about 8 kilometres to do, which wasn't all fun in the 32 degree sun. I had to carry Emily (7) on my back all the way (except up and over the sand-hills). The spinifex was the perfect height to go in her eyes so it was the only way to do it.

We didn't even know if we would find it as on looking in the direction where it should have been, there was nothing to see but sand, sand and more sand. As it turned out, we did actually find it - about 3 kilometres away from where it should have been according to the map (and the help of the GPS). Position plotted in books like Reader's Digest "Atlas of Australia" are slightly wrong, as are those on the 1:50 000 map of the area are as well. The actual lat/long for Stone-Axe Cave:
20 deg 03 min 31 secs South
125 deg 15 min 31 secs East
<disclaimer: please do not rely on the above coordinates, the webmaster, nor anyone associated with this site, takes no responsibility for any loss/damages etc if you rely on these numbers!!!!>

<webmaster's note...This was determined by using a Magellan Meridian GPS; click HERE to go to Australian Geographic Place Names (Gazetteer)>

Have a look on the map and you can see where we were!!!!!!!!!

Anyway, after we found the cave it was back to "civilisation" and on to an aboriginal community at Billilluna, on the junction of the Tanami Track and the world famous Canning Stock Route. The CSR is one of the most enchanting roads we have driven on , even though we only saw the top third or so. We said "bye-bye bears" here at Billi.

We dropped in to Wolf Creek Crater for a look before joining the blacktop west of Halls Creek. From here we went to the Bungle Bungle National Park where there are famous bee-hive shaped domes of rock. They are very interesting - striped black and orange mounds, some of them up to 200 metres in height. The colouring is interesting as the rocks are actually sandstone but the water has dissolved a lot of their "cement" and water has seeped out through some of the layers. This has caused the black striping as algae has gained a foothold and grows on the rocks. The most fascination part of the Bungles is that they were only discovered in 1978 as the area is quite isolated, in fact just to get from the main road to the entrance to the park takes about 2 hours and it is only about 50 kilometres as the crow flies.

From here we went to Kununurra where a huge man-made lake has helped to make this area very productive. The lake cruise was fantastic and in some directions you could not see land. From Kununurra we went into a great place called Tunnel Creek. This is a huge tunnel type cave that goes for about 750 metres, the entrance is very small and very well hidden. In fact, it was the hide-out of an aboriginal outlaw in the last century. He would deceive the law by being able to escape into the tunnel and as the tunnel went right through the mountain and out the other side, ( a fact unknown to the police) he could be raiding properties on the other side of the mountain while the police were patiently waiting to starve his out from the main entrance. A fascinating area and well worth a visit.

We visited an old stock camp (Old Mornington Stock Camp) in the heart of the Kimberley region and spent a few days fishing and canoeing on the mighty Fitzroy River. If you go to Old-Mornington (recommended), hire a canoe and paddle around in Diamond Gorge. It's about a 1hour drive from the camp. "They" want to dam this area (you can see how easy it would be). We hope they don't....however, it could add a lot more water to the surrounding area making the bird life even more prolific!! Let me know what you think (I know some of our friends reading this have been there...yep..and the team 4x4 members having a sticky here too!)

Next port of call was Broome, where my mum and dad were holidaying. They had been there many times and could show us all the places to see. Cable Beach is a wonderful, colourful place with camel safaris at night and spectacular sunsets. Gantheume Point has dinosaur footprints and the Dampier Peninsula, north of Broome (Cape Leveque) must be one of the most fantastic places I have ever been. Miles and miles of pristine white beaches and turquoise waters with just the occasional boat bobbing around. It was the perfect place to get lost, if only for the two weeks we had in this region.

We had to move on from Broome after our fortnight there and start heading south. The weather was good and we visited some wonderful places like Cape Kuraudren where millions of untouched oysters just litter the rocks. A wonderful place, if you like oysters !!!!! Down to a virtual ghost town, Cossack. This lovely place was the birth-place of the pearl farming trade in Western Australia, until the harbour started to silt up and the operations were moved further north, to Broome. The total population of Cossack is 3, and they had only arrived the week before we did, to take up the role of caretakers of the town and help plan the restoration of the former buildings.

Next stop were some of the national parks inland in the Pilbara area of Australia - amazing gorges, rock folds and rivers - we could have spent a lot more time there but had to keep on moving. We had a quick look at Wittenoom then out again to the coast and to a little town called Exmouth. This place has become quite famous around the world as for a few months of the year whale sharks frequent these waters and once their season has finished the hump-back whales arrive. We went on a wonderful cruise here as well and saw many turtles.

Over the Tropic to our next stop was one of my favourites - Coral Bay. This tiny town has a permanent population of 23, but the tourist numbers swell the population most of the time. This was an amazing place as you can snorkel over huge areas of coral and of course heaps of fish, sea cucumbers, clams, starfish and the occasional moray eel. The most amazing part is that you didn't need to get a boat out to the reef as in most places, but you just walked into the water and could be over the coral in about one minute. In places, the coral comes to within about 10 metres of the shore. We had a flight in a little 4 seat Cessna (that was an experience in itself) right over the reef area there ( the Ningaloo reef) and saw dugongs, turtles, sharks, dolphins and even a hump-back whale and her calf. The kids thought that was one of the best things of the holiday.

We really did not want to leave Coral Bay but the time schedule kept tapping us on the shoulder. It was down south towards Perth. We went to Shark Bay World Heritage area and Monkey Mia where wild dolphins have been coming in to shore to associate with humans for about 30 years or so. That was a terrific experience as we all got to feel the dolphin as it passed us in the water and Thomas was chosen from all the people to be the lucky one to feed the dolphin some fish.

Another place that rated well was the city of Perth - the capital of Western Australia. It is built on the shores of the Swan River, but the river is so large that the city appears to be on a huge lake. We caught up with some friends in Perth and then headed south again, this time down to the Margaret River area - one of the fine wine-growing areas of Australia. Also down in that area are lots of limestone caves - we decided to go down in one as the children hadn't done that before. They were quite amazed by the coolness and the darkness inside the cave system.

The south-west area is well known for its karri and tingle forests and the karri are the second tallest (or 3rd - I'm not so sure) tree in the world. A new attraction in that area is the tree top walk where a ramp goes up into the canopy of the tingle trees and stays at that height for approx 400 metres. Not a really pleasant experience for someone like me who is not to keen on heights!! especially when the wind is blowing.

We went down to Cape Leeuwin - where the Indian Ocean meets the Southern Ocean - and then started the last leg of our journey - heading east. We visited the town of Albany and had a visit to Whaleworld - an old whaling station that only ceased operations in 1978. The whole station, including spotter planes, all equipment and the ships had been donated so the tourists etc could understand the operations that had taken place and the reasons why. The smell of the whale oil has permeated through all the wood and has left the place with rather a rancid smell. The children were quite disgusted/amazed that whaling ever had existed.

From there it was off to Esperence. We saw lots of southern right whales cavorting out in the bay about 50 kilometres from Esperence which was a wonderful experience for us all. From Esperence it was up to Norseman and then almost due east towards South Australia.

On our way across the Nullarbor, we camped off road near some spots where our Grandad camped some 70 years earlier. He took a model-T Ford across from Adelaide to Perth (and back) in1927. This formed part of his honeymoon. ( There is an interesting story at Balladonia Station from 70 years ago involving the then owners and Grandpa ..we'll tell you when we catch up. BTW..drop into Balladonia if you are passing..there is some terrific art work on display there. The owners Jackie and John Crocker are lovely..please remember us to them...and they'll tell you the story!!).

We also stopped at a place called Cocklebiddy Cave (about 16 km from the main road) and almost were trapped there as it started to rain in the early hours of the following morning (it hadn't rained in Cocklebiddy for almost 3 years prior to that night - how's that for luck!!!). As it is all clay-pans there you can be easily caught. It had taken us about 20 minutes to get there from the main road and took us more than an hour and a half to get out. We were very lucky as , we found out later, our friends had been stuck there a few years ago for two days in mud up past their axles!!!

From Cocklebiddy it really was a straight run home, and it really felt good to be back. All the bulbs I had planted before we left had flowered and everything looked wonderful. It made us all realize how good home really is. It has also given us time in the last week to really get to know the house a little better as we only moved here in March and have been gone for 3 months. Now it is back to reality!

Hope you and your family are all well.

Mandy :) :))