At the end of September we headed off on our annual camping trip. We had an extra onboard this time as my nephew, Devon, was here from New Zealand. We wanted to show Devon just how varied and beautiful West Australia is from the inland dry areas to the turquoise blue sea. And I think we successfully managed it.
Our first night’s stop was the Murchison Settlement Roadhouse which is very isolated and on the way to, the even more isolated, Mt Augustus

Murchison Settlement Roadhouse
From there we saw same interesting things that are very iconic to Australia. One is a stock watering well. These have been put in over 100 years ago and are used to water travelling stock in an arid and remote parts of Western Australia. A lot of these are now un-useable as stock is general moved by road trains, however we were lucky enough to come across a working stock well.

Working Stock Well
From here we travelled along further until we crossed the 26th Parallel. This is officially classified as remote so if you work above this zone there are big tax breaks due to the extremely hard living conditions. There is little to no rain with extreme temperatures regularly reaching 50C (122F) and an over abundance of dangerous creatures including deadly snakes, spiders, scorpions, jellyfish, crocs, etc, etc. It can also be an expensive place to live as most water and all food is transported in. Fresh fruit and vegies are not a common occurrence especially since your nearest shop can be well over 500km away.

The three boys at the 26th Parallel
Once we got to Mt Augustus we realised it is the largest rock in the world but not as tall as Uluru (Eyres Rock). Mt Augustus looked spectacular both at sunrise and sunset. The morning we left we bush-walked around part of the rock and between the heat and the flies we all got hot and cranky so headed off to Karajini National Park. The trip to Karajini was a long, hot and dusty trek over some unforgiving terrain and when we had a rock go through the side wall of Jason’s $400 tyre, he was far from impressed. The only other damage sustained throughout the trip was both, Mike and our campers got busted brake lines which would have resulted in rocks bouncing up off the tyres.

Mt Augustus at sunrise.
Karajini NP was almost hard to describe. When you drove into the camping area it looked dry, hot and tired. But within 300m walk you were standing at the top of picturesque gorges with cascading cool waterfalls. Thankfully they were cool as it was starting to get darn hot!! Devon, managed amazingly well with the heat considering it was only 7 days previous that he had been at ski camp in NZ and it was -2C (28F) and it was about 42C (108F). All of us, 6 kids and 6 adults, had a great time in the rockpools and waterfalls, and we even went on an 8.6km bushwalk when it was 40+C and we did it without any kids complaining.

Fortescue Falls, Karajini NP

Luke sitting on Fortescue Falls.

Mitch looking hot during our bushwalk.

Strange rock formations discovered on bushwalk.
From Karajini NP we drove to Millstream Chichester NP and to get there we had to go to Tom Price (a very small mining town) to do a safety course so we could use the mining railway road. This is a private road that is owned by mining giant Rio Tinto. This road was far from exciting and the only thing that relieved the boredom for the kids was the iron ore trains. We saw about six of them in total and the kids tried counting the carriages. One train had 287 carriages and 3 engines pulling it.

Rio Tinto iron ore train.

And the three engines pulling it (taken out the car window as we drove).
Millstream Chichester NP was like a breath of fresh air, there was big shady areas, large grassed areas and a billabong only 20m from where we camped so we didn’t have to trek up and down gorges. The water was very deep and cool so it was lucky that we bought blow-up pool noodles to keep the kids afloat, and they also made awesome water seats for us lazy adults.

Billabong at Millstream Chichester NP

The 2 campers and 1 roof-topper all set up at Millstream.
From there we headed back to the coastline to Point Samson. It was a lot cooler on the coast due to the sea-breeze but still sitting around the mid-30s. We stayed at a caravan park so we could stockup with food, wash the clothes and refill our water tanks. The caravan park was probably the hardest part of the trip with the kids (for us adults) as all of a sudden we were back in civilisation. We had complaints about “We’re bored” and ”The playground is boring”. But ironically when we were in the middle of the dry hot nowhere we didn’t have one complaint and they all entertained themselves collecting rocks and sticks and running around in the fresh air. We went to Karratha which is a regional mining town to stock up with food and to check out Dampier Peninsula and NW Gas Shelf Plant which was very interesting. We also went to Hearson Cove between Dampier and Karratha. It was amazing to see how far out the tide goes (up to 6m) out and how quickly it came back in. When we first put our feet in the water we were nearly 1500m from the high tide shoreline and by the time we left the tide was almost the whole way back in. On our way out of Hearson Cove we noticed a Crocodile warning sign which we should’ve seen before we ran to the water!! So next time we’re up north we’ll be taking a closer look at the signs before running towards the water!!

NW Gas Shelf Project, Dampier Peninsula

Mitch being a croc at the Crocodile Warning sign!!
Our next, and last, destination was Ningaloo Station which sits between Exmouth and Coral Bay. This is absolute pristine coastline with barely a soul on it. Just walking along the beach we saw dolphins galore, huge rays, turtles as wide as my arm span and even a reef shark!! And the snorkelling was spectacular too!! We saw Nemo, Dory, Nor-West Snapper, Zebra fish, Angelfish and Bat fish and the most beautifully coloured coral. We even saw a monster clam which Devon and Jas were trying to get to shut!! We spent our last five days at Ningaloo. It was a time to relax and enjoy the simple pleasures that nature brings our way. We spent hours fishing, swimming, snorkelling and playing cricket. The kids made coral gardens on the beach from coral washed up on the shore. And we all sat in awe of the sunset each night.

The kids posing on the beach

Another perfect Ningaloo sunset

Mitch, Devon and Luke on the beach
Probably the worst part of the trip is going home. It’s not like a couple of hours down the road!! It was two days drive!! The first day we drove for over 10 hours and stopped at a 24hr rest bay. Then packed up and left by 530am, had a late breakkie at 8am in Geraldton then drove another 6 hours home. We did this long haul with barely a squeak or a complaint from the kids. When we did get home it made technology like flashing loos and continuous hot water an absolute pleasure.