Broome to Point Samson / Cossack

Firstly, apologies for not writing this sooner, but we have been having too much of a good time lately just relaxing, fishing, more fishing!...

Here we are back at the Cable Beach Caravan Park again, waiting for our tyre to arrive from Perth! We had booked in for 3 nights but that was a bit optimistic! We quickly realised everything operates on “Broome” time! It was going to be at least a week before we got our tyre! Fortunately we had the offer of accommodation, staying with friends who have a 4 bedroom house in Cable Beach! We checked out of the caravan park and stayed with them for an extra 4 nights. We have had a wonderful time here in Broome, just relaxing, going to the beach, eating out and enjoying the annual Shinju Matsuri Festival. The weather is about 33 degrees but it feels much warmer than that because of the humidity. Alex went out on a fishing charter for the day and caught Crimson Perch, Moses Perch and unfortunately an undersized Coral Trout! We took the girls to watch the Dragon Boat races down at Town Beach and they had the most wonderful time playing at the water park. On Sunday we went to the Mardi Gras where Sammy the dragon was supposed to lead the procession. However, he got lost and turned up rather late, racing in at the end. We found out they had stopped off at the pub on the way and lost track of time! Whoops!! We also went to Gantheaume Point and had a picnic on the beach while watching the sunset.

Anyway, our tyre finally turned up so we had it fitted and packed up ready to go again. We left Broome on Monday morning and after a quick visit to the supermarket to stock up, hit the road and travelled 365km south to 80 Mile Beach. We arrived around 2pm and went straight down to check out the beach. It was amazing! Aqua blue water and white sand as far as your eye could see! The girls were most impressed by the amount of shells on the beach and we spent the next 3 days shell collecting while Alex concentrated very hard on catching that elusive big one!... We all had a go at fishing and Zoe got the best one! A huge catfish! Alex stepped on the edge of a very large stingray which scared him just a little bit!... I saw a sea snake swim up near me and we had heard of people catching small tiger sharks off the beach so as beautiful as it looked, definitely no swimming here! Alex was very disappointed that he didn’t manage to pull in a big threadfin salmon though. Each morning we woke up to the thickest misty fog! Everything was soaking wet. We went driving along the beach and the visibility was literally only a couple of metres. Fortunately the beach was fairly empty and quiet except for the one lonesome sunbather lying right in our path?!!!... oh, and 5 cows!!!

We could have spent longer here but we have to keep moving as we are running out of time to fit everything in! We were out of here by 8am on Thursday morning as we had a 450km drive to Point Samson ahead of us. We stopped off in Port Hedland for lunch and phoned ahead to book into the caravan park. However, both caravan parks were fully booked and they have been turning 40 - 50 away each day! We frantically started researching accommodation in the region and the Roeburne Visitor Centre told us about some budget accommodation in Cossack. It was described to us as backpacker style dorms with shared facilities. For $65 a room per night we decided to book it (we were also getting a bit desperate!) However, when we turned up we were pleasantly surprised. We are staying in a beautiful fully restored historic building (circa 1800’s) which used to be the police quarters and has the old gaol out the back. This place is fantastic!Cossack is an old abandoned historic pearling township which has been carefully restored. It is peaceful and quiet and has excellent spots for fishing etc. and is only an extra $10 per night compared to the packed out caravan park we were supposed to be going to at Point Samson. We have chosen to stay here now instead for a couple of nights. It also means we don’t have to pull any of our gear out as we have beds, towels, a fully equipped kitchen and dining room and a proper bathroom! There is even a little cafe down the bottom of the garden where we can get a fresh homemade scone! This place will be hard to leave but we are off to the Cape Range National Park (Exmouth) next which is also supposed to be spectacular. We have heard that people have been queuing up from 5am at the park gates to try and be first in line just to get in as it is so popular and there are limited camping sites. However, it is supposed to be well worth the wait.

We have so many great photos from this stretch but unfortunately can only put a few up here for you. We are assuming there will be no mobile coverage in the Cape Range National Park so the next time you will hear from us will be from Coral Bay.