Norseman to Lake Ballard - and a little bit naughty in between!!

The tin camels at the entrance to Norseman - WA gateway to the Nullaboor

Historic York Hotel in Kalgoorlie - had a beer there

Paddy Hannan statue at the end of Hannan Street aka as The Golden Mile

Another lovely old Kalgoorlie building

Hannan street - the streets are very wide in Kalgoorlie

Historic Burt Street in Boulder where we stayed

Old mine shaft in the floor of the Metropole Hotel in Boulder - yes we had a beer

KCGM Super Pit Gold Mine Kalgoorlie

Another view of the Super Pit - look how small the trucks look

The sign says it all - Charlie's eager to get in and have a look

The "starting stalls" of the brothel where the ladies stand from 6 pm nightly

X-RATED - Now how can I explain that?

One of the rooms ready for business

The bondage room - sticks and stones may break my bones but whips and chains excite me!!

The Broad Arrow Tavern

Charlie reading some of the graffiti on the walls of the Broad Arrow Tavern

One of the male statues in Lake Ballard

One of the female statues - she's got boobs like me - saggy!!

They looked quite eerie

Charlie with a child statue

Happy Birthday!! - My official Birthday Photo

Happy Happy Birthday!!!

Happy Happy Happy Birthday

We are now travelling up through the Northern Goldfields and would you believe it Charlie's metal detector has decided to die!!  He could have found me a huge nugget to pay for this trip but its not to be.  So we will have to have some fun instead.

We travelled through Norseman and had lunch there in this little cafe - it was yummy.  Norseman is the gateway to the Nullaboor on the Western Australian side.  Apparently it is the second richest goldfield in WA but you wouldn't think so.  At the entrance to Norseman are the unique corrugated iron camels which depict the importance of camels in the Gold Rush days.

After lunch we headed on up to Kalgoorlie-Boulder which I must say was a surprise to me.  It was a lot bigger than I expected with very wide streets and lots of historical buildings.  The city traces its origin to one of the most significant gold strikes in Australia and was made by an Irishman called Paddy Hannigan (the luck of the Irish eh?).  The main street is named after him and is known as The Golden Mile.  Its a lovely street with lots of the original buildings still standing and some wonderful old historic pubs and of course we had to have a beer in a couple of them - its in the rule book.  The Super Pit gold mine is huge and is one of the biggest working open cast mines in the southern hemisphere. 

The discovery of gold in The Golden Mile triggered one of the biggest Gold Rushes in Australian history and so you can imagine there were lots of men here without their women which led to lots of brothels opening up!!  We did a tour of the oldest  (108 years) original still working brothel in Kalgoorlie called Questa Casa.  What an eye opener!!  It was conducted by the "Madam" and the first half hour of the tour was introducing us all to all the play toys which were passed around - small ones, big ones, a HUGE BLACK ONE, and a 2 headed one which Charlie immediately decided he liked!!!  The girls charge $280 an hour (you can just have 15 mins which is about $125 but that's usually just the young men as it doesnt take them so long - that's what she told us!!)  but that is just for the plain old fashioned act.  If you want anything else, its all extra!!  This brothel has been operating since 1890 but its still illegal - however the Madam pays tax - work that one out.

She then took us to have a look at a couple of the rooms, one of them being the "bondage room".  All sorts of things were laid out but if they were used they were extras, i.e. the black leather boots $100, whips $50 to $100 and so on.  Apparently in the early 1900's the so called respectable men of Kalgoorlie (who were using the brothel of course) decided that they wanted to bring their wives and family out to Kalgoorlie as they had established themselves and tried to run the working girls out of town because obviously they didn't want their wives to know.  However, none of them had considered the implications of this in a town with thousands of miners and their newly arrived wives and daughters the only females so the working girls stayed to provide a service.

We had a look at an excellent museum in Kalgoorlie which portrayed the early life of the miners on the goldfields in an area where there was no water and the ingenious inventions they came up with which enabled them to pan for gold without any water.

We also saw a pub in Boulder which had a glassed over mine shaft in the floor so of course we had a beer in there so that we could have a better look at the shaft.  The barmaid actually took us down the shaft to have a closer look which was good.

After Kalgoorlie, I decided that I really would like to have a look at the Inside Australia exhibition in Lake Ballard at Menzies which was about 180 ks north of Kalgoorlie before we headed over the Nullaboor to South Australia.  Another  former gold mining town but now only about 70 people live there but the pub serves great counter meals.  We went out to Lake Ballard which is a dry salt lake with 51 sculptures scattered over its 10 sq km surface.  These sculptures were commissioned by the Perth Arts Festival in 2003 and are taken from laser scans of the Menzies residents (actually they all looked much the same to me!!).  It was really interesting and was quite a different way to spend my birthday.  I'm glad we went and saw them because they are quite unique.

After a night in the caravan park in Menzies and a lovely meal and a few wines in the pub, we headed back south towards Norseman to start our journey across the Nullaboor.  We copped bad weather though - lots of rain from the cyclone which hit Port Headland yesterday so we are a little bit soggy today.  We stopped in at the historical Broad Arrow Tavern for lunch as they do the "famous" Broad Burger and I must say it was huge and yummy.  That's what I like about these country pubs - the food is good and plentiful - hence my increasing size.  The tavern was established in 1896 and is the only remaining building in Broad Arrow which was once a thriving gold mining town.  It was doing a good trade though so the burgers must be famous after all.  We often wonder who decides on this fame?  The walls, tables, doors, everywhere is full of graffiti which is quite interesting to read.

Anyway I am now sitting soggy and a little bit chilly so the heater will have to go on soon, writing this blog before we head down to the Nullaboor tomorrow and across to SA to see my little family - so excited about that.  Oh the joys of caravanning.

Until the next blog its Adieu from The Wandering 2s.

Pemberton to Esperance and a walk through the Ancient Empire - Valley of the Giants

Big Brook Arboretum at Pemberton where we camped

Charlie starting to climb the Gloucester Tree at Pemberton

Me at the highest point of the air walk in the Valley of the Giants - note load limit - I think I'm that on my own!!!

Charlie at the entrance of the Ancient Empire in the Valley of the Giants

Grandma Jane with the Grandma Tingle Tree in the Ancient Empire

Charlie standing in one of the huge red tingle trees

Elephant rocks at Denmark - wonder why they're called that?!!

Charlie and Trev launching the boat on the Kalgan River  - Charlie looks as though he's doing a dance of the fairies!!

We thought it was a big fish but it was a stingray - very big though

Charlie, Barb, Trev and Jane - friends we keep meeting up with the on the road

Charlie and Trev in the boat that went nowhere!!

Jane standing under Wave Rock at Hyden

Entrance to Mulka's Cave at Hyden

Aboriginal paintings in the cave

Large hand print

More hand prints

Charlie standing in the "Hippos Yawn' at Hyden

Hyden's first power station - the town that time forgot

Sunset from Wave Rock caravan park

Orb spider and web on one of our walks

A little friend

Entrance to Cape Le Grand National Park in Esperance

Section of Lucky Bay, Cape Le Grand

Charlie still trying his luck on the beach at Lucky Bay

Ma and Pa - not a care in the world!!

Kangaroos going for their early morning job on the beach

Lucky Bay

Starfish on the beach

Someone was lucky and caught an Australian salmon

Hellfire Bay in Cape Le Grand

Big bloody seagull!!!!

Frenchman's Peak, Cape Le Grand - the view from the top is sensational but its a 2 hour hard walk!!

Our neighbour at our campsite

Jane and Clarrie relaxing over lunch

Well, where to start.  If up north was all about rocks then down south is all about lush forests of tall karri pines, beautiful beaches again, and cooler weather.  We left Augusta and made our way to Pemberton through lots of national parks.  Instead of staying at the caravan park we camped at the Big Brook Arboretum which was just a forest with long drop toilets.  Lovely and peaceful and only about 3 other vans there.  We did the Karri Forest Explorer drive which winds through some of the south-west's most magnificant karri forest.  It is really good as there are a series of tourist radio stops when we tuned to 100 FM giving us all the information about the area.

We went and had a look at the Gloucester Tree which is a climb of 60 metres to the lookout but the view is breathtaking (or so I'm told!!).  It is still used as a fire lookout tree today.  Very impressive.  We learned also that the Karri tree grows up to 90 metres and is the tallest tree in WA and one of the tallest in the world.

I had another little accident at Big Brook Arboretum - out for a walk and slipped on the rolley stones and went down like a ton of bricks, twisting my right ankle this time, swelling, bad grazes, infected the lot and no I wasn't wearing walking shoes - just thongs!!  Will I learn?  I hope so!!

We left Pemberton and drove on through more national parks, forests passing through Walpole and did the Valley of the Giants drive and tree top walk. That was magnificent and awe inspiring to drive through these huge towering karri trees and then to walk metres over the top of them.  It was quite a windy day and the suspension bridge was swinging out quite a lot in some parts but I managed to not fall off - miracle really because if anyone was going to it would be me.  We also walked through the Ancient Empire where we walked through a grove of veteran red tingle trees and saw the amazing "Grandma Tingle" which is estimated to be about 400 years old  plus many others.

We drove on from here to Denmark into a caravan park right at the river mouth where we met up with Barb and Trev again.  Denmark is a pretty little town with quite spectacular coastline and beautiful beaches but unfortunately the weather turned cold and rainy for the 3 days we were there so I don't think we fully appreciated it.  We did the "must see" touristy things including Greens Pool which is a sheltered natural lagoon with emerald coloured water but not the day we were there!!  We also went and saw Elephant Rocks which are truly amazing because as you come round the corner on the board walk they really do look like elephants.  Night time we went over to the big bus and had another game of sequence and once again the boys were annihilated but they are such bad losers - whinge, whinge!!!  They did get their own back the next night and won but only by one game but did you hear us girls whinge?  No of course not!!

From Denmark we followed the coast around to Albany and found a great caravan park on the banks of the Kalgan River about 12 kms out from Albany.  Great place with kangaroos hopping around, good fishing and crabbing and yes you've guessed it, Barb and Trev were there as well..  That's what we like about this life, we meet great people, move on and then end up meeting them again.  Charlie and Trev went fishing late one afternoon and Charlie hooked on to something big which we hoped was a mulloway.  He took about 45 minutes to bring it in only to find it was a huge sting ray but it put up a good fight and was quite exhausted by the time it was cut free and let go.  Charlie was also exhausted and had sore arm muscles the next day.  But the wonderful thing was while this was happening, I was skyping with my daughter in law Abbie in England and I walked down to the river with my phone (hanging on to it for dear life as I didn't want to drown a 3rd one) and she and our gorgy porgy granddaughter Millie watched Charlie land the ray.  Technology is fantastic!!!

The next day the boys decided to launch Trev's tinnie and go fishing but the motor failed so Trev put the electric one on and off they went but that one also failed and at 8 pm that night there they were paddling for all they were worth back up the river - talk about The Griswalds go Fishing!!  Sore muscles again the next morning and no fish.

We decided to do a detour from Albany up to Wave Rock at Hyden so after another farewell to Barb and Trev we took off.    Drove through the magnificent Stirling Range National Park in the Golden Outback, Lake Grace with no lake and on to Wave Rock.    Wave Rock is amazing - its part of a huge granite outcrop called Hyden Rock and really does look like a wave.    It is over 100 metres long and over 15 metres high.  We also went to see Mulka's cave which has 452 aboriginal motifs in the 3 caverns with lots of handprints.  Legend has it that Mulka was the offspring of an aboriginal woman who married someone who was not approved of by the clan.  Mulka was a giant of a man and lived in this cave but used to eat children!!!  Some of the handprints were certainly big!!  We also saw another rocky outcrop called The Hippo's Yawn and that also was incredible how it looked so much like a hippo's head and mouth.

We then drove down through the Wheat Belt to Esperance.  What a beautiful place with lots of spectacular beaches.  We camped in Cape Le Grand National Park in a place called Lucky Bay and I consider we were very lucky to be able to camp there.  It is just stunning!!  It is unspoilt and the sand is so white and the sea just azure blue with white frothy waves hitting the sand - I should write a travel blog!!  Seriously it is beautiful, kangaroos hopping and lazing around on the beach and we saw salmon jumping in the waves but unfortunately Charlie only caught herring which we smoked - yummy!!!  Met some lovely people there as well and had lots of happy hours.  The camp hosts, Penny and Alan, lost their roast leg of lamb to a kangaroo who stole it from the cobb oven - we all had to be careful not to leave things lying around.

After 5 days there just relaxing, fishing, walking, drinking, eating, we packed up reluctantly and made our way back to Esperance and stayed in the caravan park for a couple of days so that we could once again clean the car, van and stock up on provisions ready for the next stage of our trip but that will be the subject of another blog.

We are having a ball and don't want it to end but I suppose we are free agents so who knows.........

Adieu from The Wandering 2s.