The Pilbara

The Pilbara

Left Broome about 9am on Sunday 13th and had a long uneventful drive to a free camp about 80km north of Port Hedland (De Greys River).

Nice little spot on the bank – even some water in the river bed.

Filled up with fuel at Hedland about 8am next morning and had a quick look around – I worked here for a month or two in 1976 but can't remember much except for 6 days a week, 12 hours a day, Saturday night at the pub, Sunday hangover.

Then drove on to Karijini National Park arriving about 1pm – booked into the Dales Gorge campground had lunch and then went walking. Went via

Fortesque Falls to the Fern Pool

where we had a lovely refreshing swim.

The gorges here are different from those in the Kimberley. Here you descend into the gorge rather than walk up through a river bed between mountains. They are spectacular in their own way with vivid red cliffs and clear blue water pools.

From the Fern Pool we walked the length of Dales Gorge to the Circular Pool

– no-one else there and it was not only very beautiful but also extremely tranquil. A steep climb back up to the top followed be a cliff top walk with several lookouts was enough for one day – besides it was well after beer o’clock by this time.
Unfortunately Jill grew a couple of blisters during the days outings so out with the bandaids for the following day where we drove about 40km on a good dirt road to Weano Gorge, Joffre Gorge,

Knox Gorge

and Hancock’s Gorge. Most of them had a great lookout just a few hundred metres from the respective car parks.
We then climbed down a steep path plus ladder into Hancock’s Gorge and walked along to

Kermit’s Pool

and Rankin’s Pool

(which is named after an SES volunteer who perished trying to save people caught in a flash flood)

Both were very picturesque. Once again we had these pools to ourselves this time having got there early in the morning before most other campers had made a move. This walk was a category 5 walk and reasonably difficult although not that long.
The harder walks required abseiling gear and skills so we didn’t bother about then and drove back to camp via Kaliman Falls.
After lunch a few hours driving via Tom Price (apparently the tours no longer include the actual open cut mine and since I have worked in plenty of these and since Jill isn’t interested in other mining infrastructure (crushers, screens, conveyors, trucks etc) we didn’t stay), and Paraburdo we camped at another free camp on the way to Exmouth and the Ningaloo reef.