Gnoorea Point (40 Mile)

 

Having a cuppa at the main camp area

40 Mile (aka Gnoorea Point – pronounced “new-re-a”) is a beach campsite about 65 km south of Karratha very popular with the Grey Nomads as an alternative to Cleaverville. With the Karratha Shire now mandating a maximum stay of 28 days in any 3 months at any of its camping areas many folk who used to stay at one of these sites for months now stay 4 weeks at each.

One of the attractions of this camping area is the unlimited availability of free (gold coin donation for RFDS) pure RO water at the Devils Creek LNG Plant which is situated at the turn-off to Gnoorea Point (raised over $4,000  so far this year and over $45,000 since it started) So - showering every night was not a problem. A lot of the folk I met at the Devils Creek water tap had large water bladders which they filled once a week. The availability of water like this is unique to Gnoorea Point in the Pilbara camping areas.

Carpet, fire, footy on TV and sand fly repellent!

40 Mile has two main camping areas – one at the Point surrounding the “caretaker” site with room for a hundred of so vans if you include the extended area to the east, and one smaller area on the way in with room for around a dozen vans. We chose the smaller area as friends from Collie were staying there for two of the seven nights we planned to stay. Didn’t have the views over the Indian Ocean like the Point but was nicely nestled behind the dunes and only 45 metres to the beach where we could swim and the fat whiting lurked. Nice spot with clean dunnie and dump point. 

Only downside was the sand flies on the beach and mangrove areas – Linda was scratching herself mad after multiple bites, yet I did not get a bite. I have a theory that beer is a sand fly repellent if ingested in sufficient quantities each evening?

Its tough on dogs in the Pilbara!

It’s funny how quickly you acclimatise to the warmer temperatures when you have been north for a couple of months – it got up to 38C while we were here but at night quickly plunged to 20C so it was on jeans, coats and light the fire!

Sad fisherman after last fish for 2020 trip

We didn’t end up staying the full 7 nights as originally planned as after 3 days of over 35C and 38C forecasted for our last day we decided to head south one day earlier (even having a swim didn’t help as by the time you got back to the van you were dry and hot again). Our trip south was going to be a rush compared to our trip up with 6 one-nighters before arriving at Mingenew (inland from Dongarra) for a few nights (forecast 3C this morning!). 

Gnoorea Point is a nice spot to swim, fish and relax with reasonable facilities and that magic fresh water supply nearby.  Short video is HERE

Point Samson

 

Where's my whine ?

While we were camped at Cleaverville Beach we took a day trip out to Cossack, Wickham and Point Samson. We liked the look of Point Samson so booked a week for our return trip after we reluctantly pointed the Pajero south from Pardoo. 

Point Samson is a real gem of a town with pristine beaches, tidy streets, boat ramps and marina, and grassy parks and views over the Indian Ocean. 

There are two caravan parks at Point Samson one large one and a smaller one (only 20 sites) next to the Tavern and 50 metres from the beach. It was a difficult decision, but we decided on the park next to the Tavern and beach. 

Miserable weather!

It may surprise readers that Point Samson is also at times - a fishing hot spot with creeks, causeways, marinas, rocky headlands, and sandy beaches. After a few unsuccessful forays at the creeks and headlands I was walking the hound along the beach next to the Park one afternoon and spotted what looked like whiting in the shallows? Out came the whiting popper gear and next day 17 nice whiting were resting as fillets in vacuum sealed bags in our freezer. This became a daily routine with the run out tide after lunch fishing best as the water was at least 5-10 degrees warmer in afternoons. Some of the best whiting on poppers sessions I have fished with multiple fish chasing every cast at the right time in the tide. The only downside to the fishing is that the sand flies at the beach are in squadrons and you need to be 100% covered in repellent before venturing down to fish. 

Out for our 31st Anniversary dinner

The Tavern at the end of the Park has ½ priced beer every afternoon between 5-6 PM and is renowned for its Fish (snapper) and Chips (called “Famous Fish and Chips” on the menu). Despite having a freezer full of fish fillets, we dined out several times - sipping on a point of beer whilst eating Famous Fish and Chips and watching the sunset – its pretty tough up here! It was our 31st wedding anniversary while we here so that was a good reason for one of the dinners.

A real oasis on the beach between the red dust of Port Headland and Karratha. 

Very short video is HERE

Marble Bar

 As we had never been to Marble Bar we decided to take a 200 km diversion east on our way south from Pardoo Station (also our freezer is half full of vacuum sealed fish fillets so we thought we would give the fishing a break for a week). 

For some reason I had this preconceived idea that this was a land of spinifex, and flat desert like country but to the contrary - the drive in and around Marble Bar is a land of red hills, gorges,  flood plains and of considerable beauty (a little like Flinders Ranges in SA). 

Eggs with the lot - Coongan Pool Grill

We stayed for six nights 35 km north of town on the Coongan River at Coongan Pool (aka Long Pool) – nice little camp area away from the main highway with grassed river banks and cool water to have a dip and wash off the red dust. 

Gumtree TV

Bird life was prolific and you didn’t need an alarm clock as the thousands of white corellas that come in on dawn for a drink made sure you were awake. With temperatures ranging between 30C to 15C it was a comfortable camping with a swim during the day and a fire at night.

Close to our campsite (just a few km away) is Doolena Gorge which is a pretty camping area nestled in between the red cliffs of the gorge. We chose the Coongan Pool site only because there is still enough water to swim whereas Doolena only has shallow water at this time of year.

We had planned three day trips around the area:

The hottest town in Australia?

Day one was into town to pick up some tourist info, and visit the marble rock bar in the Coongan River after which the town is named. Turns out the early settlers incorrectly thought the rock bar was marble, but it is in fact jasper (so perhaps the town should have been called Jasper Bar?). The Visitors Centre folk tell you to take a bottle of water to pour on the rock so you can see the beautiful colours but by a stroke of good fortune a rare event occurred the day we visited – it rained! Around 5mm - so the whole rock bar was shining in its true beauty for our visit.  

At the marble bar rock bar

Your not allowed to chip bits off the rock bar (It’s an A Class Reserve) but you can go to a near by jasper deposit for those souvenirs – Linda got a few pockets full and I snuck in a piece which is destined to be a door stopper in our house).

Day two found us packing a lunch and thermos and driving out 35km past Marble Bar to the “Secret” WW2 airfield at Corunna Downs. This remote airfield was built to avoid detection by the Japanese but allow the B52 Bombers to do some very long distance bombing raids on parts of Japanese held Indonesia (including a raid n Jakarta). Over 2000 men were stationed there in very primitive conditions with no refrigeration, air con, and living in tents. Not much remains these days except two well maintained runways and some bunker hanger earthworks but there was a cinema, hospital,  stores, ammunition dumps, water tanks and nurses quarters – WAIT a minute – “Nurses quarters” – I bet event the most homely of the Nurses looked good after a few months in the remote site! 

Ready for a beer at the "Iron Clad"

Day three was planned to be a run out to Carrawine Gorge but the 400km round trip put us off so we did a trip to Comet Gold mine and Glen Herring Gorge.  The Comet Gold Mine has a sort of museum which is managed by an old Dutch fella who is also the caretaker for the closed gold mine. You need to dedicate at least half an hour to the museum as the old fella can talk – but his sense of humour and knowledge made the visit a memorable one. Another 30km out past the Comet Mine is the quiet scenic Glen Herring Gorge (if you get the “mud map” of the area from the Marble Bar Visitors Centre – be aware that it is definitely “not to scale” and often there are no sign posts at the turn-offs to the sights). The gorge is worth “finding” and is a relatively easy walk in from the parking area and has some fascinating geological structures and a pleasant pool at the end of the walk. Molly off course – swam in every dirty stagnant puddle before we got to the clean water – but hey – that’s what dogs do.

We were glad we ventured in off the coast to Marble Bar and ticked that one off the bucket list.

Longer than usual video is HERE

Pardoo Station

The gateway to piscatorial paradise

 We had stayed at Pardoo Station for a week a couple of years ago and decided to make this our most northern destination for our 2020 winter getaway. We had booked 2 weeks as soon as the WA Regions were opened and decided on arrival to extend that by another 4 nights.

Gotta go shopping!

Pardoo Station is a working cattle station about 130km north of Port Hedland at the southern end of 80 Mile Beach Marine Park. The caravan park is a real oasis in the dry, hot, red soil of the Pilbra with shady grassed powered sites, swimming pool, General Store, bowling green (sort of) and whilst we stayed -  fresh baked bread, rolls, croissants, and sausage rolls every day. Site fees are quite reasonable as well at $240/week during the peak winter season.

As there is no fuel at the Station we did a half day trip to venture further north (only 30km) to Pardoo Roadhouse to top up with fuel (and have a hamburger) and visit Cape Keraudren Camping grounds where we had stayed on our first trio around Oz in 2011 (and Mum and Dad stayed on their big lap in 1989). Its still a beautiful camping area with fantastic scenery but seems to still have those non-stop strong winds that plagued us in 2011, very limited facilities and it’s not all that cheap to stay (about half the cost of Pardoo Station).  Still extremely popular with the grey nomads though as all three camps at the Cape were near full on the day we visited.

Gunna bring my balls next time!

Back to Pardoo Station. As nice as it is Pardoo Station is mostly an angling destination and if your not keen fisher persons it is probably not a place you would enjoy for an extended visit as there is little else to do.

Dog discrimination!

With 5-7 metre tides and shore fishing options ranging from muddy creeks, sand flats, sandy beaches and rocky headlands a 4WD is almost mandatory and there are still many places that are “no go” zones on tides over 6 metres (there is a sign at the Shop saying minimum recovery cost it you get stuck out on the tidal flats is $800).  

So - it takes a while to work out where to be and when to be, but by talking to the locals and experimenting a little we soon worked it out. Places like Red Point, Pardoo Creek mouth, Banningarra Creek, Bones Beach were soon becoming fishing hot spots for us as we worked out the “when in the tide” to be there.

Enough to say that for the 18 nights we stayed we had fish for dinner every second night and still left the Station with half of our Engel full of fish fillets!

So if you enjoy fishing, easy 4WD’ing, 30C every day, and comfortable powered sites in a well-run park – Pardoo is probably for you. We have already booked for next year!

One downside of the Station is that drones are prohibited – so there is no drone footage in my video. I did a bit more experimenting with time-lapse on my DSLR and found a great site for sound effects and decided that my video should have an “Old West” theme – so turn up the volume a little and hopefully enjoy my video HERE