Last Days in Denham

We leave here on Friday (two more sleeps) so yesterday we had our last day of fishing. The pink snapper season opens on the Monkey Mia side on August first so we decided to go over and try our luck, having never caught a size pink there before! Size is between 50 and 70 cm and we can have one for each of our licences.

We were in the water by about 10.15 and apart from catching half a dozen bait fish we'd got nothing! At 12 15, I started to get bored and whingy and wanted to go home. About 5 minutes later, Russ pulled in a 59cm pink and I caught a 37cm black snapper. We started to drift and caught 4 more blacks (biggest was 42cm) and heaps of just undersized pinks. By 2.15 ish we'd drifted about 9 more ks down the coast! and needed to head home so we could clean the fish and shower before going to friends Charlie and Beatie's for a drinks. Just as we were using our last bits of bait, I got a huge bite and knew I'd caught my snapper. He put up an amazing fight and at 63 cm is the biggest fish I've ever caught out of our tinny. We turned for home and realised the wind had got up-it took us 45 minutes bashing through the waves to get back to the boat ramp. It was exhausting.

So, this morning we went out to the hot tub at Peron Homestead once again to soothe our aching muscles and soak out some of last nights alcohol and a cooked breakfast was pretty good for our recovery too ;-)

Should'a' Gone Fishing

We went over to Monkey Mia crabbing today-I'm embarassed to say we only got 3 crabs AND 12 whiting and 3 big flathead. Should'a' gone fishing and we may have caught more crabs!

Fishing and Hot Tubs

We went fishing "out the front" yesterday. It was a particularly slow fishing day, but Russ did manage to catch our first ever Spanish Mackerel late in the day. We also caught a couple of snapper after we got him. We pan fried the mackerel, cooked up some oven baked wedges and made a big salad. Fresh, well filleted mackerel is now my official favourite fish-it was so good!

This morning after a cup of coffee, we packed up and went out to the old Peron Homestead for a soak in the artesian hot-tub. After an hour or so in the water, we cooked up bacon, eggs, tomatoes, mushrooms and toast on the BBQ. I can't remember when we last had a cooked breakfast, so it made for a lovely start to the day.


14 Months Ago

Fishing and Dolphins

Today promised to be a gorgeous day, so we jumped in the car and headed off fishing. Drove 25ks, put the car in 4wd launched the boat, pushed it over the shallows, then motored out about 3ks. It was right at this moment Russ remembered he'd forgotten our bait. We had a bucket of yesterday's cooked crab shells to dispose of, so hunted through them for some claw "knuckles" caught ourselves a few barracuta, then proceeded to fish. We ended up with two lovely pink snapper-55 and 58 cm. We're only allowed one each and they have to be over 50 and under 70cm so we were very happy.

I managed to shoot an amazing little video of 4 dolphins playing around our boat (would have been better if I'd figured the camera out 5 minutes before!). I posted it to facebook if anyone is interested.

Whales

Launching the boat at Fowler's Camp


Russ and I have really been enjoying the mild weather-around 22c of a day and about 14c of a night (it was much colder of a night at Coral Bay!). We've been doing a bit of fishing and crabbing but not having much success at either. We caught 15 crabs on our first attempt and were very pleased with that, then 12, 4 and today 7.

We had a lovely day fishing off Fowler's Camp and Eagle Bluff last Thursday-we caught around 40 undersized pink salmon each, and nothing of size to bring home but it was still a wonderful day out there. It's such a pretty place, such and easy beach to launch the boat off and we wonder why we haven't done it before. The only reason we did it this time was the many many boats putting in here at the boat ramp in town-it's always a pain to come back in when the ramp is busy.

Eagle Bluff


Coming Back to the Car After Fishing


Today we went out to Monkey Mia to crab. It was a still morning with the water like glass. I spotted a couple of whales on the horizon-too far away for us to go look. It was great when they moved closer though and we could motor up a few minutes to get a closer look at them. We stopped the hundred metres away we're supposed to and watched in awe (it is awesome from a tinny!) as the waved tails and fins in the air, rolled over and just generally played around. We watched for about 20 minutes before going on with oour crabbing, but they hung around for about another hour! We only brought home 7 crabs, but our whale encounter made it all worth while.

Monkey Mia

The Pearl Farm Monkey Mia


Looking the Other Way as We Fished by the Pearl Farm


The rain cleared and we woke to a gorgeous, still day. Russ went down town and bought us a couple of new crab nets, then we headed out to Monkey Mia.We had a great day catching 10 crabs (so not quite as good as Tuesday), were excited when 3 dolphins swam under the boat then surfed in our wake, and anngry when giraffe-necked pearl farmer Jamie of The Farmer Wants a Wife fame, PUSHED in front of us on the boat ramp. He's creepy and rude!

My Favourite Sand Dune on the Monkey Mia Road


Brought our crabs home, cooked them, vacuum sealed and froze a couple of packs but kept all the big chunks of claw meat to put through a spicy nasi goreng I made. We had that along with a ginger, soy, chilli steamed fish dish. Super, super yummy dinner.

In Denham and Russ and I have Crabs

After not getting crabs last year, we certainly made up for it this year.

It's been pouring here at Denham, but weatherman Russ assured me it wouldn't be raining at Moneky Mia. He was right. We went out and caught ourselves 15 crabs in just over an hour. 11were the biggest we've ever caught there, and 4 were over size-just. Crab sandwiches for lunch tomorrow, Chilli Crab for dinner tomorrow night and a packet of meat for the freezer for Thai crab cakes when we get to Perth! Yummmmm.

Weight Loss

I stepped on those wonderful scales this morning to find 32kg GONE! 32kg (for those of you who don't know or remember) is 70lbs or 5 stone or, a lot of weight. I started out 110kgs and a very snug size 24, now I'm a very loose size 16. I never dreamed I might get to a 14 when I started this healthy eating plan (it's NEVER been a "diet")! There's a little way to go, but I try not to think about that, preferring to set myself small goals along the way. The next one is 35kg cos it's a nice round (or no longer so round!) figure.

Shopping, shopping, shopping

I'm glad we're leaving Carnarvon tomorrow because if we stayed any longer, we, have no money left to move on with!!

We haven't seen a decent supermarket, charging reasonable prices since we left Port Hedland about 5 weeks ago and won't see another for a month, so we spent up big in Woolies supermarket and bottle shop last night. We also bought ourselves 2 new reels, a rod, 200 fishing hooks, some squid jigs and a BOAT SEAT for me. After 5 years my back is starting to ache really badly as we sit out fishing so it was time to do something about it.

This morning we did our fruit and veg shopping at the various plantations and market gardens along North and South River roads. A huge chunk of both roads was washed away in the floods so we had to go in one end, back another way and out onto the highway along another road. One of the stall owners told us it'll likely never be re-opened which is something of a shame as it wrecks a really enjoyable round trip!

Right now, our van smells of the beautiful basil I bought at Morel's along with heaps of other herbs and asian greens. We have kgs of tomatoes at various stages of ripeness and around 3kg of bananas so I really feel rich! I don't think you could fit a credit card into either fridge or freezer at the moment as we're so well stocked with food.

We did a bit of shopping in Target too-I got some new (smaller) undies and Russ got a pair of shorts. Shane Warne has put his name to a line called Spinners sold by Target. For any of you who remember my 4XL husband, these he bought today were size 82 and look really good on him!

Carnarvon

We left Coral Bay this morning and moved on here to Carnarvon where we'll spend two nights shopping, shopping, shopping (food, alcohol and fishing gear to go on to Denham with).

Our last night in Coral Bay was wonderful. After 6 visits to the place, we finally discovered how much fun happy hour is at the pub. We went on Friday night and again last night with our fishing neighbours Kylie and Wayne and our non-fishing friends Borys and Janenne. We met some friends of Wayne and Kylie's and ran into our friends Ron and Irene, so it was a really good night. Happy hour starts at 5.30, finishes at 6.30 and we got home sometime after 8! I'd had the good sense to make a chicken curry and Wayne had made a fish curry before we went to the pub, so Russ cooked some rice, Kylie made a salad and we put it all together and ate around 9pm.

Coral Bay was lots of fun-great fishing, but a bit cool to do much snorkeling, so we have decided go back up there for 4 weeks in September so we can do some more! We'll be in Denham a month, go into Perth, fly to Bali, come home and head back up a few days later!

Carnarvon was really hit hard by storms earlier in the year-it suffered huge flood and most of the crops and plantations were damaged or destroyed. It's slowly recovering, but you really see evidence of the floods still. There used to be 3 service stations right near this caravan park-two are gone and the third next door is being rebuilt right now.

The Gascoyne river normally flows underground for most of the year so it's amazing to see water flowing on the surface, but also amazing to see the destruction it's caused as it flooded through the plantations.

Tea at the Pub

Last night we went to the pub for a counter tea with the kids in the bus and the twins mum and dad Boris and Janine. We had lots of fun. The highlight of my night was running into one of the people who inspired me NOT to have lap banding and to lose weight all by myself. Her reaction to my weight loss made it all worth while-she oohed and ahhed, told me I looked so much younger, gave me a hug and asked very quietly "have you had IT done". I was rapt to be able to say "no, I did it myself"!

The bus is on its way to Broome today-the place will be very quiet with them gone!

Neighbours

I noticed our previous neighbours Rob and Amy give others around us fish a couple of times. When I commented on how kind they were, Rob said "any time you catch a trevally fillet it and give it to your neighbours-they'll love you for it". Russ caught a good sized trevally last thing yesterday, so he did just that-giving it to the 7 kids camped behind us in a coaster bus.

There is 7 of them aged between Erin 22 and Trousers 31, 8 people own a share in the bus, 4 of them are away on this trip. They are off to Broome, leaving here Saturday. It also happens mum and dad (Boris and Janine)of the twins Mark and David are here for a week, and we met them too.

So, Russ gave them the fish, they gave him a beer for the fish, then Annika (Estonian girl) sent over some of her delicious Estonian potato salad for us, then after dinner all of us sat round and had a lot of drinks and laughs. Right now Russ and Trousers have taken the boat out fishing, then after lunch Russ will take Mark out for the afternoon shift. Hopefully they'll get more than the tiny taste of fish they got last night.

The bus is amazing. They bought it 4 years ago to drive to Sydney for Youth Day. They bought it as a shell and put in big padded seats in a "U" shape. All those seats fold out into beds. It has a huge built in Esky and they carry chairs and cooking gear in the boot. They eat off plastic plates or (for breakfast cereal) out of zip-lock bags. All very simple. They really are a nice lot of people and fun to have as neighbours for a few days although I wouldn't like to many nights like last night or too much more Estonian potato salad or I'd end up right back where I started weight wise!

Coral Bay

My friend Wendy wrote and said I hadn't blogged recently but the days in Coral Bay get to be pretty much the same.26 of a day, 12 or so of a night, we fish, if we don't fish we swim. We were excited to see a big manta ray leap about 2 metres clear of the water the other day whilst we were fishing. We never get tired of seeing all these wonderful things



Friday we took a day off both and went North up the sealed road then into Ningaloo Station. Our neighbours Rob and Amy suggested we go look at the old whaling station just 3ks beyond the homestead so off we went. Rob gave us very specific directions but after travelling 15ks (almost to Yardie Creek) we admitted defeat and turned back. It seems CALM have taken over the station and we should have registered, paid and taken a key to unlock the new gate put up! Next year!!

We still had a lovely day out, stopping along the way to fish (caught a nice trevally off the beach) cook a few sausages on the beach for our lunch, and take some photos at my favourite sand dune.


(This bottom one was taken at the same place 12 months ago)

Yesterday Rob and Russ had planned to go octopus hunting. It's done on the reef at low tide with hooks to haul the ockies out of their holes. The skies opened up, down came the rain and Rob and Amy packed their tent up a day early and headed home to Newman where they both work for BHP. We've been invited to visit them at their farm in Nannup as they'll be living back home after Christmas or we'll meet again up here next year.

We've been catching and eating lots of fish. I've had the best time finding interesting recipes to use them in-whole fish, filleted fish, crumbed, curried, grilled and over stir fries. The end result of all this fish is me managing to lose 31kgs!

Russ and I have almost decided to do the boring old people thing and book here for 3 months next year. I had never really thought why I'm so happy here but Russ pointed out the fact I can swim in the sea or the heated pool and that the weather is just so right for us pleases me.

Ohhh

We both went "Ohhhh" as we drove around the bend and down to the boat ramp to launch our boat yesterday. The reef seen from the top of the ramp is amazing when you haven't seen it for a year.

Out fishing yesterday, we saw a number of turtles and a dugong went by our boat about 5 metres away (the closest we have ever been to one!).

Happy to say our 9 noisy camping neighbours are on their way this morning. I'm not at all sad to see them go. Now, if the crying baby (on our other side) that arrived yesterday moves on too, my life will be complete (until the next noisy group moves in).

The weather is ging to be around 12c over night and 25c through the day for the next week. Perfect for a couple of Southern Victorians!

Coral Bay

It felt like we were arriving back in civilization arriving here today. All bars on the phone and internet which is lovely after a month of dodgy reception (to say the least!!!!). I can't get the TV's one channel to work, but we may get something at night. We've had the ABC, then no TV for a month, so we are well used to it by now and having the other two is almost enough for me.

Our two weeks at Yardie was good but the wind got me down in the end. We've been there 4 times now and done the touristy stuff to death. It was a bit boring with only getting out to fish 5 times out of 14 days-thank goodness we had the sense to take along lots of DVDs and that we met Perth couple Beth and Gordon who then introduced us to the very social people they were camped near. Our neighbours were nice, but just not particulary social as two couples were related and didn't need anyone else to talk to and the other side we had mister perfectionist and mrs nervousness. Just not our sort of people. However they all came out to kiss us goodbye and wave us off so it wasn't all bad.

It rained all the way here and is a bit grey right now, but we have no wind which is lovely and I know the days can only get better. We arrived to find the Perth office had stuffed our booking up and had us arriving on June 21st for 9 days. Luckily we had the receipt to say we were arriving today for 21 days. And lucky the delightful receptionist Jo could find us a spot (the park is really full as usual). 12 months ago, we were here with our friends Paul and Wendy. Today we are parked alongside ANOTHER Paul and Wendy!

Russ has his boat organised already and tomorrow we fish (I'm guessing).

Port Smith and on to June 5th (Yardie Creek)

Our time at Port Smith went almost too fast. We really enjoyed the fishing, finding a great little spot on the second to last day and also coming to terms with the sandflies. You just have to keep indoors around dusk or smother yourself in repellent and be strong about not scratching the bites you get. We managed to catch 27 different species of fish (something we’d never expect to do at home) amongst them some great sized Spangled Emperors, Estuary Cod, Golden Trevally and I was so proud to catch a big Mangrove Jack.

Our waistlines have certainly benefitted from all the fish dishes we’ve been eating! We’ve both lost around 30ks each now so our little boat goes much faster (it’s like losing a third person as far as it’s concerned!). It makes everything we do on this trip so much easier than other times too. I wish we’d done something about our weight before we headed off a few years ago.

On Saturday 28th of May, we drove the 160ks into Broome for the first meeting of their race carnival. Beth got us tickets to a marquee right on the track which was great. We ate our share of the yummy finger food included in our ticket, then snuck up into the members to spend the arvo with Jimmy and Beth and Beth’s friend Janelle. What a fantastic day, but what a long way home after a big day out-in hindsight, we should have accepted Janelle's kind offer of a bed for the night!. It was really nice to get dressed up for a change and such a beautiful day for the races in such a pretty spot.


We left Port Smith on Monday 30th of May and made our way to Port Hedland where we spent the night in an expensive ($40) tiny site in a crowded park with not so clean showers and toilets (imagine termite mounds growing under the hand basins cos no one had bothered to mop there in a month or two!). We did manage to visit South Hedland's fantastic Coles supermarket and stock up, and go to an oriental restaurant (mainly Japanese) we we'd been to around 4 years ago with Jimmy and Beth, so the stop over wasn’t a total waste.

The following night though we decided to try our first ever free camping on the side of the road. It seems you have to get in early for the good spots and we’d almost given up when we crossed the Cane River 40ks away from the Nanutarra Roadhouse. We crossed a very big bridge over a somewhat dry river and there was our spot-flat, by the river and not another soul there. We drove back 1k along a dirt track and set up for a lovely night. We built a fireplace, collected enough timber for several hours, then sat and ate our dinner (sausages and a couple of salads), drank a bottle (or maybe two) of wine and watched the most amazing stars until the fire went out around 11pm. So much nicer than the night before!


Yardie Creek hasn’t changed-even the prices are still much the same. It was good to pay $24 a night rather than the $44 we paid in Broome! The park has a very old electrical system, so we can’t use anything with a heating element or too big, so no air con, toaster, jug, oven, hairdryer, jaffle maker etc. We are cooking on two gas cookers that use disposable butane cans and doing a little bit that’s not too smelly (pasta, rice, potatoes etc) in the van, but we are still eating well.

On the way out to the homestead over the last 5 years, I've loved seeing two old horses (a bay and a buckskin)on the side of the road. No fences, nothing to make them stay but they've always been there. I was so sad to only see the buckskin the day we arrived and so happy to see his friend, the bay, the next day. Now Idf like to see a few bustards!

We managed a couple of days fishing before the weather changed on us and we got our first rain of the whole trip. I don’t mind as I felt we’d arrived here, got the boat in the water and got fishing. The break has made me relax. We even managed a lovely long walk on the beach between showers yesterday!

Today we’ve just lazed around, then tonight the park puts on a roast dinner which we’re off to. Tomorrow we are off shopping then it’ll be fishing as normal on Tuesday.

Port Smith

Port Smith Lagoon Caravan Park is 140ks south of Broome on the Great Northern Highway, then a further 23ks of unsealed red sand into the park. The park itself is on Aboriginal land and surrounded by three communities-Bidyadanga being the largest of them and the largest community in WA. Other than that, there is nothing here.

Port Smith is actually a tidal estury with a number of creeks and inlets and is subject to some pretty amazing tides-9 metres when we first arrived but it's reduced drastically now.

The variance in tides means we have to be always rethinking where we launch and retrieve the boat and where we park the car and trailer. In the first week, we had a lovely clear swimming spot, now it's a 4wd track we cross to launch the boat and the tide won't come in high enough to re-cover it before we leave.


This is the second time we've been here and it's lost none of it's appeal; in fact with less people in the park, we're enjoying it more and it seems like there is more fish around. Russ also managed to catch us a mud crab, the first we've ever caught here. He certainly made for a yummy entree!


The downside to Port Smith is the limited TV, phone and internet. We can only get very snowy ABC 1 and the internet and phone were dropping in and out until we went to town on Tuesday and bought an antenna. I've got it mounted on a surf rod and it works a treat. I don't care about the TV now I'm back in internet land!

It's a pity the sandfly problem can't be solved as easily! We spend all day doing battle with them-making sure we have enough insect repellant on, then dabbing all the bites in all the places we missed with Sting Goes. A shower after fishing aggrevates the bites, but an anti-histamine before bed makes for a good scratchless sleep. Bushman's repellant it good but I find it melts my vinyl boat seat and the grips of fishing rods!

We'll be leaving here on Monday and making our way down to Yardie Creek outside Exmouth but before we go, we're taking one more trip into Broome on Saturday to go to the first race meeting of the year with friends Jimmy and Beth. Beth promises me it's a big meeting-nearly as big as the Broome cup. They are members and we can go along with them, so it'll be a nice chance to get out of fishing clothes and get a bit tidied up!

Polo on Cable Beach

Russ Beth and I went to the polo on Cable Beach today. We shared a bottle of Sem, Sav, Blanc at a bar on the beach, then wandered down to watch the game (Good game cos Aus beat NZ) After a spot of shopping we finished the day with Jimmy and Chinese take away.

Broome Photos

Broome

We have had a wonderful time in Broome-the gorgeous weather is so very easy to take and this caravan park has really made all the difference to my feelings about Broome!

We've love catching up with old friends Jimmy and Beth and having a few meals and drinks together. We've swum, fished ridden camels and generally had a relaxing (warm) time.

Tonight we're off to the crab racing here in town. It comes with a roast dinner and is supposed to be fun according to Jimmy and Beth.

Tomorrow we move on to Port Smith which we loved last time. It's quite remote, so no TV, internet or phone for 13 days unless I drive around 15ks to use the Bidjidanga community's tower! Port Smith is great fishing which we are really looking forward to.

Dragonflies

I forgot to mention the dragonflies we've been seeing! Apparently they emerge when the wet finishes so we are seeing millions at the moment.

At Bitter Springs, they hovered over the water as we swam-red, blue, jade green, fluro green/yellow, black, black and gold, bronze, while here in Broome they are a more sombre colour, but much bigger. We walked down Cable Beach this morning followed by hundreds of them. We saw heaps of hawks (up to a dozen in the air and at least 16 resting on the beach) which we thought must be catching and eating them on the wing.


I'm really enjoying Broome-I think arriving here before the main tourist season and staying in the virtually empty park helps. Plus, the weather is gorgeous and the place is beautiful after the wet with all the frangipani and bouganvillia in bloom. We enjoyed a 5k walk on Cable beach this morning. We virtually had it to ourselves apart from a handful of nude sunbathers.


Tonight we're off out to dinner with friends Beth and James. BYO Italian which I'm looking forward to.