Broome
We left Eighty Mile Beach keen to stay ahead of the rain that was making its way up the coast and overnighted in the quiet, spacious and clean Stanley 24h Rest Area. We woke to a distinct feeling of having moved out of the Pilbara and into the Kimberley.
Just outside of Broome we had lunch in the lush surrounds of the Mango Place then had to ditch plans to stay at the Broome Bird Observatory for fear that we'd be rained in. Instead we made a last minute booking at Broome's Gateway Pet Friendly Caravan Park about 25km out of town and enjoyed watching the free range chooks and threading frangipani leis before the rain set in that evening.
The next morning we drove straight into Broome's Chinatown which appeared to be the touristy centre. Pearl shops, colourful clothing boutiques and eateries lined the streets. Street art and interpretive signage told stories of a bygone era. We were excited to see our first boab trees and to read of a recent croc sighting at Streeter's Jetty, which stretched a short distance into chalky blue water amongst the mangroves. We got a taste of pearling history at the Pearl Lugger ship before moving on to run errands.
A highlight of our stay in Broome was having dinner with an old family of mine Chevaun and her gorgeous kids Henry, William and Isabel and husband Steven. I hadn't seen Chevaun since we were kids and I'm sure it would have made our parents laugh to see our kids playing together the way we had so many years earlier.
Our base for three nights was the RAC Cable Beach Holiday Park, a really lovely small park with lots of trees, and a great pool. Hugh blew me away with how his swimming had progressed. He spent a whole afternoon swimming with a pair of older boys without his life jacket. I supervised from the sidelines while Claire fell asleep in my arms.
We'd booked ahead to get our car serviced in preparation for hitting the Gibb River Road. Luckily it passed without any major issues though various wear and tear was reported and our known oil leak continues to bear over us. Other important admin included getting my hiking boots fixed and getting our flu shots. The kids were applauded as "deadly" by our kind nurse who was impressed that neither of them shed a tear or even flinched at being jabbed with the needle.
We enjoyed the classic sunset and camel trains on Cable Beach, though we let others do the riding while we took photos. We had seen Cable Beach in another light the day before when we'd walked down from our caravan park and dared to splash in the shallows. People were surfing another fifty metres up the beach from us so we figured the crocodile danger couldn't be too great. The greater danger that loomed on the horizon was a spectacular, dark weather system that was tracking our way. We ignored the warning signs and instead of retreating for cover we got soaked to the bone in a gorgeous tropical downpour.
Gantheaume Point was a great spot to explore incredible erroded rock formations. We arrived at high tide so missed out on hunting for dinosaur prints. Town Beach water park and playground was a winner with the kids and Hugh and I returned later that evening for the Thursday night markets - Claire and Matthias were on food shopping duty. Hugh and I had a ball treating ourselves to market food for dinner and listening to live music. Then Hugh got extra lucky when we ran into friends who shouted him to an ice-cream.
