What is the Pilbara known for? Iron Ore…. But what is it famous for? Red Dog…..

So prior to entering the Pilbara we decided to watch the movie 'Red Dog'. Last time we were in the Pilbara we visited the Red Dog Statue in Dampier, but this year we are setting a goal to find where Red Dog is buried. Lets see if we can achieve this mission.

After travelling 5900 km and nearly seven weeks since we left home, we have finally hit some decent weather. We will have three days of 27° and overnights of 14 to 17, stunning weather but it took a long time for us to reach it.

Over the last couple days, we have watched quite a few Virgin aircraft taking off near us, these planes are moving in FIFO's from mine sites back to Perth. We had the privilege of watching one takeoff. We were at the start of the runway, just parked off the road and as the Jet took off a massive red dust cloud flumed up towards us. It was a very impressive sight to see.

On considering whether we go back into Karijini National Park, speaking to other travelers and the fact it's school holidays now, we've been told it is that busy that they have opened up overflow camps, visitors day areas and even the airstrip for the extra travellers, we have decided to bypass it.

We enjoyed several days at our favorite camp spot in WA, Albert Tognolini. Here we still had low flying planes, enjoyed chatting to other fellow campers and walking 4-6 km each day(map my walk app, keeps track of the kms we walk). The wildflowers are just starting but nowhere as prolific as when we were here three years ago. We are looking forward to see more wildflowers as we travel through Western Australia

Heading east towards Marble Bar the road is busy with mining road trains, the chatter between road train drivers on the UHF is a lot of jovial banter. Piles of huge boulders are seen across the horizon before changing to mountain ranges. There is heaps of road kill of cattle, camels, kangaroos, pigs and foxes, we even saw a live dingo having a feed off a cattle carcass. We have entered the East Pilbara shire, the largest shire in the world....

Our stop off on the Hillside-Woodstock Road, 48 km east of the great northern Highway we found a small track that lead us down to a billabong (Tambina Creek) A pelican flew off as we arrived, follow by a few water fowls, corellas are in the tree on the opposite side and heaps of budgies, finches and kingfishers chirping away.

The Supercars are racing this weekend at Townsville, so we have decided to stay put for the weekend, as we have Foxtel on the Ipad. We have this beautiful oasis to ourselves, for the last three days. Heaps of river gum firewood is available, so we are enjoying (as we always do) our campfire cook ups, the warm weather and the serenity of this place. Tambina Creek, Hillside is now on our favorite list of campsites in Western Australia.