The "Almost Intrepids" are back on the road again!

17th March 2014

We still had unfinished business after rushing home from Exmouth in September 2013. The chance arose to spend 8 nights in Coral Bay with family then resume the unfinished section of our trip, so we jumped at it. We would be living in luxury in a cabin for the 8 nights, hence the "Almost Intrepids" then continuing our trip dare I say with the car and the motorcycle trailer towed behind. I guess you could say "Not very Intrepids" but with the temperature in the high 30's to 40's and only down to 27 - 28 overnight the air-conditioning of the car seemed like a good idea.

The first nights stop was at Hamelin Pool, just off the North Western Highway on the road to Shark Bay. Dry and desolate with more flies than a starry night has stars in the sky. The donga was clean and spacious compared to many we have used. Bore water for toilets and washing and a 10 litre ration of drinking water for the night. They have to truck in all the drinking water at a cost of 79 cents per litre.

Having left Kelmscott when it was 10 degrees and arriving when it was 38 meant a dip in the pool was top priority. Clean clear and refreshing! With the hot wind howling and the flies humming we enjoyed a walk to the Stromatalites going via the shell block quarry. In the early days of the area some houses were built from the blocks cut from solidified tiny shells. Nowadays it is a historic site and quarrying is only done to restore old buildings. The signage on the walk and the boardwalk out around the Stromatalites was very interesting, Trish dragged out the fly net she had been carrying for over a year and look extremely proud of herself for her foresight as I tried in vain to keep the persistent blighters out of eyes, nose, ears and everywhere else.

Luckily in my foresightedness I had prepared two meals for the night before leaving home so we were able to escape the flies and dine in the donga. No way would you want to live here but we did enjoy the visit. Fearing the flies would be in plague proportions in Coral Bay we set out.

Dave the swatter.