November 7

Waking up this morning Alan was in time to see our first feathered friend of the day!!

Time to explore the Karijini National Park, there are several canyons here with pools to swim in although the water is very cold so I think we will just be looking and seeping in the beauty with our eyes.  Our first task is to head back the way we came in and see if Winston's water tank cap can be found, it is not ideal to travel around and eventually return Winston to his rightful owners without this bit of plastic.  Luckily for us the water tank where we filled up is very close to the first canyon we are going to investigate so time is not lost.

Lookie here - in the road by the turnoff for the water tank - one white screw stopper just lying there looking all lost.  Might as well fill up with more water here for another shower at some point and then reunite the cap with Winston.

On the road again and up to the Oxer Lookout where three gorges meet.  Spectacular, deep iron banded gorges, oh this beautiful rust red land, with water at the bottom.  Now I did mention we were unlikely to be swimming because the water is so cold but look too at how steep the climb is, ladders provided in some areas and then scrambling over rocks.  I wish we were younger and fitter to be able to do the proper walks on offer in the awesome park but it is not worth an accident and our holiday being spoilt.  However, if you are reading this and you like an experience along these lines then this is the park for you.  They also arrange assailing etc from Tom Price (the town close by).  There is a lovely memorial to Jimmy Regan here, he was a State Emergency Services Volunteer who gave his life performing a cliff rescue to an injured park visitor when a flash flood swept him down river.  It was here at the Oxer lookout his body was retrieved.

Memorial to Jimmy Regan

And this is what I was taking a picture of

Now to go and view the Knox George and Joffre George.

Once again, stunningly beautiful colours with gardens at the bottoms and more water with waterfalls.  What we are seeing today I do not have the words to be able to do justice to natures work of art so I with give you some pictures instead.

The last place we visited was the Kalamina George, a gentle gorge and not the challenge the other gorges were to access but by now we were at mid day and had decided the best use of our time was to leave the Karijini National Park and head further inland.  We have a long drive ahead of us trying to cut across country and then turn south towards Kalgoorlie, around a 900km drive at a rough estimate.

We headed down the Great Northern Highway, through Newman.  This is all mining community and very reminiscent of a certain oil company we know <g>.  Newman was rather like Dhahran, a town/city created to cater for the companies employees!!!!!!  Continuing onward, on tarmac and traffic that consisted of company vehicles and road trains we gobbled up the miles so as to move onto areas more in keeping with what we continually hunt for - tranquility and a place to be at one with the land.

Passing over the Tropic of Capricorn again, no signpost but instead a roadhouse and an excellent cup of coffee - that will do me fine <g>.

With night approaching and no sign of a place to legally pull over we found a general road side parking area and sneaked further off into the bushes.  Not a bad little place, the only wild life was a single cow and a bunch of flies.  The flies kept Alan entertained for a good hour of two with his fly swat - his favourite toy of this holiday <g>.

Alan and I ended up taking almost the same picture here so I will put up both :)

Alan's sunset with a star

My sunset without a star!!!

Time to quickly upload this before the signal vanishes as we travel south, Alan driving and me still attacking uploading as many post to the blog as possible.