On the road: Perth to Broome

We left Freo on the 27th April and moved back up to Trigg with Dilly for a week. We were both really sad to leave our respective jobs because we'd met such decent people. Also Liverpool were dumped out of the champions league by Chelsea which was very disappointing.

We left Trigg on Saturday the 3rd May. The night before we finally met up with Annie Ballances auntie in Gwelup which isn't too far from Trigg. We had a lovely evening with them. They know more about whats going on in Newry than people who live there do thanks to digital radio. There are probably more people listening to 5fm around the world than in Newry.

We got on the road late on saturday and stopped off in Cervantes the first night. The Pinnacles are nearby. Hard to describe them really, just hundreds of pointy rocks from 2-6ft sticking out of the ground. They describe it as being a bit like the moon. I don't know I've never been there. We drove onto Geraldton the next day and met up with a couple called Gareth and Emma from Melbourne who are travelling up to Broome. We stocked up with food and water and other essentials before heading on towards Kalbarri national park. Everywhere of note is off the main road. Before we began this I had visions of driving along the coast to Broome but in reality we are always at least 50kms from it so when we stop somewhere we for the night it's a 100km round trip. Kalbarri was an excellent camp site with shower and toilet combos rather than just the showers at one side and toilets at the other.

Emma has really thrown herself into the camping. To say she had reservations about the whole thing is the understatement of the century but the set ups are really good in most places. Some of the kitchen areas leave a bit to be desired but we do most of our cooking on a two ring gas burner we bought so we can do pasta and bolognese or chili and rice. It sits on a fold away table which does the job. We are pretty much eating the same meals we would have eaten in the house. We have a foam mattress in the back of the van which we fold over when we are driving from place to place so we can get stuff into the back like the esky (ice box) and the cooler bag with the food and the other cooking equipment. At night we just buck all that in the front and there is enough room for us to sleep comfortably. The van also has a built in bed and compartments underneath to fit stuff. We've had to bring all out suitcases with us so it's pretty packed. We've got into a routine now and everything we need everyday is handy and the stuff we don't use is storted underneath.

After Kalbarri we headed to Monkey Mia which was brilliant. It was well of the main road but well worth visiting. The feed dolphins there every morning and hundreds come to watch this everyday. they are there from 7.30 til 10am every morning and they are literally at your feet. They've been doing this for forty years apparently and one of the oldest dolphins is the daughter of the first ones to come in. We spent two nights there becasue it was so good. The ocean was amazing. Crystal clear. The weather before we left Perth was getting changeable but it has been glorious the whole way up the coast. The only thing is drivng in the heat is uncomfortable. we don't have air con but it's not too bad.

After Monkey Mia we drove to Carnarvon which is a town. We stocked up there and stayed in a caravan park in the town. We met two boys from Newry who I'd never seen before in my life. They were working there way up the coast and had jobs in a banana plantation cutting leaves off the trees. One of them said it was the hardest work they'd ever done. AFter that we drove to Coral Bay which is probably the nicest place I've ever been. The reef is 20 metres off the shore and you can literally walk out into it. We spent 3 nights there and met up with friends of Dillys parents from their time over here. Colum and Jean are retired and are travelling around Australia in the lap of luxury. They have a caravan with a lounge, Kitchen and bedroom complete with queen bed. Colum invited me out snorkeling on his motorised rubber dingy, I said aye why not when am I going to get a chance to do this again. So we headed out while Emma and Jean went to the beach. Emma wasn't so sure I should be going but I went anyway. we went a good bit out and you could almost touch the reef below you. Colum saw a good spot and he gave me one of his flippers and we got in. He swam over to the reef and and I edged over behind him but I made the mistake of looking round to see where the boat was and panicked when it was a good 20 feet from me. Colum shouted are you alright? I had the snorkel in my mouth and g\could only mumble know. He saw I was in trouble and swam back to the boat. I was trying to stay calm and keep my head above water but the bloody flipper was catching the reef. Com couldn't get the anchor up and and had to cut it loose but by the time he had done this I was beside the boat anyway. I got in and we headed back to the shore. Pretty embarrassing but I'll not do anything like that again.

We had a lovely lunch with them. We ate squid and snapper that colum caught the day before and we sat chatting til the evening. The next day we were on the road again and we drove for 8 hours on consecutive days as there isn't much to see after Karratha. We did stop off were Dilly was born in Wickham and in Port Hedland which was a bit of a dive. We also drove for a couple of hours after sunset which wasn't too bad as there can be a lot of kangaroos and cows on the road but we only saw one as we drove into our camp site along a 12km dirt track. We were just relieved there was a camp site at the end of it. When we got in there were aboriginals lying about on the ground. we just parked up and went to bed. The next mroning it looked a lot better and we went down to the 80 mile beach for a look. It was absoluetly beautiful.

We arrived in Broome yesterday and we're gonna spend about 4 nights here. We've done about 3000km and it's taken us 11 days so far. We're just gonna hit cable beach in broome for a few days and relax before plannin gthe next part of the trip.