Day 158–161 28th – 31st August Cape Leveque

By 10.00 a.m. we were away from Broome and heading up the Cape Leveque Road. This was a distance of 210 km from Broome the first 90 or so of which was a fairly rough unsealed section. After 90 km’s the road becomes sealed for the rest of the trip to Cape Leveque. As the road slices its way north it passes quite few turn offs to isolated Aboriginal Communities, many of which are gradually awakening to the power of the tourist dollar. After about 10 km travelling along the sealed section of the road we turned off to visit the community of Beagle Bay, which was originally a mission set up by the Dominican Fathers, early last century, but has a beautiful white washed brick church in the style of the gothic Lutheran churches. It is quite a beautiful church and is adjacent to a P -12 Catholic School that has roughly 120 students, mainly Aboriginal, on its books. The altar of the church and its surrounds is inlaid with mother of pearl shell and these and the rest of the decorations in the place were all collected and made by the aboriginal members of the community. We spent about 45 minutes or so here and had a chat to the local priest before departing for our destination. We arrived at Kooljamon some 45 minutes later. One of the first things we saw as we were setting up was whales about a km off shore splashing and breaching. This was to be a common occurrence for the remainder of our stay. We had a beautiful campsite on a low cliff top facing westward overlooking the sea. In a short while the Ellks came and checked out where we were and as there was vehicle access to the beaches, we drove down onto the beach for a swim. This place is fishing, snorkeling and swimming heaven. It was decided that drinks on the beach at sunset was the order of the day, something we were to do for the next 2 nights as well. A great way to end the day!! The next morning (Friday), we made the trip with Jon and Megan, to Lombadina, which is another Aboriginal Community about 12 km south of Cape Leveque. They have a bakery where they bake and sell their own bread within the community and if you are quick enough you can snaffle a few loaves. We planned to do just that and head down to the beach at this place and spend the rest of the day there. We managed to purchase the last loaf and the last 4 bread rolls that were available. Once again access to the beach was by 4wd, so this we did and drove a few km’s down it until we found a suitable spot in which to set ourselves up. Lomdadina has to be one of the most beautiful beaches that I’ve seen. We were the only ones on it. We all enjoyed eating the still warm bread with heaps of butter and jam whilst sitting on the beach. The day was glorious with not a cloud in the sky and the most inviting looking water in which to swim. The tide was still high when we arrived, but as it retreated (remember this area has 6-8 metre tides) it revealed shells and rock pools which the children enjoyed exploring. Drinks on the beach at sunset once again. Saturday morning Jon, Megan and their brood dropped by to say their farewells as they were heading back to Broome for a few weeks before beginning their journey back down south. We had really enjoyed our couple of days with them in this paradise. We had the rest of the day to ourselves and as the weather was beautiful and the water temp. about 25 degrees, we headed for the beach once again This time we drove on to the fishing beach where there were a few people set up for the day. It wasn’t difficult to find a spot however where there was no-one else around. There is something extremely satisfying about being able to drive on to a remote beach and choose a place to set up for the day and then just relax and enjoy the surroundings! We had a fantastic day enjoying the warmth, the blue skies and the pristine waters of the bay here. It really is a divine area that is pretty well untouched, although one wonders how long this situation will last, especially as the rumours are that within the next few years the road will be sealed the whole way to the cape! That evening we enjoyed drinks and nibbles once again as the sun set over the Timor Sea and the whales played offshore in the distance. The next morning we were hoping to be away early so that we could cover as much distance as possible to get to Port Hedland some 900 km distant. After that Karijini N.P. beckoned.