About half-way between Broome and Port Hedland is a roadhouse at Sandfire that we stopped at overnight on our way to Cape Keraudren.

I’ve only included it in my story because our campground was jammed up against a plantation of mango trees and the fruit bats (flying foxes) squarked all day and night. The upside though were the beautiful peacocks that wandered in and out amongst the trees, not just the brilliant blue ones but several white ones as well. Noisy critters, but oh, so lovely to have wandering around so close. None of them did a display of their tails for us unfortunately.

So here is where I am on my travel down the west coast of Australia. That little line on the map of Australia is just over 600 kilometres long.

Before we turned off to Cape Keraudren we decided to do a side trip to 80 Mile Beach and I’m so glad we did. It was spectacular – miles and miles (80 of them actually) of pristine sand with fishermen dotted along the shore. After investigating the beach we stopped at the camp store and lashed out and had scones, jam and cream for morning tea. Decadent!

Cape Keraudren is at the Southern end of 80 Mile Beach and about 12 kms off the highway on a good sealed road except for the last 4 kms of gravel. There were a few different places to camp here and I checked them all out before joining my travelling buddies at the main beach. One of the camps was by Mosquito Creek, very pretty but those mozzies would have carried me away.

I enjoyed 6 nights here before resuming my journey south and was joined by the Broome crowd of Dave, Anne, Mick, Nola, Mel, Jalanta and Robyn. Then Jose turned up and Marion – it was beginning to look a lot like a Solos Rally!

The tides were huge here and if you didn’t get a swim at high tide you could forget about it as you could walk out about 1 kilometre and still only be up to you ankles. It was a lovely stop over – except for the sand flies! They were thick and everyday I had to slather on insect repellent to survive without being eaten alive. Fortunately if I do get bitten I have no lasting effects unlike some of the others that really suffered. At happy hour one night Dave told us a story about opening his fridge and a mosquito flew out. He reckoned it had on a beanie and scarf as it escaped! As it had been in there overnight he thought it deserved a second chance at life so he let it fly away – I’m not sure I would have been so generous!

Here’s a slideshow of some of my favourite Cape Keraudren photos. I love the ones taken at sunset looking east along the beach. I hope you enjoy them too.

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Next stop Port Hedland…..shops, traffic lights, mining and industry …. and the busiest port in Australia! Also my opportunity to catch up with Ladybird, Pam, who I spent Christmas with last year.