A nice short update for everyone this time.  We visited 80 mile beach – it was a very long beach but much too sharp under foot for me.  Also there was a resident shark which swam up and down the beach in shallow water which put Phil off a little!!!  We stayed there one night but didn’t linger any longer.  We are finding the price down this coast very expensive – so if we are not really taken with something we move on. The drive from the road was down a graded track and the shrub growth along side was being burnt off. This attracts Whistling Kites who eat the escaping wild life and will spread the fires by picking up a burning branch and moving it to a un-burnt section to keep the feast ongoing.

Our next port of all was Cape Keraunden, about 50km south from 80 mile beach.  We had to pay as we entered this national park so only paid for one night just in case.  We spent a long time looking at the different sites and decided on one with an outlook over the beach.  There was only one other tent in this part of the park and we settled in for the night.  We took out the fishing rod which had been stored since South Australia and wetted the line (Bob did- Phil was the supporting team!!!!)  After a very short while he had caught 2 reasonable sized Australian salmon.  The sand flies came out to play too and we were nicely bitten – even though we had put on our homemade remedy they still got us.  After dark they died down and we were able to sit outside and enjoy the evening.  We stayed there for a couple more days – each day taking walks down the beach to collect shells etc and Bob did more fishing – 1 catfish and 2 even bigger salmon – the salmon is a nice eating fish but totally different to the salmon we get at home.  It was a very pleasant and peaceful spot.

We had heard about a possible cyclone hitting the shores at Exmouth and for the last couple of days we had watched the Australian Meteorology Board to see there advice.  They advised that when it hit it would settle down and would not be too bad.  We wanted to move on from Cape Keraunden but were worried about this threat.  On Saturday morning the news came that the cyclone had got to shore and we no longer a threat.  40mm of rain had fallen in Port Hedland and this is were we were heading.  We decided to take the chance that it would be OK, we checked the road website and couldn’t see any problems.  We had a bit of rain on the way to Port Hedland but nothing dreadful.  We filled up with groceries and fuel at Port Hedland and carried on our way. We could see that lots of rain had fallen and there were some quite big puddles but nothing too major.  We stopped just outside Port Hedland at a free camp and found a decent spot.  Within minutes of us getting out of the car we had both been bitten by mosquitoes – so that was it – we didn’t stay there the night!!!!  Carried on until nearly dark to Point Samson.  It is a little of the main route but it had good reviews. 

This area is hugely supported by the Rio Tinto Mining Company and they have a massive Jetty which uses a giant conveyor belt to load the iron ore from the trains which dump the stuff and what looks like a huge water wheel on a crane shovels it onto the belt which then loads gigantic ships which we could just see all queued miles out to sea waiting for their turn to be loaded hopefully you can see the ships in the panoramic picture below.

We found a nice caravan park and stayed there 3 nights.  On our last night there it was a ‘Staircase to the moon night’  This is where you have a full moon and the sun is reflected from it.  We took the opportunity to go to the lookout at Cossack and view this amazing sight.  We were joined by quite a few others hoping to see the same as us.  Although a cloud came along just at the wrong moment – it was an amazing view – and we were both really pleased we had stayed for it.