Since our last post we have done over 4500km and have travelled through Albany, Esperance, across the Nullarbor, though Peterborough, Broken Hill, Lightning Ridge and back to Toowoomba, three different states and five difference time changes – wow a very long way.

We left our friends Nigel, Amanda, Indiana and Sienna Snelson in Busselton three weeks ago and headed towards Albany.

 

We had been told that Albany was beautiful and it would be a disaster not to visit there.  We agree Albany is beautiful – even in winter it is a nice town.

 

 

We visited the whaling station.  This station was closed down in 1978 but it is now a museum and it is very interesting.  Some people would find it all too gruesome but it was great to understand why and how whaling was done and why it stopped.

 

 

It is not a place to visit with young children but we enjoyed the visit.  We spent a day on the beach dipping a line but no luck this time.  Albany would be a place we would visit again in the summer as the beaches are beautiful and there are some lovely walks you can do.  The weather was sunny but in the evening the temperature has really dropped. We only stayed two nights in Albany and were on the road again.

We headed for Esperance, again another delightful town.  It was whale spotting season so we took a trip along the coastal drive.  We spotted about four whales in the bay but they just didn’t come close enough to get any photos.  The coast here is beautiful, and sand is white and the beaches are huge.  Again we would love to visit in the warmer months and enjoy the beaches and sea to the full.

 

 

We were camping on an Olive Farm here and the owners were delightful.  They were so welcoming and chatty and they were in the middle of picking their olives and they loved to chat!

On our second day in Esperance we visited Stonehenge.  They have  a full scale replica of Stonehenge on a private farm.  The owner was really enthusiastic about having it and it had been open only since 2011 and they had had over 40,000 visitors.  It is huge and very calming.  Phil had never visited Stonehenge only seen it from the road passing and in real life it is much bigger than it seems.  Their Stonehenge was as it would have looked when it first was constructed.

 

        

 

We also went to mermaid Leather.  This is where they make leather out of fish skins – odd as it might seem but the skin is just a tough as cow leather and it doesn’t smell at all.  We watched a video of how the leather is made and had a look round the showroom.  it was very expensive so we passed on buying any to bring home.

While we were in Esperance we visited one of the National Parks – Cape Arid.  We had been told by locals ‘this was the place to go to see whales’.  After a couple of hours and a gravel road we found the beach where the whales were meant to be.  We had a lovely picnic watching the sea all the time – but sadly no whales for us.

We had enjoyed our time at Esperance but we were itching to get back to Toowoomba.  We have been in the caravan nearly six months and we just need to get back to settle for a little time before setting off again.

Over the next couple of days we drove, ate and slept.  We went through Norseman and saw the corrugated camels.

 

Then onto the Nullarbor.  The Nullarbor or Eyre Highway is approximately 1675km long.  We took three days to cross it from Esperance to Ceduna.  We saw lots of dead kangaroos and not much else.  We stayed in free camps all the way across it.  We stopped at all the lookouts hoping to see the whales, but again the weather was against us and it was very rough seas and so no whales were to be seen.

 

 

 

 

All around Australia we have met oversize loads on road trains some of which were 53.5 meters long, being over taken or trying to overtake these is interesting!!!!!

Here though are some oversize width wise loads, where they were being escorted by police with a car ahead then a car between each of the three lorries they were forcing all oncoming traffic off the road we did sweat as they drove past…

 

Once we had crossed the Nullarbor we headed for Peterborough.  interesting little town – obsessed by trains!  We didn’t see much of the town, we saw a giant gum tree just as we entered the town but we just wanted to sleep and get going again.

 

 

 

We did notice that Simon has branched out, sadly the business is now long gone and is a youth club

Next day we went to Broken Hill.  Not a great town – very run down and not much of a tourist attraction.

Our last stop on the way back was Lightning Ridge.  We had been recommended this town before we came away and we were really pleased we stopped there.

 

 

After a very long day in the car we visited the Hot Artesian Bore Baths – the baths have an average temperature of 42 degrees and are open all year round.  The temperature was slightly lower than that as they had been emptied and cleaned that day.  It was strange going for a swim in the dark in the middle of winter, but when you got in it was great.

 

They say the pool had healing qualities, and it made us feel great.  The following day we went on a red car door tour.  You follow car doors with numbers on them to interesting places round the town.

 

Halfway round a tour we called in to the Chamber of the Black Hand – it is an underground mine with lots of sculptures all carved into the sandstone wall – all by one artist.  The artist was there and we had a lovely chat with him as he was originally from Poole, England not far from where Bob used to live.

 

       

 

We did another coloured car door in the afternoon, and in the evening we were entertained in the campground by a couple singing country music with their own style of humour.  It was very entertaining.  It was cold watching so the blanket came out again. Another late night visit to the baths ended our stay in Lightning Ridge.

 

In the morning it was up early and headed off to Toowoomba.  We made it back just as the sun went down and the McKeon family were here to welcome us back from our journey round Australia.  We think that we have done so far this trip 27000km and we still have lots more to do.

Here is a map of the travels so far with the route highlighted in green.

 

We are now staying in Toowoomba until beginning of September.  We are going to do some short trips in Queensland and we are having fun sorting out dates and where to go.  There is lots to do round and about.

We will still update the website if and when we have interesting things to tell you.  You are always welcome to let us know what is going on in your lives by using the contact form below.  News from home would be lovely to hear.