From Marble Bar we moved on to Port Hedland arrived around morning tea time on a Sunday of a long weekend and everything was closed, so all very quite in the centre of town. We did the port area walk, a hive of activity, several large tankers were in and loading iron ore. Salt is another industry here and the piles of dried salt ready for export on the outskirts of town are very impressive.

From here we took the turnoff to Karijini NP, but first we had a homestead stay at Indee Station. “What a great place, the owners could not have been more welcoming”. “Just park the van and happy hour is in the Homestead at 5.30 just BYO drinks nibbles supplied”.   Betty and Colin were only too happy to share their station, the history, the animals and allowed us to explore the property unrestricted. This was the start of the wildflowers, Stuart Desert Peas covered the paddocks around the homestead.

After a couple of days we moved on to Karijini NP. I was not going to say how amazing things were this blog, so I am just going to say that this place was spectacular. We walked cliff tops, down into gorges, walked around waterfalls and traversed gorge walls like monkeys, it was ALL spectacular. Circular Pool, Fortescue Falls, Wenoa Gorge, Handrail Gorge and Joffee Gorge.

Wildflowers once again covered the cliff tops, this time in an array of colours.

From the park we drove to Tom Price, one of the biggest iron ore mines in Australia.  We did a mine tour, all the equipment is big boys stuff.

We drove the 4WD track up Mt Nameless and took 180 degree panorama photos, drove the Rio Tinto rail access road (permit required) and paralleled 4 huge iron ore trains in just 25 kms.

We crossed over the rail line and then into Hamersley Gorge, not amazing just unbelievable. It was just like someone had thrown a colourful tablecloth over the hill, then crushed it up into folds. The earth was certainly angry the day this gorge was formed. Four days in this area was not enough.

Sunday we were off to Dampier. Pam and Garry had travelled here a couple of days earlier with car issues. We had a stop at the Whim Creek Pub that had been recommended to us as a lunch stop it was one of those moments. A pub in the middle of nowhere, but there were 30 cars and 20 car/caravans in the car park. We travelled through Roebourne, Karratha and on to Dampier. The van park was right on the port, huge ships filling with iron ore, tankers, tugs and fishing boats. Then sailing craft and tourist boats moored in the bay. Over the next couple of days we did sightseeing in the area, iron ore, salt and the North West Shelf Gas processing plant all exporting from the town. We went down to Millstream NP and saw the homestead with the same name, an oasis in an arid area.

Back on the North West Coastal Hwy again and we are heading for Exmouth.