BROOME

The other end of the day can be beautiful too - morning on Cable Beach

Sunrise over the dunes - Cable Beach

The old and the new - Kayakers in front of The Young Endeavour which is currently in port in Broome on its way circumnavigating Australia.  We saw it in Darwin Harbour too.

Bridgie and another sandcastle masterpiece

My beautiful boy carrying water up the beach with the moon rising

Dancing around the campfire on Cable Beach

The kids.  The funny shimmering is actually the heat from the campfire rising up in front of my camera!

Ben made himself a "beach chair"

Ben dancing and singing from the car

Tessie showing us her great moves

Our campfire - soo much fun!

DAY 59 – BROOME                                                      Tuesday, 30^th August

The husband has all of a sudden decided to get creative.  He finally took the camera along on his morning constitutional – and came back with 150 beach photos.  So I really need to include some to make him feel, well …. like he is contributing!

This morning, I did a really stupid thing.  Thinking that Marj and Barry would have to sit in the car and put their luggage in there, I decided to clean the inside of the car as best I could.  Having stared at it for a few minutes, I then decided that cleaning the back was a ridiculous idea because we would still be going to the beach and the sand from the boogie boards and towels etc would make a mess again.  So I cleaned the front, with Beth’s help, as best I could with a bottle of Nifti and a dustpan and brush.  If you could all see the sand on Cable Beach … the bloody stuff is so white and fine it gets into everything!  Again, any sympathy?? 

After that, Ben and I had our Mummy and Son time which was beautiful.  He looks after his mummy so well – a real gentleman!  We went wandering around the shops, had an icecream, bought a shark’s tooth necklace and, most importantly, went collecting firewood for our beach fire that night.  Clearly Ben and I were the only ones taking it seriously!  I even went into 4WD mode to go down a track off the main road and went into the scrub, tearing apart trees with my bare hands (all the while terrified that someone else would come down the tiny track where it was impossible to turn around, or even pass someone!!  And my beautiful, law-abiding son constantly asking: “Are you sure we are allowed to do this, Mum?  Are we going to get into trouble?”

Back to the caravan park for some lunch and then down the beach for the last night with the Patterson and the Dearness families.  The Tedescos came down too after they picked their car up from a service (mechanics here must make a mint – EVERYONE  seems to use their extended holiday to get their car serviced).

We all had a fantastic night on the beach, more sandcastles, dinner, sunset and a big beach fire!  When David went to pick up Lawrence to take him back to his car, he found a factory with loads of pallets they were not using!  I think we have enough wood for a Melbourne winter!!  The kids played the IPOD from our car and danced around the fire all night, singing at the top of their voices.  About 4 packets of marshmallows were toasted around the fire with stick collected expertly by Bruce and I in the dunes (until we saw the glowing tell-tale sign of Wolf Spiders in the dune vegetation – I got out of there pretty quickly after that!)

At the end of the evening, with the water fast approaching for a 9.9m high tide, we packed up, the Dearness’ left and the Pattersons and Tedescos turned towards the south end of the beach when …. SHOCK HORROR … click click… no battery.  Not sure if it was all the John Denver my husband was playing (much to everyone’s disgust – except my poor children, who have been converted in a few moments of child abuse in the car over the last eight weeks) or if it was the one thousandth playing of “Dynamite” by the girls, but the battery was absolutely dead.  David jumped out and grabbed Lawrence’s attention.  Lucky Lawrence is incredibly organised and had, not only jumper leads, but two batteries under his bonnet!  For the first few minutes there was absolutely nothing – Sarah starting to panic, thinking something was wrong other than just a dead battery!  But, as the tide lapped within 3 metres of the back tyres, Lawrence tried the other battery and FINALLY got a spark!  Of course, as I have been telling this story, it has been getting better and better with Lawrence knee deep in the advancing tide, shoulder to the back of the 4WD!!  What a hero!! A fantastic night ended with a bit more excitement than I usually need!!!!

BROOME

The kids looking at sea creatures in the rockpools at Gantheaume Point

Will have to start pureeing food at this rate!!

One of the 120 million year old dinosaur footprints

A dinosaur footprint - oh and the one on the right is a dinosaur footprint too!

All of us at Guntheaume Point at sunset

The most beautiful sunset in the world!

Father and son contemplating the universe

Husband and wife contemplating ....

The lighthouse at Gantheaume Point with the Osprey nest on the second landing - you may be able to see some of the birds perched on the lighthouse.

DAY 58 – BROOME                                                                 Monday, 29^th August

This morning was Beth and Mummy time so we did some jobs around town, went shopping and Bethie bought a toe-ring!  I have always wanted one of these so am very jealous.  She, too, is now looking very “Broome-like”!  It is so nice to have some one on one time together – it happens so rarely in a big family.  She is growing up so quickly now.  It seems every time I turn around, she has a new look or expression that I have not seen before.  It is such a beautiful age – she loves having a joke with Dad, or being complicit in the workings of the Tooth Fairy.  She is the perfect big sister, thinking up better excuses than me as to why the Tooth Fairy might have forgotten to collect Bridget’s tooth one night.

Off to the beach again this afternoon for more boogie boarding (pretty non-existent surf this afternoon), and more sandcastle building (getting more impressive with each session).  No dinner on the beach tonight because we went searching for the dinosaur footprints which are visible off Gantheaume Point only at very low tides.  So we all met out there at 4:30pm and gingerly climbed down the rocks which are very slippery with sand and sea creatures (as they are normally covered in water). 

We managed to find the first set of prints easily (OK, let’s face it, there was no “we”.  The kids found the print while I was still negotiating my way down the rocks and peering at interesting sea coral in the rockpools!).  The second foot print was obviously of an entirely different type of dinosaur.  In some ways the kids were fairly blasé about it all.  I suppose that happens when SO MANY amazing things happen in your lifetime.  But I was very moved by the fact that these prints had lasted about 120 million years, and enjoyed listening to my “frustrated geologist husband” telling me how these prints were preserved and others were not.  We saw Anastasia’s Pool also, built by a lighthouse keeper for his arthritic wife amongst the rocks

The sunset from Gatheaume Point was, AGAIN, absolutely stunning.  We also got a good view of the Osprey nest up on the lighthouse landing.  Weighing half a tonne and carrying, I think, two chicks, it is a most impressive site, and you will have to forgive me for sending photos of it.

BROOME

A beautiful pair of Tawny Frogmouth Owls appeared today in the tree outside our van.  Just beautiful to see in the wild.

Luke and Gerard Tedesco and Ben with the "boys' pool"!

Bridget, Tess P, Tess H, Beth and Jemma at the "girls' pool"

Ben, Gerard and Luke - still digging!

Ella, Ben, Bridget and Caleb digging to China, I think!

Celebrating the sea filling their "swimming pool"!

The tide encompasses the first pool (where the girls are standing) and heads towards Bridget's painstakingly-built wall!

A great team effort - the shovel being stuck into the sandcastle before the sea finally claims it!

DAY 57 – BROOME                                                                 Sunday, 28^th August

Off to Mass at the “cathedral” this morning and then for a drive around Broome to the Anzac Memorial (a successful Geocache finally!!) at Bedford Park to look at the William Dampier memorial and others.  We discovered lots of local history and discovered that William Dampier first reached Australian shores 100 years before Captain Cook!  Dampier allegedly buried a treasure chest in the region so I figure the kids have nothing better to do for the next week – they might as well try to contribute to the cost of this adventure of ours.  Keeps them out of mischief anyway!    There was also a French expedition to Australia led by Captain Baudin.  It is interesting to note the number of localities with French names down the coast as a result of this.  Marie-Antoinette’s palace even had an Australian collection of animals taken back there by the expedition!  There was also an interesting memorial to the Aboriginal and Muslim men who fought in the Second World War in the special “Z Unit”.They were commandos who fought the Japanese behind enemy lines. It was sad to realise that one of these heroes who fought in the Australian uniform was deported to Singapore after the war because the pearling master sacked him from his job.  He was only allowed to stay in Australia as a pearl diver.

The township of Broome is amazingly multicultural with huge influences by the Japanese, Chinese, SE Asians, and French. 

We decided to have two beach sittings today so off to swim between the flags in the morning.  Again the colour of the water was amazing and so warm.  No-one will believe that Sarah is even getting her hair wet!!!  Water just gorgeous!  Home for some lunch and journal writing before back to the beach again (thank goodness we could drive!!).  Four families (the Pattersons, the Dearness , the Hansens and the Tedescos) had dinner together and it was just gorgeous!  The kids just love all playing together.  As a parent you can’t believe how happy it makes me to see the kids playing together in the water, catching waves, making sandcastles – good wholesome fun.  Not a DS, X-Box or TV to be seen!!  Man, do I sound old? 

Just to see the kids having so much fun creating enormous swimming pools in the sand and their squeals of delight as the tide comes in and swamps their pool is so funny.  The effort Bridget went to to build a wall to protect her “swimming pool” was so amazing!  So intense!! So futile.

BROOME

Butter wouldn't melt in that toothless mouth!!!

This boy just loves doing his Maths on holidays!  Need to buy him an extra book!

My beautiful girls with their new earrings!!!  They are so proud!

The amazing colour of the water at Roebuck Bay!

Day 56 – BROOME                                                             Saturday, 27^th August

Did some schoolwork this morning and then went for a drive to see the Japanese Cemetery and the Chinese Cemetery.  It is incredible how many Japanese died on the pearl luggers last century.  The most horrific stories were those told about the ships which were caught in storms off the coast whilst divers were on the bottom of the ocean.  If a storm approached, and there was insufficient time to bring the diver up from the ocean floor, they just cut the rope and the oxygen to the diver and left him there in order to save the ship, the catch and the other crew (in that order, I think!).  Of course, many died of the bends as well.  In the year 1914, 33 died of this paralysis alone.

After that, we took a drive down to Town Beach which is very pretty.  The water colour is just an amazing aqua and so clear.   There is a pioneer cemetery on the hill at Town Beach and people were still being buried there up until 1995 (presumably because husbands/wives had already been buried there). 

Again, off to the beach in the afternoon, but (shock/horror!!) we had to CARRY all our accessories down to the beach because Opera Under the Stars was on at Cable Beach and the vehicular access was closed for the evening!  It didn’t stop us staying there until well after dark, having our barbie and watching the sunset and the kids play in the sand.

You can’t imagine how exhausting these days are!!  David and I desperately wanted to go down with a bottle of wine and a blanket and sit on the beach and listen to the opera but just could not convince any of you to come up and babysit!!  So David went for a walk down to have a look.  Even though the black plastic was all around, so many people had brought their chairs and wine down to the dunes to listen!