Onslow-Karratha-Cleaverville

June 11th-16th

Day 51-56

Originally known as Ashburton, Onslow in Western Australia is a pretty coastal town with a history steeped in sheep and cattle farming, pearl farming and gold mining. It is the oldest town in the Ashburton Shire.

Old Onslow Township

The town has been hit by cyclones over the years and even war in 1943, when a single Japanese plane reached here in World War II, bombing the airfield.

Onslow boasts a warm, sunny climate, with average annual temperatures ranging between
19.2 °C – 32.1 °C.

The Old Onslow Town was located approx. 30klm SW, but due to cyclones, the silting up of the river, and port loading problems it was moved to its current site in 1923.

New Township pop.850

Onslow is one of the best places in Western Australia to view the Staircase to the Moon – a spectacular natural phenomenon seen only in the northern region of WA. This occurs all along this coast to Broome, so we have until the next full moon and low tide on the 26-27th June. Stayed tuned to this post and we may be able to bring it to you.

Termite Mounds in Onslow

Occurring from March to November, the Staircase to the Moon is caused by the rising of a full moon reflecting off exposed mudflats at low tide, creating a beautiful optical illusion of stairs reaching up to the moon.

The Monte Bello Islands, are an archipelago of over a 100 small islands lying 130 kilometres off the Pilbara coast. The islands were the site of three nuclear weapons tests by the British military in the 1950s. Onslow provided the accommodation for the troops.

Onslow is one of two salt producers in Western Australia owned by Japan’s Mitsui & Co. It began shipments in 2001 and produces 2.7 million tonnes per year.

The original park we intended to stay at was booked out, but another one a few klm on the other side of town had vacancies, well this was our good fortune, turned out to be a gem, not crowded, plenty of space. It is encompassed within a FIFO mine site. (In OZ known as Fly In Fly Out). People who work in remote areas stay at these very impressive accommodation sites, with everything provided. The work rosters differ for each mine site. They may work 8 days on and 6 off, or 14 days on and 8 days off, when they fly back home from all over Australia.

Part of the accommodation FIFO from the van

Mountains of Salt..ummh Fish & Chips come to mind.

Salt Jetty.

Sunset and Sunrise from Onslow, not many places this occurs across the same bay. Jetty & ANZAC Memorial Beadon Bay

Everything is provided by the mines, inc. flights, all fully catered meals 3 times a day, satellite TV in each room, billiard rooms, table tennis, swimming pool, Gymnasium, laundry facilities & much more, including a generous pay packet. Food choices are incredible, all you can eat, one draw back beer is $2 bottle, daylight robbery. If the food is not up to standard, staff walk and move onto another mine site.

This part of Australia is known for it’s large LNG (Liquefied Natural Gas), 33 trillion cubic feet, sounds a lot to me. A consortium of companies developed this project including Chevron, BHP, Woodside, Shell etc.

So, this mine’s accommodation currently has 14 people staying, but when a Shut Down at the Gas Plant is scheduled, accommodates 400. Friday night was happy hour, in the canteen for the small number of workers, plus the lucky caravaners on site. What a treat. It was longer than a Happy Hour for some. We had a wonderful night of singing, laughing, sharing travel stories, long into the night…Declan providing music choices of your favourite song… the fact that the latest song to hit the sound wave was from the 1980’s going back to the 1950’s tells you how old we are….how do you have such a noisy night and have no complaints…. easy Sarah invites all back to the caravan…Great night, Steve, Graham, Bill, Denise, Mark, Meredith and others…Phew

Puparazzi are in town, main street, and the Boab Tree, related to the African variety, found in West Australia’s tropical region.

June 12th Onslow-Karratha – 20th Parallel

After 300klm arrived in Karratha, (indigenous name meaning Good Country or Soft Earth) it was only established in 1968, with a population of 17,000, again it’s growth is linked with the establishment of the Hammersley Iron Mines. Lovely modern town

Love the rocky outcrops of the arid outback along the way.

Average June temp for Karratha, 25 deg C, Ave o/nite low 15 deg C Went to the local indoor shopping centre, was highly amused by the window display in K Mart, puffer jackets and beanies? Sarah Could not buy any shorts, only winter stock in!

Very excited to see our fist traffic lights in over 3 weeks, Red..Yellow… Green…how we miss the city lights!

We are staying at a council run ‘Overflow’ caravan park which is at the Karratha Golf Club. We are allowed to stay 2 nights free, very nice. We are 1 klm from the city centre, so many shops and most things catered for. Sarah & I decide to watch the Euro Football Tournament in a local outdoor/indoor sports bar. England playing Croatia. In WA we are only 6 hours behind European Time Zones.

This is a large rig joining the overflow. Jarrod owns this rig who purchased this unit 3 years ago. He decided he had enough of city life and has been on the road since. He is now 52 yrs. For the technically minded it is a converted bus with trailer at 28 tonnes all up. Fuel economy is 1.8-2.4 klm /ltr. It is a two stroke 9lt 6V92 Series Detroit Diesel.

No beaches in Karratha, just mangroves along the sea front.

The colour of the rocks have changed from a vibrant red to this deep crimson/ rusty colour.

Sturt’s Desert Pea, famous for its distinctive blood-red leaf-like flowers, each with a bulbous black centre. It is one of Australia’s best known wildflowers.

Move about 30 klm further along the highway to Cleaverville on the beach. Time for a swim and star gazing with a wonderful sunset. Bought a pair of aqua shoes which someone suggested was necessary when walking in some creeks that have fresh water crocodiles, even though will not kill, but will nibble at your feet whilst walking along the creek. They came in handy just walking along the beach also.

Aqua Shoes, also The Moon and Venus visible at sunset

The view from the van.

We are visiting Millstream Chichester National Park. You can enter via Karratha, (sealed road) or Roebourne (unsealed road), but good dirt road. We completed the whole loop as the Roebourne side provided wonderful scenery such as Pyramid Rock and the surrounding escarpments. Saw many iron ore trains along this route, wow are they long. Boys and their train sets.

Millstream Chichester National Park is an oasis in the desert, nestled within the chocolate brown rocks of the Chichester Range, dotted with spinifex and snappy gums. Permanent pools are fed by springs that draw water from the underground aquifer within porous dolomite rock.

Time for a swim in Python Pool.

Deep Gorge, situated on the Burrup Peninsula, is a wonderful natural record of Aboriginal culture. This area is recognised as one of the most prolific Aboriginal rock art sites in Australia. Over 10,000 individual rock engravings (petroglyphs) and etchings have been located in this archaeologically rich region. The collection of rock engravings number over one million across the Dampier Archipelago and Burrup Peninsula, many depicting images of the now extinct Thylacine (Tasmanian Tiger).