This Adventurous Age

Adventures travelling and working around Australia.

Monthly Archives: June 2019


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2004 Travels July 26

MONDAY 26 JULY     MARBLE BAR

We managed quite an early start to the day’s sight seeing ventures.

Drove the couple of kms to the actual “marble bar” at the nearby Coongan River, that gave the town its name. The reef of rock is actually jasper, not marble, but – especially when damp –  it looked enough like the real thing to trick the first settlers.

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The “marble” bar and Coongan River

We put some water on it to show M how it does look like marble.

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Jasper outcrop

People trying to souvenir a chunk of jasper at the main part of the bar, had become a problem, so a little quarry area had been created, slightly out of the way, where those so inclined could pick up a piece of jasper, with vandalizing the main reef.

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It was a pleasant spot out there, by a big pool in the river, and we had a bit of a wander around.

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It would appear that there were fish in the river…

Then drove on a little way further south, to the old Comet gold mine. This started with a gold find in 1936 and was worked until the 1950’s. Its claim to fame was that it had, for some years,  the tallest chimney in the southern hemisphere, at 75 metres. It was still producing little bits of gold to sell to people like me!

The township of Marble Bar grew up as the result of a gold rush in the 1890’s. In that period of optimism, some substantial buildings were put up. However, the main rush was fairly short lived, as news of the great finds around places like Kalgoorlie, filtered north. But some mining activity continued, in fits and starts, around Marble Bar. The Comet Mine had been one such occurrence.

I bought a chunk of gold nugget. I planned, when back home, to have a setting put on the top, so I could wear it on a chain, as a pendant. Also bought a tiger eye iron necklace. My excuse was that these would be this year’s birthday and Xmas presents!

We went back to the van for lunch. Then it was out the Salgash Road, for about 36kms, to the old Corunna Downs WW2 airstrip and base.

Back in ’93, when we were rained in at Marble Bar, the park owner had given us directions out here and we had been captivated by the place and its little-known history – which he had told us, as there was then no tourist information available.

The drive out to Corunna Downs was lovely – dramatic scenery.

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Unusual rock outcrop near Corunna Downs

The air base here was built in 1942, in great secrecy – for long range B24 Liberator bombers – American – that would attack Japanese bases in the Dutch East Indies, and shipping in that region. At the time, the air bases further north – around Darwin and at Truscott in the Kimberley – were being attacked by Japanese planes. The surrounding area here was so hilly, remote and inhospitable, that it was thought the Japanese would not suspect a base was here. It was also beyond the range of most of their aircraft.

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Rugged Corunna Downs country

The base operated until 1945 and was decommissioned in 1946. It was never attacked. Although the Japanese hunted for the base of the big bombers, they never found it.

The remnants had survived remarkably well, though the few actual buildings that existed, were removed. The Australian and American servicemen were housed in tents, camouflaged, which must have been distinctly uncomfortable in the hot Pilbara summer.

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Flying fox was used when water course flooded

The longest of the two runways was about 2100 metres long and 50 metres wide; a slightly shorter runway intersected it, and there were kms of taxi ways.

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We could still see the remains of the old runways and some of the twenty earth bunkers that sheltered – and helped camouflage – the big bombers. There were lots of bits of metal, old drums and the like, lying around.

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Truck in revetment that once sheltered a big bomber

Of course, we had to drive some of the long runway, at speed! We did quite a bit of walking around and exploring on foot.

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On the runway

It was a very good afternoon. Something different for our tourist friend and something well off the beaten tourist track. We saw no other travellers at all, through the afternoon.

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Some of the travellers  we talked to, back at the caravan park, said that Carrawine Gorge, east of here, which we had considered visiting, was not worth the trip, because it was really badly degraded after this year’s cyclone. Scratch that idea, then!


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2004 Travels July 25

SUNDAY 25 JULY   NEWMAN TO MARBLE BAR   300kms

We headed north out of Newman, soon onto the unsealed road to Nullagine. The road was in pretty good condition.

We stopped at Nullagine to eat the lunch I’d packed.

Back in ’93, we were intending to stay here because John wanted to do some prospecting, so we’d driven down from Port Hedland. However, we thought it was a place with a very bad “feel”, not helped by seeing some sort of lock up structure, with bars, and occupants visible behind them as we passed. We’d about turned and driven all the way back to Marble Bar.

It still did not appeal at all to me as a place to stay! Whereas, we had great memories of Marble Bar – despite, or maybe because of – being stranded there for a few days by rain-closed roads. Back then, the Port Hedland road was still unsealed. Whilst the roads out to the south and north had been closed, the little local ones were not, and the caravan park owner had directed us to some great exploring.

We continued on to Marble Bar, through some really interesting country – ranges and hills, flattening out a bit before we reached Marble Bar.

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Went into the Marble Bar Caravan Park – $20 a night. The park had grown in size, since ’93. It was still quite a pleasant one. This was the park that was offered to us, to buy, back then! New owners took over, 16 months ago. There is really only a few months of tourist season here, though, obviously, it is far more a visitors’ destination now than it was eleven years ago.

Because we had phoned ahead and booked, they had kept us a nice site. M had a great grassy patch to one side of us for her tent. They were full and having to use a gravel overflow area too, so we congratulated ourselves on our foresight!

The town looked like it had been spruced up since ’93, and there was more information for tourists. But there were still some grotty areas.

After setting up, M and I walked up Water Tank Hill, behind the park, late in the afternoon. The sweeping views from the top were superb.

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Marble Bar town and caravan park from top of Water Tank Hill

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At 5pm, the park owner held a briefing session for all that day’s newcomers – about things to do in the area. Great idea, that probably resulted in at least some visitors staying on longer than they intended.

It was very pleasant to be back in a park that was peaceful and quiet, after Newman.

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2004 Travels July 24

SATURDAY 24 JULY     NEWMAN

Today’s destination – also sourced from out little booklet – was Weeli Wolli Springs, about 100kms from Newman.

This involved driving back on the main highway, the way we’d come on Thursday, for about 70kms, then turning north-ish.

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Locations of Kalgan Pool and Weeli Wolli (Google Earth)

The track was reasonable for most of the way. It deteriorated, though, towards the end. We may have tried to drive a bit too far?  We got stuck trying to cross a little creek that John didn’t check first – just drove into. It had a deep gravel base that we sunk into. Luckily, he was able to reverse out.

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Oops!

Then we saw where other vehicles had crossed this creek and were able to drive on a bit further. These places just do not have sign posts to tell you when you have reached where you intended to go!

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Checking out the creek depth

We had lunch out there – by a pool and rock wall.

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Weeli Wolli

There was a build up of dark cloud, so we did not go exploring to follow the creek any distance from there.

However, we did stop a bit further back on the track, closer to the springs, and wandered about exploring there, for a while.

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Creek at Weeli Wolli. near springs

Would have liked to stay out there longer, and maybe walk far enough to see if we could find the source of the springs, but the skies were looking really threatening.

Weeli Wolli Springs and creek were supposed to be a Rainbow Serpent home. It certainly seemed an unusual formation for these parts. The belief was that the Serpent came up here, in the water that flowed at the springs, from the desert to the east. He went north under  the creek and came up again in the Fortescue Marshes, then went on to Millstream. It was supposed to be a dangerous place where no one was to venture into the water and should not camp there at night. Women were not to walk alone along the creek, according to the lore.

On the return trip, took an alternative, longer track to the highway – this brought us out a bit closer to Newman. We only did it for variety, and because it was marked on the map.

As we’d driven about, the past two days, saw much evidence of mining and exploration, and one could not help but hear talk of new mines. I did hope that exploration and development spare places like Kalgan Pool and Weeli Wolli.

Over the past two days, we’d visited two little known destinations that were just superb, neither of which we’d been to before. Once off the main roads, both times, we’d encountered no other travellers – had both destinations to ourselves. Wonderful.

Back in Newman, refuelled again – $1.16cpl. We’d done 353kms since yesterday’s fill!

The people who were now parked next to us had come in from the Canning and the “bomb” tracks – so called because they were made (by Len Beadell) initially to monitor the atomic bomb testing in the desert country. One of their party had been towing an Ultimate camper trailer. His auto transmission got too hot and caught fire. There may have been a build up of dry spinifex underneath, too, I thinks to myself.  That damaged the electricals, so they were now in Newman for repairs, for a while. Another thing that I thinks to myself was that they were pretty silly to be towing anything on those tracks, anyway.

There were a lot of “sitting about” indigines in Newman. One cannot buy 4 litre wine casks in town, unless leaving town that day – and driving licence must be produced. They let us stock up today, as tomorrow was Sunday and we were leaving then – we had to make solemn promises that this was true. We wanted to stock up a bit because we’d heard that such casks were not available in Port Hedland at all.

 


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2004 Travels July 23

FRIDAY 23 JULY     NEWMAN

Had to be up, fed and organized quite early, in time to front up for our mine tour. This departed from the Tourist Centre. We had to wear closed-in shoes.

We travelled in a full sized bus that took us to various points of interest at the Mt Whaleback mining operations. A couple of times we got off the bus at vantage points, but basically, the tour was bus-based.

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Mt Whaleback iron ore mine dated from 1968. BHP built the Newman township at this time, too. The ore is transported by BHP’s railway to Port Hedland, for export.

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Essentially, the mining operations are taking away the mountain!

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The tour was interesting and worth doing.

The mine pit – open cut – was huge.

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The guide told us there was plenty of iron ore in reserve – essentially, ore is all through the Pilbara and right to the coast.

At the mine area everything was, of course, coated in red dust.

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We saw, close up, some of the huge trucks used to move the ore out of the pit.

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I know the country needs mining, and progress, but part of me was very uneasy at this beautiful, elemental, country being dug up. No amount of rehabilitation could ever make it the same again.

At the Visitor Centre, where the bus returned us, I bought an iron ore necklace  and earrings. I do love ironstone, and the colour suits the things I wear in my non-travelling life.

Refuelled Truck – $1.16cpl.

Back at the van, we changed footwear and I quickly packed up a lunch.

We drove out to visit Kalgan Pool.  Had to drive out the unsealed Marble Bar road for some 25kms, then follow a track for about 25 kms to the west. It was not too rough, but definitely a track rather than a road.

Kalgan Pool was on the upper reach of the Kalgan Creek, which eventually fed into the Fortescue River.

The track  basically followed the Kalgan Creek valley, so was really scenic, with quite lush growth along the creek and regular occurrences of red rock valley walls and outcrops.

 

Kalgan Pool itself was lovely – a green oasis, but for me the real attraction out here was the massively folded and fractured rock walls – fascinating.

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Quite amazing that trees could establish themselves on the rocky hillside

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Tortured rock strata – massive folding

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Kalgan Pool

We had lunch at the pool and walked about, exploring, walking up the creek for some distance.

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Kalgan Creek

 

Had to return back the way we came. We started off on what looked like a continuing track to the west – were following directions from a little booklet bought at the Tourist Centre in Newman, but it was not the easiest to follow. Although the rough drawn maps in it indicated that we could continue west from Kalgan Pool, that was a bit vague, tracks on the ground were hard to relate to those in the booklet, so we decided to be prudent and backtrack.

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By Kalgan Creek – John looking for gemstones

On the way back, we turned off the Marble Bar road and went west for a short way, to the Opthalmia Dam. This was nothing really special – a body of water dammed back by rock walls. It contributes to Newman’s water supply.

Hordes of mosquitoes descended once we got out of truck, so we were not tempted to dawdle there. One quick look around, and we were away again!

Back at the caravan park, another traveller came up to talk to us. He owned a Trakmaster too. He’d left it at home, this trip, because he was driving the Canning Stock Route. His group had come in to Newman, off the Track, to source parts to repair a vehicle.

We bought fish and chips for tea. They were adequate.

Phoned the caravan park at Marble Bar and booked us in there. There were such crowds around these parts at the moment, that it was prudent to be sure of our accommodation – particularly since M was on a fixed schedule and we couldn’t adapt plans too much.

 


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2004 Travels July 22

THURSDAY 22 JULY   KARIJINI TO NEWMAN   210kms

There was a van queued up to take our site, well before we were packed up and ready to go!

I wondered whether this mounting pressure of visitors here would eventually mean that more camp areas would need to be set up? Or this one expanded? At least, the current limitations on the numbers of campers went some way towards ensuring the main attractions were not impossibly overcrowded.

The drive to Newman was really scenic and dramatic, with lots of the stark Pilbara ranges, near and distant.

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We went into Dearloves Caravan Park, at $20 a night. The park was crowded. It was, supposedly, a 4-star operation, but to me a long way off the standard I would expect for that rating. There were no annexe slabs. Our site was a mix of struggling grass and red Pilbara dirt. The amenities were adequate, but nothing flash. We had to supply our own hose splitter before we could connect to water. They seemed to be squashing rigs in all over the place.

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Newman site

There was a large section of – presumably – mine workers. They were fairly feral!

This was a park that was noisy at night – a rather unpleasant contrast to where we had been. There was noise carrying from the town. There were shift workers coming and going through the night and noise from trains and trucks.

After doing a basic set up, we drove to the central shop area, to collect the mail that had been forwarded from Karratha. It was not there! Had to phone housesitter L for the tracking number. Then a very nice Australia Post staff person phoned around – and found it had been sent to Broome! They said there was another person with the same surname, having mail redirected – not sure whether that was an excuse, or true. We arranged for it to now go to South Hedland PO – where we might or might not meet up with it! Hope there was nothing too important – or urgent – in there.

Then it was off to the Tourist Centre where we booked a mine tour – BHP Billiton operation – for tomorrow. It cost $15 a person.

Newman was the typical mining service town of these parts, with a central area of shops and services. There was little of note to see around the town itself, so it was back to camp.

I showered thoroughly – very enjoyable, after several days in the heat, and with all the walking I’d done!

Did our washing and hung it out to dry overnight.

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2004 Travels July 21

WEDNESDAY 21 JULY     KARIJINI NATIONAL PARK

M and John went off to walk down into Knox Gorge.

I felt like a lay day, so did not go. Hadn’t had much sleep last night – John was snoring!

After they had gone, I had a nap, then lazed about camp.

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Karijini bug – reminded me of the Leichhardt’s Grasshopper that heralds the wet season in the Top End

The intrepid explorers returned, earlier than I’d expected.

They’d had a great walk, they said. Had to negotiate a scree slope down, but then got right along the gorge. They were really pleased with themselves.

On their way back from the gorge, they had called into the Visitor Centre and used the phone there to book us into a Newman caravan park, for three nights.

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I liked the bronze tips on this plant

We all lazed about for the rest of the day. Talked about what we’d do next. Broadly, hoped to do a tour of the mine and also explore some of the water holes and springs in the area, that John and I had not before visited.

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Possibly a type of grevillea?

Had we been travelling on our own, there was no doubt that we’d have spent more time here in Karijini, and probably spaced the walking out more. But, this time, we wanted to make sure that M saw a good sampling of these parts.