This Adventurous Age

Adventures travelling and working around Australia.

Tag Archives: Pilbara


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2006 Travels September 9

SATURDAY 9 SEPTEMBER     HOWARD SPRINGS

We had to go to the Darwin company office, in the morning, to see R. When things moved, it seemed they did so quickly!

Apparently, it had been getting environmental and aboriginal heritage approvals that had been holding up the project. These things were not up to the company – it was Fortescue that must negotiate and sort out the approvals, and then hand the site over to the company for the construction work.

I was still trying to get my head around the delineations and processes and who was doing what.

It was arranged that we were to turn up at 8am on Monday, for “work” – induction and so on. We would be paid for our time.

There would be three options for getting us to the site:  1. Drive ourselves there.  2. Drive to Alice Springs, so some training at Head Office, then drive the Tanami Track to WA. But the Tanami was very rough at this time.  3. Fly to Alice for training, fly back to Darwin, then drive ourselves.

R was not yet sure which of these it would be. Just one of a number of uncertainties, it seemed to me.

Back at camp, I made John go and tell J we would not be doing the mango work after all. I felt really bad that we had let her down, and hoped John was embarrassed.

Occasionally I saw, in my walks around the area, Rainbow Bee-eaters – really colourful little birds, with the distinctive longer tail feather. In some light angles, they appeared irridescent.

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Rainbow Bee eaters


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2006 Travels August 15

TUESDAY 15 AUGUST     DARWIN

In the morning, we had the job interview at the company’s Darwin office.

The Manager, R, and his daughter who was the secretary, acted like we would probably be hired.

I was quite suspicious and found it hard to believe that John was the only applicant for the Safety Officer job. Maybe it was important that there were the two of us?

It was explained that there were two job sites, approximately 100 and 250kms from Port Hedland. A somewhat vague description….

The company was to build two 280 person accommodation camps, for construction crews that would build an iron ore railway for a small company, Fortescue Metals, from the mine in the Chichester Ranges, to be shipped from Port Hedland, where they were building their own shipping facility.

There was a real sense of urgency. Apparently, they needed to start ASAP, which might explain the speed at which they were prepared to hire us.

R said access to the site had already been delayed by some sort of external cause – not his company’s fault.

Mention was made that they would train us here and in Alice Springs, and then fly us to Port Hedland, transporting our Truck and van down by truck! But it all seemed rather vague and being made up as they went.

It would be BIG money!

I came away thinking I would need to learn the Excel program in a hurry, and brush up on my Office program skills in general. John tends to think that anyone who can spell or write can do clerical work….

We left there with nothing concrete. They would get in touch with us….

However, John did mention that we had a friend travelling with us – and R seemed a bit keen to hire her too! But M was not interested, however much John tried to persuade her. I thought that was very smart of her.

I would still prefer to tag along with her and go home. I said to John that I could go with M and leave him to go off alone on this particular little adventure. He did not like me saying that. I even said I could drive Truck and van home, and he could fly off adventuring. He got quite cross at the idea.

We went to the Casino for lunch. It was $9.85 each, for all one could eat from a very good buffet spread. Great value. It was a pleasant dining area too, with views out over the swimming pool to the sea.

We were not interested in the gaming machines and facilities, so we were not the type of customer the establishment was trying to lure with their attractive lunch deal.

After lunch, drove to the Holmes Jungle Nature Park, on the outskirts of town. Did one of the walks there. It was hot dry and dusty and not particularly impressive. The reputed bird life was in hiding from the heat. I did not have my camera with me, either.

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Inner Darwin


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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 15

THURSDAY 15 JULY   MILLSTREAM TO TOM PRICE   270kms

It was a grey and cloudy day.

The campground was still closed, as we left. We were so lucky to have been able to spend the time there, that we did.

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After some discussion, we had decided that remaining on the Roebourne-Wittenoom road might be a safer option than returning to the railway access road, given all the rain there had been. It meant a longer drive, but that was preferable to the potential embarrassment of getting bogged on a private road!

The scenery became progressively more interesting through the drive. The eastern parts of the Pilbara were more rugged than where we had been.

For a while we ran parallel to the Chichester Range.

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Near Mt Florance homestead, there was an area of contrast, where one side of the road had been burned, the other not.

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Contrast between burnt and unburnt country

The roads we travelled on were mostly unsealed, but in reasonable condition.

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Crossed our old friend, the Fortescue River, on another long, slightly built up causeway. Clearly, a prolonged heavy rain event would close all sorts of roads in these parts!

Turned south-ish at the junction of the Wittenoom and Nanutarra roads. We then had to drive through the Rio Tinto Gorge – one vehicle width and very narrow. It would have been “interesting” if we’d met a vehicle coming the other way! It goes for several kms.

Just after that, we tried to go in to Hamersley Gorge. Part way down the access track was a wide turning point and a sign saying no caravans beyond that point. This was still quite a distance from the gorge, so we decided against walking the rest of the way.

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Track to Hamersley Gorge

Decided to have lunch at the turn around area, anyway. Just to make life harder, another van came in and parked there too, which made our reversing out, to leave, quite difficult.

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No vans past this point!

The Tom Price Caravan Park was very full. We managed to get a site – small – though. It was right up in the back corner of the park. $22 a night. We felt crowded all the time we were there, especially in the amenities, which were Atco type. Not amongst the better places we’ve stayed!

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Tom Price camp

After setting up the camp, I did some cleaning up of the van – Millstream mud!

M and John showered. I washed a couple of loads of grotty clothes, then had my shower. It was welcome after the muddy days without.

We drove into town to the Information Centre and shops.

There was a notice up saying that the Dales Gorge camping area in Karijini National Park, was very busy and would-be campers should get there very early, to obtain a site.

While tea was cooking, the power pole “died”. Overload from the four vans hooked up to it, we suspected. After this, our battery charger was no longer working! If we could not fix the problem, it would not be long before we would have to turn off the fridge, which worked exclusively from the batteries.

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