SATURDAY 25 AUGUST     BROOME

I went for an early morning walk on Cable Beach. It might be legendary and all that, but it is really just another beach. We have seen better. It does have vivid sunsets, and it does have camel rides, but…..

Whilst walking I got chatting with another walker, a lady from Melbourne who was staying at the Resort for a long weekend. Nice to have the life of some people……

At least, out here, there did not seem to be the groups of alcohol affected, yelling, fighting indigines that were so evident in the town areas, especially at night. From our past experiences here, early morning walking in town would involve picking one’s way through much broken glass and other rubbish, including that originating in the human body!

We went to the Courthouse Markets – along with a lot of other people. The atmosphere there was quite festive and very tropical. The stalls are set up in the gardens surrounding the old Broome Court House, as the name suggests, under lots of beautiful old shady trees.

Some of the stalls here were of a much higher quality than is often found at weekend markets. There were some very good jewellery stalls with unusual, local-related items. I bought pearly shell pendants for the three daughters, and unusual dichroic glass pendants for daughter’s partner, and myself. These were done in shades of vivid blue and red-browns, so evocative of the colours of Broome.

Bought a lovely smelling bath soaps pack for the errant daughter in law – in case a Xmas gift for her would be needed.

Another stall had items based on satellite photographs of Kimberley places and a few others of interest. (This was before the era of Google Earth, Zoom etc). I was really taken with a satellite image of the Kimberley, mounted on a lightweight board. It cost $90. but I thought it would be a real talking point at home, and illustrative of the area we had travelled this year. The detail was great. That whole northern Kimberley actually looked much more rugged on the satellite photo than it did, travelling it on the ground!

The same stall had a magnet with a sat photo of Antarctica. It looked like a slightly convoluted pearly shell – most unusual, so I had to have that too.

We bought lunch at the markets where there was a good range of “ethnic” food choices.

Also bought fresh vegetable and some fruit there – excellent quality.

We drove to the town shops, because it was where I could buy the Weekend Australian. Got sidetracked, first, by a stall that was selling floor rugs and bought a small one for the van, to go in front of the bed to help prevent the sand and grit from these ungrassed sites, that was finding its way into the bed.

Refuelled Truck – $1.44cpl.

Spent the rest of the afternoon at camp, reading the paper.