Day 5

Our overnight under the tree

Wild flowers

Day 5.  Started off as usual with everyone else heading out before us. The bird life is amazing around this water hole. We had a large Hawk circling overhead with a huge mob of pigeons i n a bush rushing down for a drink and a group of pink and greys over us in the tree watching us late starters. It was nice to the galahs in their native area.

Wildflowers

Locals drop in for a chat

Once again it was a lazy breakfast then hit the road. We only had 180 ks to go to Newman so we cruised along. We got to a place called Manarra Roadhouse, it is up for sale if you are interested, but it is very run down. Petrol was $1.95 a litre! Got a little so Maureen could check out the amenities. For some reason there was a huge mob of pink and grey and white cockatoos there. There seemed no food for them but they hung around like an old smell.

Lunch with the bitumen truck

Maureen on the pile of rocks

the pile of rocks

Pushed on from Manarra and headed for Capricorn. We stopped a few Kms short of Capricorn to have lunch and pulled into a parking bay right next to a pile of rocks, which Maureen had to climb. There was already a truck in the bay which we did not pay too much attention to when we pulled in, but we will in future as it was a bitumen carry truck with its burners going to keep it liquid, what a noise and a bit smelly! Drove into Capricorn and it has the most amazing truck stop I have seen. There is acres of bituminised parking places for the big rigs and piles of petrol pumps. It has been purposely built for road trains and there were dozens of trucks there. It is only 10 kms south of Newman but a popular staging point. 

We rolled into Newman and stopped at the Newman Caravan park where our friends Pete and Judy were and setup camp. We put up our new annex that our very good friend Grant Gadeke has made for us and it worked like a charm, already had a few asking about where we got it from. I will put a picture up soon.

River views

Went to the shops via our bike and gopher and saw part of the town. It really is setup for mine accommodation. Mile after mile of worker accommodation units. There is the part of town with real houses, but we did not see those today. There is also a really big Tourist Info place that has an old Haul Pack outside, going to go back tomoorow to have a closer look. 

 

Spent the evening with Pete and Judy and watched the final quarter of the Dockers/Carlton game – good win Dockers! How civilised is this roughing it on the road! Plane for tomorrow is to spend a couple of days in Newman sight seeing and restocking the caravan before we move into Karajini.