Saturday, August 14, 2010

Broome





































Can't believe number of people on the road luckily we had a booking got a great shady cemented site but was advised would need to move in the morning to a more long term site in the park this was fine, anyone without booking who arrived late - read after 930 am - ended up shoehorned into a site at the local gun club with portaloos only. Took off to explore Chinatown with high expectation but only thing open sat 2.00 was Coles and fish and chip shop so grabbed some Barramundi and headed off to cable beach to watch sun go down sipping wine. Kids went for explore along beach and found camel rides -preferable to the nudists who congregate in same part of beach. After strong negotiating they were booked on an 0800 ride. I reluctantly declined a ride to sleep in, with Gordon volunteering to watch from the beach with a coffee. Kids had a ball, connecting with a family who were also traveling. Their father was an emergency doctor, they had been traveling since Nov 09 with him working locum for a couple of weeks then they would spend 2-3 weeks making their way to his next posting. They usually live in a small town near Goulbourn, Jonah 10 lives for sax, soccer and scootering, Faith 12 loves to chat, torment her brother and read. Organized to catch up for dinner again at Cable beach. Filled in the rest of the day at the courthouse markets booking our flight to Cape Leveque checking out the local artists and the kids getting their first tattoo - just henna but they know they are cool. The enticer for the camel ride (competition is strong between the 3 camel groups) is a voucher to the camel store so bravely headed off for the con but to my surprise and the kids great delight Jack walked out with a floppy headed camel he named Shibabee and Morgan with a backpack which also carries a camel on it. She named her humpless camel Wun. Monday pampa and the kids headed off for a morning being tourists while we followed up on domestics buying me new boots replacing underwear which has just given up and generally getting sorted. Our next leg is possibly up for review as the Tanamai is closed due to rain, will continue to Bungle Bungles and make final decision Friday when new reports available. Have been surviving on cask wine as the glass tends to shatter but can't buy wine in more than 1 ltre volume, must have shirt and shoes on and drive through or catch taxi from bottle shop. Now have milk cartons of wine with there being 3 varieties - red, dry white, sweet white could be interesting. Gordon organized me my anniversary present early so I got to spend Tuesday with a professional photographer traveling around Broome area -read up to 100 Km away- with him giving direct instructions on how to take the shot from every perspective, camera settings, lighting, shooting angle, basically every detail. Not sure I will ever make his grade but definitely learnt heaps and saw some spectacular scenery.
One of the most interesting things was when each of the 8 of us on the day got to choose shots from his collection and he took us through settings, setup etc. Though several he admitted to being composition shots of up to 5 photos laid over each other - often taken at 3 am with flashes powered by car batteries or on film which costs. $80 a roll of 4 shots then a further $100 to have developed and digitized before he tweaks it. Bit of a let down but at least I'm not searching for the impossible to achieve shot. Gordon and kids spent the morning at the skate park waiting for the car to be fixed. The internal drivers door handle wasn't opening which was getting frustrating to say the least - a warranty issue this time happens often enough they keep spare parts in stock. In the afternoon they went on a paddle tour around the southern point of Cable Beach exploring caves avoiding sea snakes and learning to distinguish a rock popping out of the water from a turtle. All had a ball though Gordon is certain the only time the kids used their paddles was when they splashed someone. Wednesday our last day in Broome saw us up early again for our flight over Horizontal Falls and Cape Leveque. Followed the dusky green flat landscape north east out of Broome getting excited when we spotted a red slash of road through it or a blip in the horizon suggesting a hill, feeling rather ho hum when all of a sudden we were over an azure blue expanse falling from the coast. Beyond description all the colours you see and the enormity is for real. Didn't know what to photograph, did a few long slow passes over the waterfalls before meandering our way south west over pristine islands and beaches to Cape Leveque. The tide was rushing out so fast -40km/h that the still spot was of note rather than the rip Landed in Cape Leveque for swim and stroll round more breathtaking scenery which didn't stop till we landed in Broome that afternoon including a brief whale spotting. Back to the mundane in afternoon of sorting out and provisioning for our hop over to the Bungle Bungles.Out for a treat that night to the open air theatre where Bran Nue Day was showing. The kids getting very excited identifying the local locations checking out if their deck chair was one from the movies and looking out for the extras we had met. When you met people they didn't bother with a name just which scene they were in.

No comments:

Post a Comment