2020 Aus Bacteria to Boats and Stromatolites to Sal Darago
Bacteria to Boats and Stromatolites to Sal Darago 26:24.42S 114:27.50E That evening we cooked in the outdoor kitchen near the tent instead of the big camp kitchen and I’m glad we did because we met numerous really interesting people from WA; one lady travelled the world’s universities in her role as an adviser to students on dissertation presentation and a chap had helped a friend sail from the UK to the Canaries. So lovely to chat with strangers in out of the way places and with shared interests. During the night I had to attend to the wants of nature and was ably assisted by the brilliant white path showing up as grey in contrast to the black rocks. On the way back the starlit sky was well defined, there being little in the way of light pollution, the tiny solar powered light stalks were not a problem just making the path whiter in places. Orion and the Southern Cross and a moving satellite, a nice collection to take back into my sleeping bag with me. Soon we would be viewing the heavens from Zoonie’s moving hull I thought. With the tent packed away we sat on our comfy folding chairs and sipped tea while the early morning sun warmed our backs. Then as we drove slowly through the campsite, past the lovely old restored homestead, we were rewarded with the sight of three roos, contentedly nibbling the local bushes and casting just a cursory, unafraid glance in our direction. Another place we were reluctant to leave. Compared to the thriving organic market garden area around Carnarvon where we saw crops of bananas, maize, greens, pumpkins, oranges and apples under the tender care of the Carnarvon Growers Association, the road to Denham can only be described as a mono feature landscape of low lying spinifex bushes growing over sedimentary rock, so that when we turned a final bend we were delighted to see Sal Darago moored off the small town and our meeting was definitely on. We had booked into the Denham Seaside Caravan Park for two nights and I was tickled to discover the plot the lady allocated us was ‘A’ in the camp area, nearest to the town, about ten paces from where Jeremy and Kathy had tied up their dinghy to a no parking sign and in direct visual sight of Sal Darago through the dunes!! We had a good chat and a valuable exchange of info with Jeremy and Kathy at a Hotel Bar in town. They reminded us to send off a form for entry into Cocos and Jeremy had been having a chat with Jerome in La Reunion when his phone was cut off but a stop over there sounded feasible. The four of us are assisted by the fact we are coming from WA where the interstate borders have been closed for months and there is no CV here. But if the WA government loses its current high court battle to keep its borders closed and CV starts to raise its ugly head here then that could change; so we are spurred on to leave sooner rather than later. We watched as our friends motored gently away back to their home and looked forward to seeing them the next day for coffee in the camp kitchen provided the weather didn’t change overnight. We could hardly stay at this prime seafront location without taking a walk along the beach to the distant headland, and a peep around the bend to see more of the same. Families were enjoying the clean and peaceful shoreline as the sun again promised a beautiful meeting with the horizon and we were warmed by our encounter with our English friends, the four of us so far away from home. A perfect day was rounded off when I beat Rob at Dominoes 3’s and 5’s which we played on our mattress inside the tent before spreading out the sleeping bags.
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