Day 97-101 Barn Hill Station – Broome 7th July - 12th July

It was getting close to school holidays in WA and I rang up some of the camping spots in Broome which stated that they were full for the next month for camper-trailers! Luckily, Broome opens up a couple of overflow caravan parks during the holiday season – which allowed us to stay in Broome at a good price for an extended period. I believe that there is some resentment from official caravan parks on these overflow parks but without them, Broome would loose out on a large number of tourists that would otherwise bypass it with their dollars. We stayed at the Pistol Club which had large, shady spots and I'd certainly recommend it – with helpful hosts Derek & Charlie and their partners.

Broome certainly exceeded our expectations. We initially planned to only spend a couple of days here but kept extending our stay and ended up staying five nights. It was full of great places to visit and a great place to chill...and then chill some more. We set up the annex and made our home. 

We started our time there with a visit to Cable Beach in the evening. We had sparkling red wine (kids had sparkling grape juice), while we watched the sun set, with the 4WD on on the beach with camels striding by.

Biggle having a drink

We went twice to Sun Cinema's the first to watch Cars 2 in the open air cinema sitting outside in the balmy evening on deck chairs. You get interrupted a couple of times by overhead planes as its situated quite close to the airport – but it only adds to the experience! On our second visit we went to the air-conditioned cinemas and watched Transformers 3 – which was the highlight of Adam's day. He could barely contain himself!

Cars 2!

Deck chair seating

Waiting for the show to start!

Matzo's Brewery had great boutique beer. I took the kids there for lunch while Robyn went shopping. We went again after our last sunset at Broome for a couple of quiet ones. Robyn particularly enjoyed the Mango Beer - no surprise there!!

Kids all behaving themselves

China Town has lots of shops!

We visited the Deep Water Port - apparently an excellent place to fish due to the large tidal movement in Broome.

 We visited Reddell Beach - which has some amazing rock formations exposed at low tide.

We went searching for dinosaur footprints  at Gantheaume Point where you can also see the old lighthouse and a swimming pool made by the lighthouse keeper for his arthritic wife.

Anastasia's Pool

We swam at Cable Beach – an amazing beach for swimming – beautiful, clean, soft, white sand with a gentle, warm, turquoise blue sea. We spent a few hours catching waves in. The kids kept screaming big wave! big wave! and did their best to catch the wave in.

The Broome Historical Society Museum had a great historical display on the Pearl Farming industry at Broome. The Relations Exhibition Old Convent showed the impact that the Sisters of John of God had on the local area and its indigenous population. 

Our final night in Broome and it was time to say goodbye with with a yet another spectacular sunset.