Jen, Stu and the boys, a year in the States 2013, 2014 6 months, 2015 4 months: Back in WA...down Memory Lane...Up North.....

We arrived in Perth, after nearly 6 months away, and were met by Jakeb, who took us back to his house and we had tea with Jakeb, Morgan and Joshuah and met Jakeb's girlfriend, Jordana. Once we were back home we caught up with Kristoffer and Asha, who had done a great job of looking after our house and Lua...

(along with Steph). The next night all my family got together for dinner and a big catchup which was great.
The good thing about being home and not having to work is that we can go and watch Jakeb and Joshuah play basketball in Perth midweek and drive home in the same night...and we have been doing just that!

We had been home for 2 weeks, and apart from all the boring paperwork that greets you when you have been away from home for a long time, (and buying a new hot water system and dishwasher) managed to squeeze a lot in in that time. We had an over night trip to Redgate, staying with Margaret and Kym, which was really lovely....

Morgan's 21'st birthday...twice!

watched Jakeb complete a Half Marathon...

revisited, through our number plates and maps, (and with a few drinks) all the US states and Canadian Provinces we had visited over the past 20 months.....

and celebrated Mal's 80th birthday....

After 2 weeks at home, the itchy feet started. I have always wanted to go back to some of the towns that we lived in in the North and check out our houses, schools etc that we had lived in and worked at. So we borrowed Kristoffer's 4WD, his swag, his Engel fridge.. the rest was ours... and off we headed. Lua looked like she wanted to come too!!

We popped in to see Joshuah and Morgan on our way out of Perth and the first stop was at a friend of Stu's from the Army, who lives just out of Gin Gin...he has a small farm there and we enjoyed having a look around....

and he gave us two duck eggs for tea that were huge AND delicious!!

We camped on the side of the road in a parking bay...our first night...and slept in the back of the car...big mistake and one we didn't make again!

...but we were sooo close to the red dirt, blue skies of the North!

Next morning we stopped in at the Pinnacles.....an interesting landscape of limestone formations in Nambung National Park, and a place I am embarrassed to say neither of us had visited before...it only took me 50 years, but I got there!

We followed the Indian Ocean Drive up the coast, stopping in at Lancelin, Cervantes, Jurien Bay and other small coastal communities. The coastline was refreshing, picturesque, lovely....and we were into the warm weather!

That night we drove to Geraldton and stayed with our old Meekatharra friends, who we have known for nearly 30 years.... Graham and Karen. It's always a laugh catching up with them and very comfortable.
The next day we headed to Carnarvon, stopping on the side of the road for lunch....lots of memories of doing that in the many, many trips we did over the years!

.....camping at a lovely secluded beachsite...no mozzies, just Stu and I....

We headed into Carnarvon the next day. I worked here as a nurse in 1985 for 9 months before we were married, and have never really taken the time to check it out since. Jordan (89) and Jakeb (91) were both born here while we were at Gascoyne Junction, and we bought Jordan to the hospital here after he died in 1990, so a lot of happy and sad memories in this hospital.
Carnarvon has changed so much...it looks great now, despite having to pay $5 to walk onto the One Mile Jetty (we didn't...as a matter of principle)!!

and we caught up with our old Meekatharra/Tom Price/Australind/Windy Harbour/North American friends Ric and Jen's kids, Jesslyn and Zane who are both living in Carnarvon, which was really nice.

We made our way out to Gascoyne Junction..a tiny town in the Shire of Upper Gascoyne, nearly 200kms east of Carnarvon. We spent 3 years there 1989-91, which was Stuart's first school as Principal...and the Junction is where Jordan died, on April 5, 1990. So it is a place of many memories for us and we hadn't been back since we left 23 years ago. On our way we stopped at Rocky Pool, a permanent water hole, for a quick swim and took in the beautiful colours.

We got to the Junction late afternoon after travelling the 169 kms on a bitumen road. How good was that!! The road used to be gravel and would get closed during the Wet, so you would be stuck there until the Shire reopened it. This road was fantastic...still lots of feral goats around and cattle....not so many roos, but we did see some emus.

In 2010, floods came through and destroyed the pub which used to be on the main road through to Meekatharra. With money from Royalties for Regions, a brand new roadhouse/pub/caravan park has been built...this time up the hill from the Gascoyne River

...and it was opened a few months ago. It was fantastic...lacking a little "character", but that is something that takes time..and the facilities were great.
We walked through the town...checked out the school, nothing is left of the school we worked in, although it is on the same site and still had the beautiful trees and lawn,

marveled at the grassed oval that used to be a red dirt oval, were gobsmacked by the new homes that had been built next to our old place and sucked in the gorgeous colours of the land as the sun went down....

The next morning we stopped in at the Shire and caught up with Sue and Bruce. Bruce was the CEO before we got there in 1989 and he was back relieving for a few months. Although we were never at the Junction at the same time, he did play polocrosse with Stu at carnivals and we all knew the same people, so it was a great catchup.
We checked out the Community Centre (which wasn't there when we lived there) and found a book on the history of the District, and Stuart had a mention in it....

Next stop was the school where we were met by a welcoming "Hi Y'all!!"It was Theona, who had worked at the school when we were there, and was now gardening there. To see a familiar face was fantastic and she showed us around the school, had a coffee with us and made us feel so welcome.

She knew the lady who was now living in our old house and we were able to have a look in the house...which was very emotional for me....as Jordan had died there...but also very happily nostalgic! So many memories came flooding back...it was amazing! Stu's memory was shooting at a crow from our bedroom window!!

We hadn't been out to the Kennedy Ranges in probably 25 years, so decided to head out there....a dusty, bouncy gravel road.....

(which was hard work in Kristoffer's car.....)

towards an impressive, familiar landscape....

before making making our way back via the Junction and spending the night at Rocky Pool....

The next morning we headed out to Quobba and the Blowholes...where I used to go on my days off from nursing.....it had changed a bit too...loads more people, but still a spectacular coastline.

and then we went snorkelling here.....

We drove North, turning off at Minilya Roadhouse, up towards Coral Bay. There is no free camping on Exmouth Peninsula so we had to stay at the Coral Bay Caravan Park, with a cast of thousands, no power, nice grass...but a bloody ripoff at $36! We did have a nice hot shower and it was good to have grass instead of dirt under our feet...and Coral Bay is really beautiful.

Then on to Exmouth where we lived in 1988 and where Kristoffer was a newborn. This is our first house in Exmouth...

and our second house in Exmouth.....

We drove out to Cape Range NP, where we spent 2 nights camping

and exploring/snorkelling Ningaloo Marine Park.....it is so beautiful and we think better than the Great Barrier Reef in that you can snorkel off the beach, instead of hours on a boat to get there. There was hardly anyone there, warm days, blue skies, clear water....lovely.

We also got to see some of our beautiful West Australian flora......

and some of our uniquely Australian animals.....

and we loved seeing the huge anthills again.....

When we left the Park, we stopped at Stu's favourite fishing spot back in 1988...he cast a few lures, with no luck....although there were a few whales out the back!

and we took in the view from Vlaming Head Lighthouse....

At this stage of the blog I'd like to thank the Pilbara Regiment for hot showers, a washing machine, a clothesline ice and water....all very much appreciated after a few days without a decent shower and dirty clothes.
We did our grocery shop....$4.50 for a loaf of bread????? and while buying some beer, Stu ran into his gardener from North Tom Price PS days...Ron, who told us which classroom to go into to see my mate Chris from NTPPS and Colleen, Ron's wife. We surprised them at school and spent an hour catching up...Chris hadn't changed a bit and it was lovely to see her.
We left Exmouth quite late in the afternoon and crossed the Exmouth Gulf driving east, towards Tom Price. We paid close to $2 a litre for diesel at Nanutarra Roadhouse and ended up camping the night at a roadside parking bay....a beautiful evening and watching the stars through the roof of the tent is pretty nice...despite the cockatoos and cattle calling out to each other most of the night! And our solar shower bag hanging off a tree did the trick to freshen up!

The next morning we got up early as we had a big driving day ahead of us...approaching Tom Price mid morning.....

We are so comfortable in this landscape and I think we'd find it pretty easy to settle back into life in the North West again....even the red dirt!

We drove past our old house where we lived for 2001, 2002 and 2003....and it looked great....uninhabited, so really tidy...

and we assumed noone was living in it as Stu leaned over the back fence and took photos of the backyard....our one and only home with a proper swimming pool! Our saving grace!

Next stop was the school where Stu was Principal for 3 yrs and I worked in the Library. We had a great time working at that school...fantastic staff....lots of fun....a great place to work. The school looked as good as ever, and there were still signs of some of the changes Stu had made while there.

We drove through the town...so many changes...which were great, but the drive-in where we would take the kids on a Saturday night and where we had our end of year school concerts was just the same...what a setting to watch movies!

and our regular Friday night was spent at the oval playing/watching touch rugby, with views of Mt Nameless in the distance.....fantastic nights!

Tom Price was one of our favourite places to live. A great place to raise the boys, terrific community, fantastic school...and we had our own swimming pool!!
After leaving Tom Price we went in to Karijini NP...to check out Fortescue Falls....

Circular Pool....

and the gorge....

Despite being the middle of the day, the colours were still nice, and I loved the colour of the road...both sides were bitumen, but the red side was from coming off the gravel road!

We left Karijini and made our way to Newman....

where we stayed overnight with our friends Lynn and Dave....we go back a long way, but mainly when we were at Wankatjungka RCS (in the 90's) and they were at Muludja RCS in the Kimberley....our kids were friends and we would travel 100's of kms to see each other for a few hours!
Leaving Newman, we fuelled up at Capricorn Roadhouse.....where all the big roadtrains were lined up...an impressive sight!.

as were the huge mining vehicles, taking up most of the road, bringing machinery up to the minesites....

As we travelled further south, the wind started to pick up. We were getting reports of big storms in Perth, and we were obviously getting the winds from those....we stopped for lunch under a bridge, just to get out of the wind...

and as we got closer to Meekatharra the wind and dust was phenomenal...you could hardly see cars and roadtrains in front of you....and it was so disappointing to drive past our first home together...our marital home...and see it like this....

We had looked after it so well when we lived there in 1986/87 so it was very sad to see it in such disrepair. We drove past the hospital where I used to work....

and the house where Stu used to live before we were married....

We loved our time in Meekatharra, but I don't think we'd want to live there now. The wind and dust didn't stop as we drove through Cue...a beautiful old gold mining town 650 kms northeast of Perth.

As it started to get dark we pulled into an off road parking area in the bush and set up camp for our last night on the road...the wind and (now) rain were on us, but we managed to cook tea and be in the shelter of our tent in 1/2 hr....