We spent a couple of nights at Onslow, a small town on the south Pilbara coast. Apart from yet another salt mine (the third place in a row we have been at with a salt industry - perhaps the endless clean seawater and sunshine have something to do with it), Onslow's main industry is as a support base for some of the offshore oil rigs, plus a bit of fishing. The caravan park was right on the beach, just out of the right hand side of the war memorial picture at left. However, we seem to be outrunning Spring on our way South, and while we are still wearing shorts during the day, it is definitely not swimming weather.Exmouth is at the southern edge of the Pilbara and the northern tip of North West Cape. The town was founded as late as 1967 to support the US naval communications base built in the same year. It now has a big tourist industry, thanks mainly to the coral reef that stretches along the coast (Ningaloo Reef), attracting divers and snorkellers, as well as just beach lovers.
The water is such a brilliant turquoise blue that it almost looks fake, but we can assure you that the beach photo below is a faithful rendition of real life. Somehow it is warmer here than it was at Onslow, although we had a 400km journey to get here that was because of having to swing all the way under the Exmouth Gulf, in reality the towns are on pretty well the same latitude and only about 100km apart. However, we have had some bad winds while here, the first night we had to get up at 4:30 am to put up the caravan awning, in fear that it would take off in the gale (well, John had to get up and do it, while Wendy supervised from under the doona).
The water is such a brilliant turquoise blue that it almost looks fake, but we can assure you that the beach photo below is a faithful rendition of real life. Somehow it is warmer here than it was at Onslow, although we had a 400km journey to get here that was because of having to swing all the way under the Exmouth Gulf, in reality the towns are on pretty well the same latitude and only about 100km apart. However, we have had some bad winds while here, the first night we had to get up at 4:30 am to put up the caravan awning, in fear that it would take off in the gale (well, John had to get up and do it, while Wendy supervised from under the doona).As usual, we haven't ventured into the water here, but we did go for a stroll along the beach. We also did some good walks in Cape Range National Park, which covers the western half of the cape. Most of the action in the park is on the western side where all the beaches are, but the eastern half has some spectacular canyon views. The longest walk we did was 8km, and as usual we virtually had it to ourselves. The views were stunning, well worth the rock scrambles.
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