As we left Exmouth the landscape made a gradual change to a much more interesting scene. Slowly, gone was the flat, low shrubby country and it was replaced by many more beautiful gum lined waterways, many of which must have been underwater rivers as there was not much actual water about, and rolling hills and iron ridges of various size and colour. The spinifex grasses were all in seed, which made for some interesting viewing; a lot of the hills we drove passed looked like you were watching a 3D movie without 3D glasses on – it really was quite odd; all a bit shimmery.
As we got closer to Paraburdoo we even drove through a few little rain storms, quite a novelty to use the windscreen wipers for the first time in quite a while.
We all travelled reasonably well, I’m still very thankful for all the audio books that are keeping everyone quietly entertained on the longer journeys – though we do need to break it up with some tunes every now and then to keep the driver sane!
Paraburdoo probably isn’t on many people’s “places to see” list while travelling this country, but my closest male cousin works at the mines there, and we hadn’t caught up for a few years, so a brilliant opportunity to see some different country and catch up with some wonderful people.
Growing up in central New South Wales I had one set of cousins who lived about 1/2 an hour away, while my other cousins all lived in Queensland. The close cousins were my Mum’s Sister’s children, and I think there is a special bond between us all. Many of my childhood memories involve these cousins, and I have thoroughly enjoyed getting to know them again as adults – as a child, because I was the youngest of the NSW cousin tribe, I sort of unintentionally got left out of a lot of activities (or maybe it was intentional as I was a pain in the arse…) so to reconnect at different times with these guys has been lovely. The elder of these cousins, Mrs Beautiful Chickens, lives near Brisbane, and while we lived in Brisbane a few years ago I saw a lot of her and we became friends as much as cousins, and although her brother Mr Mine (the one at Paraburdoo) was much closer in age to me, I definitely had lost contact with him a bit, and was really looking forward to catching up again.
Not to mention the chance to catch up with his lovely wife, Mrs Mine, again, and to see/meet their children. We were able to time our visit to coincide with Mr Mine’s rostered days off, allowing quite a few days to hang out and do stuff together. Unfortunately Mrs Mine still had to work, but we had the weekend and the evenings together.
Arriving with bag loads of washing and having not had a shower for nearly a week, though we had been swimming in the ocean everyday, is an interesting way to enter a house, but these people are so lovely that I honestly don’t think they could have cared less.
Some more lovely rain overnight, making me very thankful that we were all happily packed into a house, especially one with air-conditioning, as although the rain cooled things down, it was still pretty hot.
The 2nd cousins eating pizza
Saturday we split camp, with the boys heading to the gun club to shoot some stuff, and the girls (+ 2year old Mop) went to the Paraburdoo library and then the milkbar for a treat supplied by Mrs Mine.
The kids having a Paraburdoo treat
The libraries in Western Australia really are great, taken that I have already established my love of libraries, but they really are welcome little havens. The Paraburdoo library was filled with very new looking books and dvds and everything was neat, tidy and air conditioned – which out there is totally essential!
Paraburdoo is a mining town that was established when the mine was first started in the 1970’s or sometime. The majority of the houses in town are owned by the mining company (Rio Tinto), and rented by the minors, with a few other businesses in town keeping the place going, such as a supermarket, bottle-o, service station, doctor surgery, mobile dentist, and visiting vet van. Most people in the town wear High-Vis clothes and work shifts and rosters at the mine.
Saturday afternoon saw the men disappear into Mr Mine’s “Man Cave” (which as he is a committed member to the gun club up there is quite an exciting place to be) to clean rifles and talk about bullets and stuff, while the kids spent the afternoon in and around the pool.
Mr and Mrs Mine have two children. Banana has just turned four, so our girls loved hanging out in her room playing dress ups and making up loads of games around that (the favoured being Rupunzel, which consisted of tying a long piece of any coloured material around your head and pretending it was hair).
Banana, HGB and MMB dressed up as Rapunzel (though they look like shepherds)
Their two and a bit year old son I have dubbed Mop, as he sports the same mop-like haircut that I had as a child. Mop is a total live wire and I’ve never seen a kid his age, like him in the pool. He is fearless and although his swimming style is far from regular, he manages to get everywhere he wanted to go, even if at times we all thought he was about to drown!
Mop and AHB underwater
As always, I think the kids all formed a closer bond with each other than they did with the adults, which is really how it should be. Though I really did enjoy watching them all together and having little interactions with both of my first cousins once removed, I don’t think I rated anywhere nearly as highly as the kids on the “fun scale”, especially MMB who seemed a very big hit, especially with Mop.
The Mine’s also have a beautiful dog, who prior to them having children we were all a little worried about how she would adjust to life not as the only child as she is part Rhodesian Ridgeback, and can be rather protective. She has grown into the most beautiful family dog though, and although her personal space was probably being encroached fairly often, she coped very well with the influx in child numbers, and seemed to love the extra attention, especially that given by AHB.
During our communications prior to arriving at Paraburdoo, Mr Mine had offered to take us on a tour of the Paraburdoo Mine. The lovely Mrs Mine had offered to look after the kids for us, so He and I donned our High-Vis mine gear on Sunday morning and headed off with Mr Mine for a tour.
Mr Mine is a very calm and laid back kind of guy, always has been, and I really loved seeing him in his professional environment. Mr Mine is really well suited to his job, and his knowledge of the whole mine history and overall scope of the mine was very interesting. This may be one of those times when the pictures are worth more than the words, but the one thing the pictures don’t show is just how HUGE the whole thing is. Everything there looks the same as mini versions, but totally on steroids, which I think you lose a bit in the photos, but here you go:
Him and me with Mr Mine before our mine tour
Him and me at the graveyard
Him and me at the graveyard again
Tour with Mr Mine
Paraburdoo Mine
What it’s all about – Iron ore
The mine
Big digger and truck
Big digger
Quick explanation of a couple of things, the graveyard is where the machines that have broken down completely go, where they are then used for spare parts, or one day brought back into service if it is deemed financially viable, or left forever. These are the only vehicles you can get close too, as all the ones that are working really are very dangerous. When up in one of the big trucks, there is something like a forty metre blind spot in front of them, and they are enormous, so would squash a person without even noticing. The rest are photos taken of the numerous mines at the site from varying vantage points. The mining up here is different to lots of places as they are pulling down mountains, not digging big holes, to get the iron ore.
That afternoon we headed back to their home for a party that HGB had organised during one of her english units of school work. Good excuse to make a cake, eat loads of lollies, dress up and have a good time! The kids got to ice and decorate biscuits, which was good fun, the only issue was when Mop decided to swallow a snake lolly without chewing it properly, but once it was retrieved all was ok.
MMB with her biscuit
During the week we decided to take a day trip to Karijini National Park. We had originally thought that we would go and camp there after being at Paraburdoo, but the reality was that it is still so hot up here that the walks through the national park would become sweat treks, and the sleeping would be near impossible due to the heat. We thought a day trip to check it out would help us make the decision whether camping there would be suitable or not.
Mr Mine brought the two kids along with us and took us to some lovely spots in Karijini. It really is amazing countryside, very Albert Namatjera (an Aboriginal artist who painted amazing Australian Landscapes). The view was ever changing depending on the light. The rocks could look so very red, then fade away to brown. I had all kinds of wonderful words flowing through my head at the time, but they are all hiding from me now.
Amazing country. You drive along, and all of a sudden in the distance these massive red cracks open up, huge gorges flowing through the land.
Looking into the gorge
Another shot of the gorge
A gorge at Karijini
Swimming at Karijini
Swimming at Karijini
We had a lovely time, the swim was very welcome, and it did confirm that camping at Karijini at this time of the year really wasn’t going to be our best option. We went back to Paraburdoo, via Tom Price (a nearby mining town) for an ice cream and a few supplies.
The rest of the week passed in a comfortable manner, very relaxed and easy going. The kids and I went to the library a couple of times to do a bit of work. The kids swam heaps, played heaps and generally enjoyed Paraburdoo.
It was hard to believe that an entire week went by while we were there. The Pilbura lifestyle is definitely not for everyone, but there are worse places to be. Summer must be incredibly hot, and how people lived there without air conditioning I don’t know, but it is very well cooled down now, making it very pleasant.
I loved catching up with Mr and Mrs Mine, seeing Banana again and meeting Mop. Such a brilliant family. Goodness knows when we’ll next get our paths to cross, but I hope the time before drinks is not as long as the last one.
All of us with Mr and Mrs Mine, Banana and Mop
It is still very hot up here (and I do realise this post has flipped between past and present tense the entire way… sorry about that!) but we are hoping that the worst of the hot and wet has passed and our trip north, and then the beginning of the eastern journey is now possible.
Life is an ever changing event…
Sunset at Paraburdoo
Backus Adventures 