Daily Archives: 18/04/2026

Broome

John had celebrated his 81st birthday at Wooramel on the first day of our trip. It was a lovely, relaxing day. A few messages from family managed to come through on his phone although he couldn’t reply. I mentioned to our neighbour, Tom, in the next caravan that it was John’s birthday and he told his friends so all day people were wishing him a Happy Birthday!

John has always suffered with a sore back but it became increasingly sore over the next few days. When he woke at Stanley Rest Area he also had very bad vertigo. It was fortuitous that our next stop was going to be in Broome. Friends have a block in a caravan park there and kindly told us we were welcome to park our van there. It would be a good place for John to take it easy and recover. So I drove the three hours or so towards Broome.

Broome Vacation Village Caravan Park is very nice and close to everything, particularly Broome Golf Club much to John’s delight. We parked the van and got settled in. Before dinner, we took a drive to the golf club for a drink. I hadn’t been before and was very impressed with the buildings and the stunning views.

The following morning, John felt slightly better so we went out exploring. We drove to Chinatown and mosied around the lovely shops with all their colourful goods. After coffee, I suggested to John that he have a Thai massage and made enquiries. He was feeling worse and struggling to walk. However, he refused. But he did book an 18 hole round of golf for the next day!

Before returning to the van, we went out to Cable Beach and walked up to the restaurant. It was lovely sitting on the verandah overlooking the beach. We had a very nice, simple lunch and a drink. We really felt like we were on holiday.

Unfortunately, John’s bad back and vertigo worsened. So much so that golf was cancelled.

Camping off grid

We left our camp at South Hedland and stopped in town for fuel and supplies. Then headed north in the direction of Broome. We had no plans to drive that far, it was about 630kms. Instead we thought we’d free camp somewhere near Sandfire Roadhouse.We love to camp off grid but had been a bit wary because of our power issue. As it turned out, the change of fuses at Wooramel had fixed the problem.

The drive was easy, a fairly straight, flat and quiet road, the surrounding countryside was also very flat. We pulled in at Sandfire Roadhouse to refuel. It was very hot being the middle of the day, and we hoped to find a camping spot with shade. So we kept going.

It was close to 3pm when we arrived at the Stanley Rest Area. As we drove in, we remembered having stayed there before. The area allowed overnight camping, had shade and drop toilets. There was space for about twenty caravans but we were the only ones there.It was a perfect evening.

John made burgers and we had them with a glass of wine while watching the sun set and the sky turn various shades of orange and red. It was beautiful. And so quiet.One of my favourite things to do is sit in the dark and look at the stars. Being so far away from any towns, the stars were prolific and magnificent.

John retired to bed but I couldn’t bring myself to leave. The temperature was perfect, there was not a breath of wind and there were so many stars in the sky as well as a couple of satellites. It was bliss. Eventually though, the mosquitoes started to bite and I had to drag myself to bed. Earlier in the evening there had been hundreds of dragonflies which had kept the mossies away. But even they had gone to bed.

There’s nothing like sleeping in total silence in the pitch black.