Tanami Track & the West Coast

Fortunately we woke this morning to a clear sky but with a cool breeze.
Packed up in Carnarvon and had a coffee down the Main Street before heading south to the Shark Bay World Heritage area, staying the night at Hamelin Station
This station is now a Bush Heritage station which is seeing it be returned to its natural state. They have rebuilt some of the original buildings and added toilets and showers and made it a great base to explore the area.
After setting up we headed to the Hamelin Pools to see the stromatolites, the old telegraph station and the shell block quarry.
The stromatolites are the reason for the World Heritage rating as this is one of only two sites in the world where they are know to still exist. They are microbes that grow and trap limestone molecules and turn this into stone therefore appearing to ‘grow’. They are believed to be 3 million years old.
Adjacent to this is the old telegraph station which transmitted messages up the coast.
The quarry is made up of millions of small shells that have solidified also with limestone and have been cut out in large blocks to build houses, etc in Denham and the surrounding area.
The day was complete when we found that the fire had been lit inside the camp kitchen with many of the campers heading there after dinner to warm themselves and chat.Read more