62-63 Karijini national park

Jasper: Karijini National Park was awesome. First the camping ground had no power or water which made it like real camping. Then we went to a few amazing lookouts (Oxer Lookout was the best) and two awesome waterholes. The first was Fortesque Falls which had a steep walk down then a waterfall that was not that powerfull but beautiful. Then we went to the second water hole which is called Circular Pool which had an even steeper walk and a freezing pool. On the way back Em hurt her wrist really badly. Also I made a sling shot and we all got junior ranger patches for answering all these questions about protecting national parks.

Kate: We'd heard so much about Karijini NP from everyone we had met on our trip.  For once, their raves lived up to reality!!  The red of the Pilbara region is redder than anywhere we have been.  Really deep, deep red and sometimes looking purple.  We think this is due to the iron ore content of the rocks around here?  Anyway, the NP is relatively small, accessible but with the deepest gorges.  Karijini is apparently the adventure NP where you can abseil, rockclimb etc.  Jasper kept looking over edges and scaring us by saying he'd love to abseil down there!!  The kids had complained about seeing "more" gorges and waterholes but we were all blown away by how different and beautiful they were here.  The gorges all have multicoloured little layers which look like lasagne.  Unfortunately we are in a cold snap (not as cold as you in Melbourne!!) where the nights have dropped to 0 degrees and the days only 17 degrees.  So swimming was only an option chosen by J & E!

I loved camping way out bush.  Steve, on the othere hand, was pretty uncomfortable and seriously out of his comfort zone.  I get the fact he feels protective of all of us.  Two nights was enough and we were not sure how long the gas was going to last to keep the fridge going.  Going without showers has become easy peasy now.  We all smell and look the same!!!

Steve: The BHP port tour was sensational, big, massive investment. Everything in the mining world is talked about in billions.

BHP Billiton - Port Hedland

Full moon - Karijini NP

Oxer Lookout (junction of 4 gorges)

Knox Lookout - a long way down to the bottom

Who's that good looking bloke?

Joffer Gorge

Fortesque Falls

Circular Pool

Maddy asleep on the warm rocks

Lasagne layers of rock at Karijini