We had a longish and mostly uninteresting drive of 360 km from Fitzroy Crossing to Broome on Wednesday.
After an hour and a half, we pulled into one of the roadside stops for morning tea. As usual at this type of roadside stop, there were about nine or ten caravanners stopped there but one left just after we arrived so we were able to use a table. These places get very worn and dusty with all the traffic but they do offer a good off the road stopping place. We saw a large flock of galahs and a number of other birds that Ruth could recognize.
We stopped for lunch in Derby, which like Wyndam, is an old cattle exporting town. Derby is much bigger than Wyndam and looks much more prosperous. After lunch in the botanic gardens behind the library, we took a look at the wharf, and then at the water trough and prison tree at Myall Bore.
We reached our motel in Broome just as the sun was setting and after a short time to settle in, we took everyone down to the Chinatown area where there are a number of eatirg places for dinner.
On Thursday, we had time for looking around the sights of Broome.
We started by looking at the Moonlight Theatre, an outdoor movie house that has operated since the 1930’s. It is directly under the flight path from the airport so every plane that takes off or lands drowns out the sound for a moment or two.
For the rest of the day, we visited most of the other tourist attractions in town – pearling luggers, town beach, Gantheaume Point to see the dinosaur footprints and finally, the Japanese & Chinese cemeteries.
We ended the day by going to Cable Beach to see the famous Broome sunset. A few of us went on a camel ride along the beach.
Our final tour activity was a group dinner at Matso’s Brewery and Restaurant. From here, some people will take day tours and then leave Broome to arrive home over the next few days.
