Hamelin Pool and their Stromatolites

We went back to Carnarvon to pick up Lou's school pack for the term. This is all the material for distance school needed - worksheets for the homework, information sheets, and a couple of mags and books to read, then some skipping rope or art supplies etc. Now all we have to do is pull our the blue folder for the fortnight, read the lesson, do the exercises and submit by Friday each week. The feedback from the teachers is thorough and encouraging. Their school report for end of term is very succinct, just that it's completed satisfactorily.

We also restock up on food in town. A visit to the ice cream and fruit place is mandatory here. We try Sapote ice cream, a choc covered banana, mango ice cream, a choc covered mango ice cream on paddle pop sticks, plus some dried fruit.

Stayed in a caravan with a shipping container style room extension with en suite. It was totally clean and awesome. Got the fly rip repaired by the canvas man and lady, but one pole is bent so we're not looking good to limp the tent home. It's like having a rip or a bent rod in an umbrella.

Left: the Stromatolites, living fossils.

We're in Hamelin pool outback stay. Immaculate facilities here. The buildings are well maintained, tiled walkways, crushed gravel sand drive areas, neat gardens, even though it's a semi arid area. After the squalor of Red Bluff, everything seems 5 star.

Visited Stromatolites. They live in water. They are over 3 billion years old - about 3/4 of the time that earth has existed. The discovery of these is like finding a living fossil, one that is about ten times older than dinosaurs.

Without those, life as we know it could not have evolved, ie humans would not be here. Before these guys, the earth had a CO2 atmosphere, less than 1 percent oxygene. They take CO2 and make oxygen, making all life now on earth possible. When oxygen was first introduced into the atmosphere, the skies turned blue. it caused a mass extinction for other microbes, as they breathed carbon dioxide. It took billions of years, billenia!, for these microbes to photosynthesise enough exygene to change the atmosphere from 1 percent to the 20 percent we have today. They dominate fossil records for 80% of earth's history.

They are a whole community of microbes, like a miniature rainforest eco system. The grab some small rock particles, like sand I suppose, knit it together, thus providing a place for other microbes. Each produces stuff that others can use. They are covered by slime, against the heat and to hold water, nutrients etc. Once they link up, they form layers, a mat of microbes. When they put rock down, they are then called Stromatolites.

Of the few Stromatolite assemblages, Hamelin Pool is the biggest and the most diverse. The microbes vary according to whether they need to survive being out of water at low tide, and how deep in the water in other places. "The sheer number of stromatolites at Hamelin is mind blowing, and then you see all sorts of shapes and sizes as you move around the pool" says Erica Suosaari, geologist. 

Hamelin Pool has limited water flow. With evaporation, the water is twice as salty as the sea, limiting what would grow and live there, meaning the competition in here is limited, and the microbes can thrive. Amazin sh11t. Are these guys required for alien life? Seeing rock formations indicating these microbes would be evidence of primitive life.

Red Bluff Quobba Station

Red Bluff is a spectacular little bay with a wide sandy beach. The land rises slowly up to a small cliff and the plateau.

Right: walking at Gnaraloo. Some good snorkelling, coral and tonnes of fish here.

An afternoon game of Cluedo in the cafe. The smoothies were delicious. Ma and Marie had a tea.

The old faithful travellers; I'm under pressure to let them go.

The waves are awesome. The rocks are not. Ollie got stuck on a wave and cut his arm. We both got sand rash in the dumpers. Caught some great rides.

Red Bluff says it is a wildlife sanctuary. The guy keeps a cat that likes to sleep all day and hunt all night. There are wild looking sheep with tails and goats. Huts, camping, roads and toilets are scattered across the sanctuary at Red Bluff.

Pizza night: good pizzas, had a chat to some of the visitors: a couple from Exmouth, can't remember who else. A lot of them are repeat stayers, many with their own caravans.

Right: the second surf shack we stayed in.

Stayed in a surf shack the first night. It's spacious but dirty. The mattresses are older, more ripped and more dank than I'd hoped for but it's out of the wind.

The second shack is relatively clean, dusty, sand on dank ripped mattresses again, but an amazing view of the beach. We've got a short path straight onto the beach. There is a sign up to not graffiti or urinate here so management must come down to see the place occasionally.

This is more like a serious holiday for the boys. We went for two or three swims per day.

The next 2 nights we stayed in our tent, as shacks were unavailable, next to the shelter of a tree with our own pit toilet. Privacy in the toilet is a few palm branches. Opening the lid brings a swarm of flies. The sanctuary provides wood chips and insecticide to try to master this.

The wind is non stop but got strong. Got sand blasted on the beach, gusts of dust walking, conversation was difficult. Sitting next to tent or walking around was miserable. At the office there is a sign saying no refunds given for early departure. We upgraded to a surf shack again, not in time to save the tent which got a decent rip in the corner.

The bluff out to the left with all the fossils and the surf break.

The swell is just non stop.

 A walk out past the lefthand point shows limestone with its distinctive surface that looks like rain splashing on mud. Dotted everywhere, there are what looks like old reef, still recognisable, and whole shells. Some of the stones crunching underfoot on the path are whole chunks of fossilised reef.

Left: A wipe out. Deliberate? Seems like a nice wave.

Right: our second surf shack

Below: fossilised coral

Under it all is a massive layer of conglomerate rock and limestone chockers full of fossilised shells and coral. As the limestone reefs of the Kimberleys, and the limestone at Katherine NT, are Devonian era, I'm guessing these are 350 million years old also.

Quobba blowholes

Rolled up to the Quobba blowholes, spectacular views of the coast here. 

Carnarvon

Carnarvon is a beautiful little town. Parts look quite old worldly charming with a section of footpath park and garden outside some small shops. 

The foreshore is well terraced, green, wide footpath, great kids play area. As per all towns, some of the modern buildings are as ugly as a cardboard box. Actually even cardboard boxes would be a big improvement if scaled up and placed side by side. They would not be garishly coloured nor have that incongruous modern ugly feel.

Went to the space museum. What a surprise! 

Tonnes of displays on rockets, the planets, full scale mock up of an Apollo and Gemini command modules.

We sat in the Apollo one for a simulated lift off, a replay of the first moon mission.

In the other section, you had to land the space shuttle, play Space Invaders, Galaga, Asteroids, Defenders. One table had a pile of sand with a contour map projected onto it. As you move the sand, the map followed. The gullies formed lakes. As you moved the sand the water would flow out or in. Another lets you get yourself onto a photo of the moon.

Ningaloo Reef, Cape Range National Park

Cape Range NP includes Ningaloo Reef marine reservation. 

You snorkel at the beach. You go a couple of metres into the water. There is coral and tonnes of fish of all kinds. We saw a sting ray bury itself in the sand. Marie saw a turtle. We don't know anywhere else where you can swim into a coral reef and see the kinds of fish and sea creatures. Spectacular beautiful, constantly a bit windy. 

The birds were friendly, then turned evil - one bit Ollie, so we stopped feeding them. 

We stayed at the Kurrajong campground with Latitia and Jackson. We met them one day in the office looking for any spare space. We offered that they could stay in ours, as it's huge. The lady in the shop said up to 6 is ok, so they paid for 2 more people, and we totalled 6 people.

Getting into the back of the car is a pain, but not if you're just the right size to climb on top of the tyre.

A nice little walk in Yardie Creek in Cape Range.

On the way down south, we stopped in at Coral Bay. Lots of coral and fish, a bit crowded. It's hard to avoid people while snorkelling.

Giralia Station on the Exmouth Gulf

Today we're in Giralia for some accidental luxury and a break from tent living, which the boys were very excited about.

We stayed in "The Cottage" which is really a spacious two bedroom house with a grassy yard that would be worth 2 million in Sydney. Sitting on the veranda is sheer luxury. The sunset with the old windmill, farming sheds, gear etc is magic.

It had a great little pool. Even the old shearer's shed was converted into a cinema with two giant speakers, a projector and a massive sheet as a white screen. The beach at Exmouth Gulf is a half hours easy drive. Here's some words from Louis, since he had to write a journal for school:

I woke up in a real bed instead of a tent. I was calling for Mum. It was dark and scary. My calling woke Ollie up. He kept on telling me to be quiet. Mum eventually came. I eventually went to sleep. Then I woke up in a real bed instead of a tent. Had breakfast.

Towards noon we went on a driving trip to the beach [Exmouth Gulf]. Me and my parents went on a walk. Ollie didn’t come. When we were getting close, I realised it would be a good idea to cut across the channel than walking all the way around. We didn’t have any problems at all until we were on the actual island. Then I tripped. I looked behind me to try to find out what I tripped on.

And I saw oysters. When I looked down at my toe, it was bleeding. We washed it off at a pool. The moment we did that it stopped bleeding. But it was still cut. We started heading back because of my toe. Then my sliders kept on getting stuck in the mud, and I had to take them off. Towards the end, we found a pool to wash off our feet, and sliders. I noticed that the cut on my toe had healed up and there was no evidence apart from a white line that it was ever there.

For the afternoon, we popped into their pool, which looks like it's in their backyard. Awesome for a cool off. In the evening, we went to the "Giralia Cinema". We watched a movie called Red Dog - True Blue. There were four funny scenes. One was when he said it landing in the Pilbara was awesome to his kid, but in reality he was saying “This is stupid!!” Then there was a horse that thought he was a bull. He said “What’s with the horse?” Then his grandfather said that he got struck by lightning. The funny bit was seeing the horse get struck by lightning. The third one was when he got a motorbike for his birthday. His son asked “Did you know how to ride a motorbike?” He said “Of course I did” The flashback showed him going “ahhhh” then crashing jumping off a ramp. Later they were playing a game with the dog. He said, no cheating this time, and hid it under a bucket. When the dog went to get it, because he was watching him hide it, the boy moved it to the roof and watched the bucket from the roof. And then he heard a squeak. The dog was on the roof and had the rubber ducky. He chased the dog with the rubber ducky and ended up in the paddock with the crazy horse. He ran and left the paddock gate open. He got chased by the horse. He thought he was safe, but then the horse opened the gate. First the dog goes past, then the kid, then the horse. It was funny watching him just race past the cook who hated the sun so much he always had an umbrella. Later in the movie, the spirits turned against the boy because he stole a spiritual rock. They ended up in a hurricane that stole the cooks umbrella. Then there was a fire. He took the rock back, then the wind turned. So the fire went out. And the wind brought the cooks umbrella back. They say lighting always strikes in the same place twice. That place is on the horse. Never ride him.

We can recommend this film!