So after the Gibb, we nipped into Broome for a few days. Catching up with family & friends, then we scooted straight up to Cape Leveque!
We decided to drive right up to the top to meet some more friends. Gumbanan Wilderness Retreat was our choice of campsite🏕. We used this as a base while we explored the surrounding areas. We day tripped into One Arm Point community, had a dip at their local beach and visited the hatchery🐢🐠 (open air aquarium).
Tossing up whether to visit Kooljaman, we just grabbed a day pass and had a look around the place. The western beach had impressive contrasts, with the red sandstone cliffs. Kurt had a little flick and caught a 45cm🎣 GT, which made him happy. We drove onto the eastern beach for a quick dip. Again a very picturesque beach, with white sand and amazing clear blue water. Not sure it was worth $35 for a day trip though.🤔
We so happened to visit Cygnet Bay Pearl Farm while the ‘festival of the pearl’ was on🎏. We popped in on a Saturday where they were doing free demo’s all day. We heard about the history of Cygnet Bay and fun facts about the place. We also got to watch them harvest a live pearl. Our intention was to do the pearl tour, but once we saw the demo’s we figured we’d pretty much seen the tour 😉.
A few days later we returned to Cygnet Bay to go on the ‘waterfall reef tour’🚤. A great few hours out on the bay seeing the local sights. We got to see the main attraction Waterfall Reef which is a reef a few nautical miles north of Cygnet Bay. Due to the large volume tides that frequent the area, when the tide is outgoing, it rushes off this large reef which results in a waterfall affect⛲️. Have you ever seen a waterfall in the middle of the ocean? We thought it was pretty darn cool to see👏🏼.
After 4 nights at Gumbanan we moved south to Middle Lagoon. A slight 32km detour off the main road on a dirt track. It’s $15pp per night and since it was out of peak season we pretty much had our pick of the sites💁🏻♂️. Two main beaches, one is a long sandy beach which is dog friendly🐾 and the other beach up the top, is great for fishing & snorkeling. We spent 2 nights here having some RnR, swimming & snorkeling around the reef.
We then continued the track south, swinging into Beagle Bay for a look. It is home to a very pretty historical church⛪️, with the internals made of shells & pearls. A pretty spectacular place to have a wander around. The local shop across the road was well stocked aswell, for any bits of groceries needed🍏. We kept driving south and headed to Quondong Point.
What a gem💎 of a place this turned out to be. A free camp, right on the beach, phone reception and only 30 minutes north of Broome! We set up camp here for 12 days while we waited for some parcels to arrive at the post office🎁. The 12 days seemed to go rather quickly though, with lots of fellow travelers passing thru, which lead to plenty of campfire gatho’s.🍻🔥
While at Quondong, we day tripped around to nearby places, like Willie Creek and checked out Barred Creek. We did have to do 2 town trips to grab some supplies🛒 (food, water & more beer). On the second trip into town, we collected all our parcels from the post office which was great🎉. We spent a final night at Quondong, before moving up to James Price point for one night. Another awesome free camp, perched high up on red cliffs overlooking sandy beaches into the ocean🏝.
Some newly formed friends joined us that night, which was a great way to finish off our 3 weeks up at Cape Leveque! A glorious sunset, campfire chats & cold beers 🍻.