Tom Price to Karratha - Thu 30th August-Sat 1st September 2012
The red dust of the Pilbara is well known for its ability to insinuate itself into the most unlikely places. After the dirt road from Tom Price to Karratha we discovered several "seams" in the caravan that needed sealing.
We decided to drive north on the dirt road past Hammersley Gorge and Millstream-Chichester NP. Hammersley Gorge was stunning.
The first day ended at Mount Florance station, where we had the whole grass-covered caravan park (about 20 sites) to ourselves. By this time we had covered just over half of the 212km of dirt road. So far the road was in good condition so progress was quite swift.
But the caravan had attracted more than its share of red dust, so we spent a couple of hours cleaning up the worst of it.
Next morning the first 50km of dirt road was good, but it then deteriorated progressively. At times speed was reduced to 10km/hr and we wondered when we would get to Millstream. In the event we spent two or three hours at the old Millstream Homestead, now a visitor centre, and the Deep Reach Pool (which turned out to be part of the Fortescue River).
After Millstream parts of the road were very badly corrugated. Even 10km/hr was too fast on a couple of occasions. The very last few metres before the bitumen were absolutely horrendous. Even trucks slowed right down before tackling it, except a concrete truck that bounced high into the air ... the concrete was well mixed.
We finally reached the bitumen as the sun set, and camped in a tiny area about 50m past the start of the bitumen. The iron ore railway was only about 100m away, with 2.5km long trains passing in each direction about every hour. But the important thing was we made it with no apparent damage, and a lot of cleaning up to do.
