Murph and Crowey: Cape Leveque - 27.07.2012 to 29.07.2012

A place that many people have recommended we go is Cape Leveque, 220km north of Broome, so being the adventurous travellers we are, making sure we see as much as we possibly can, we set off in the Prado, leaving the caravan back in Broome.

the road to Cape Leveque over 200km of it

There are quite a few places to visit along the way before getting to Cape Leveque along the dusty, sandy and at times corrugated road, but to be honest it was not as bad as some people had told us. Our first port of call was in a little township called Beagle Bay. Beagle Bay is the home of the Nyul Nyul people, a little aboriginal community about 180km north of Broome. Amongst the homes and a general store sits the Sacred Heart Church, a church built by the French Palestine Monks who arrived in Beagle Bay about 1890. The church itself is made by hand made bricks but it is the inside that draws many visitors. The alter is decorated with mother of pearl shell, cowries, volutes and olive shells. The church is still in use today and has stood the test of time through many restoration projects either through age or weather damage.

Our next stop off point was a place called middle lagoon and along the way a detour to a cafe called the Whalesong was rumoured to be quite a special little spot. So Crowey and I thought a cuppa would go down well after our early start that day and when we got to the cafe we were not disappointed. Whalesong Cafe overlooks Pender Bay a National heritage listed coastline and Humpback Whale nursery and resting grounds. Though we didn't see any that day.

After our little snack we thought we would go and have a look at Middle Lagoon, another 5-10kms down the road. A nice looking spot with a decent swimming beach and campgrounds.

After leaving Middle Lagoon we head for Cape Leveque to book in and settle in our accommodation

Getting comfy

Kooljaman at Cape Leveque is a unique wilderness style luxury camp on the tip of the Dampier Peninsula, 220km north of Broome. It is jointly owned by Djarindjin and One Arm Point Aboriginal communities. The view for the future of Cape Leveque is for the complex to be wholly aboriginal run and provide employment opportunities for community members. Currently the complex is managed by non-Aboriginal staff, under the guidance of a board of directors. The campgrounds are very neat and tidy, with even a restaurant here to dine for lunch and dinner. On both sides of Cape Leveque you have a beach for fishing and the other side is a great swimming beach where the water is a great temperature, not cold like Cable Beach. A very scenic spot where people flock to in the evening, champagne in tow to watch the sun go down.

The next day we went for a drive to a place named One Armed Point, home to the Bardi aboriginal community. While we were here we called into the Ardyaloon hatchery, Australia's only operational trochus hatchery. It was here that we met Barry, an old guy (probably about 80 years old) who ran and also polished the trochus shells. Barry was very casual sort of old dude who decided to give us a tour of the hatchery which not only included the Trochus but also Barramundi, tortoise, Anemone fish and many forms of coral. Some of the species he had were there for rehabilitation, some I think were his pets. I got to feed a barramundi with a little bit of fish. When the barramundi eat they actually suck their food and it feels like a big commercial strength vacuum cleaner when they come to the surface. It frightened the living daylights out of me, I was certain it had sucked my fingers off as well., Barry the hatchery owner reckons the barramundi will be traumatised after hearing my scream. I ended up purchasing a polished trochus shell, they are quite beautiful.

living trochus

look at that face

Nemo is that you?

The barra awaits his feed

not a bad lunch spot

One Arm Point Beach

a little friend heading for the water

Coming home from One Arm Point we decided to drop into Cygnet Bay, a pearl farm operated by the same family for over 60 years. They have a cafe out here (they do the best fruit smoothie), a pearl shop of course and tours of the farm if you wish. We decided to book a tour the next day which took us out to the archipelago islands, including Sunday island.

Off at midday the next day, we hop into the sealegs boat to get to the tour boat. Now I have never seen this boat before (see pic below) but a Sealegs boat can be driven from land, down a boat ramp or beach and into the water - all with the occupants staying in the boat and remaining completely dry!. Once in the water, the Sealegs wheels are easily retracted into the "UP" position and are completely out of the water. The boat is then driven and used as normal. When approaching land, the Sealegs wheels are lowered into the "DOWN" position whilst still moving in the water. Quite an amazing little boat.

The tour was a little disappointing. They bought along a senior leader called Bruce Wiggins who happens to be an artist and was actually born on Sunday Island. Now when going on a tour you expect to receive quite a bit of information about things along the way, however both were not as forthcoming in information as we would have liked and we weren't the only ones who thought this. It was sort of like getting blood out of a stone, but we tried to find out as much as we could along the way and take in the scenery just the same. I guess with tours you either really enjoy them or you leave a little disappointed. Nevertheless we went somewhere we haven't been before. We arrived back about 5pm and then set off back to Broome to fetch the caravan and take off the next day for Derby.