Passing time in Broome (a long post!)

Our first sort-of disaster struck on our first night in Broome when Suzy Q's airconditioner broke. We didn't know it was the airconditioner at the time, just that whenever we plugged into power at the caravan park we tripped the safety switch and shut down our power and the power of the unlucky people plugged into the same power pole.

We got it diagnosed the next day after a very hot and sleepless night and an even hotter two hours in the dusty dry workplace of the recommended repairer. The diagnosis was bad - the airconditioner was broken and it was the most expensive and hardest part to replace that would have to be ordered from Melbourne. And this was on the Thursday before Easter: so no chance of anything happening before Tuesday.

As the repair man said to us (in an attempt at consolation) 'it's not 9-11 or a giant tsunami', but the thought of 38 degree heat in a motorhome with six people and no airconditioner for a week in Broome was getting pretty close to my definition of 'not happy Jan'.

Thankfully the motorhome company agreed and said they'd pay for us to stay somewhere (after their first offer of buying us a fan was flatly rejected!). After a mad dash to the visitors centre pleading for accommodation over the peak Easter period, we managed to find some last-minute-pretty-average-but-has-airconditioning-and-a-pool accommodation.

Phew.

So we've spent more time in Broome than anticipated, and we've found more things to do than we probably otherwise would have. Here's a list of our top time-wasters in Broome:

Hello crocodile territory!

1) A visit to the Malcolm Douglas Crocodile Park scared us sufficiently not to swim anywhere for the rest of WA and NT unless there's a sign explicitly stating there are definitely no crocs! Evie, Max, Dylan and I had the inglorious pleasure of being splashed by two crocodiles fighting at the daily feeding and covered (I mean covered) in muddy, green crocodile slime.

Big decorator crabs

2) Lots of time at Cable Beach hunting for giant crabs and taking photos of sunsets.

The beach is very beautiful but feels like peak hour around sunset when everyone with a 4wd seems to want to drive onto the beach and three camel gangs traipse up and down.

We did a camel ride, cliché-y and touristy yes, but fun nonetheless. Max enjoyed it so much he fell asleep while sitting on my lap riding!

Photographing the sunset

A shadow shot of Phoebe, Lukas and Max
on board our camel Goliath

Cool reflections on the sand

3) Learning about pearls and the pearling industry. We held the world's fifth biggest pearl and looked at the biggest through a glass case. We also saw a $1000 pearl being harvested straight from the oyster and were allowed to hold it! There are a lot of pearls in Broome, but only on the strip created especially for tourists, creating a very clear distinction between this part of town and the rest.

The history of the industry is interesting and visits to the old pearl luggers and Japanese cemetery provided a good insight into the Broome of old. The visit to Paspaley provided a good insight into jewellery I will never own, but I think they're pretty used to people walking in just so they can say that they have (who me?!?!)

 (Warning, there is a graphic image of oyster insides below, but we thought it was really interesting to see where the pearl came from!)

Pearls, pearls everywhere! I'm pretty sure
these must be the rejects!

We saw this oyster opened and the beautiful
pearl contained within

The $1000 pearl freshly harvested

Dylan in an old pearl diver's helmet

The Japanese cemetery contains the graves of hundreds of
Japanese men that died during the pearling days of the 1800s
and 1900s

4) Watching a movie at the Sun Cinema - the world's oldest operating open air cinema. Opened in 1916 it's survived floods and cyclones and still screens movies in the open air. A great place to view some history as well as a movie. We watched a very cultured screening of Spongebob Squarepants!

5) Viewing a natural phenomenon: 'Staircase to the Moon'. In the dry months if the timing is right - a full moon and a very low tide - the rising moon creates a lovely light effect. This is also captured in our favourite book 'Are We There Yet' and Lukas and Evie were very keen to see it. We saw a huge red moon rise off the horizon and the shadow it cast was pretty remarkable. I didn't get any good photos of it, I'm going to blame the camera for not having a 'moon rising' setting but suspect it was probably because I couldn't hold it still enough in the dark! Look at this link though to see what it looks like: http://www.visitbroome.com.au/images/images/Staircase-To-The-Moon.jpg

So we've found lots to do but it's been a week now and all in all we've had enough of Broome. Apparently our airconditioner part is on a truck somewhere and should be arriving tomorrow. So, fingers crossed, we'll be able to continue our journey heading towards Darwin in the near future.