Thurs, 6th June, 2019 RV Stop, Newman to Bush camp south of Eastern Creek, east of Nullagine, WA

The traffic got moving early so we woke at 6am. 13 degrees, clear sky.

Got up and had breakfast then topped up the water tanks and put some air in the van’s tyres – more weight in the poor thing again.

Headed back down the road a bit then turned onto the road north to Nullagine. Flat spinifex plains everywhere.

Stopped for a cuppa at Roy Hill rest area where there are heaps of lovely white river gums.

Continued on and there were heaps more in the flood plain before the Fortescue River which had a waterhole with water on each side of the road.

A new bitumen road has been laid to go around the two iron ore mine sites that we drove past 3 years ago.

Into ‘Arizona Desert’ country.

Back onto the dirt which is very rough with the ironstone making it very corrugated.

Met the grader further north which is working its way south from Nullagine.

Back on some bitumen as we pass Bonney Downs Station which is a huge pastoral lease that goes nearly up to Marble Bar so where we will be detecting is on that station.

Back on the dirt again but it is smoother now.

Across the dry Nullagine River as we drive into town.

Checked the mail but our 40E permits haven’t arrived. I rang Leonora Mines Dept where we put them in and she couldn’t understand why they hadn’t been done as they get their permits out in a week and the Marble Bar officee had been given extra help to process all the permits. I rang the Mining Registrar at Marble Bar who isn’t the most helpful person but after a while he eventually found our permits and said they have just been too busy to get them process!! I told him we were not impressed as we are here waiting to go onto our leases and now we have to wait another month if he manages to get them processed in the next week. I rang Leonora office back and let her know what was happening and she offered to try and push it along. Luckily Ray has permission for a few other leases so we have somewhere to go, not that I was going to tell that bloke in Marble Bar. We have permits to submit for a couple of spots at Marble Bar so I think we will have to put them in early if he is going to take so long in processing them.

Ray and Carol headed off to check out a lease for us to camp at. We had lunch then headed along the good dirt road – maintained by all the mines. Found Virginia and Geoff where we had detected 3 years ago, about 6km out of town on a pending lease. They have had fun finding lots of little bits with their 2300. They are heading to a station near Port Hedland next week to help out. The owner said he has found gold there too so Geoff is hopeful.

We continued on Skull Springs Road and found Ray and Carol’s van in a cleared area – the spinifex has been burnt off which is good. We parked up near them. It is still very windy.

Nice view even if it is spinifex.

Ray was out detecting already while Carol was cleaning the van after all the dust we have been through. I have a good deal of wiping to do too – just the fine stuff that comes in through the 4 season vents on the roof and as the van is old it is coming up through the walls in a couple of places – no too bad really.

Another shelf in the fridge broke – it was the new one we bought for the old fridge. Luckily we had kept it as we have lost two shelves so far which  are being replaced under warranty and Margaret and Bob are picking up for us. Might have to put another claim in for the next one as they are over $100 to buy.

I had two over-ripe bananas so I tried Maralyn’s moist banana cake recipe – everything goes in a saucepan then I put it in patty cakes and it cooked beautifully.

Ray came back with a grin – a very nice nugget so we had drinks to celebrate a good start and I gave them some cakes for their dessert.

As the wind is still blowing and cold we headed inside early as we haven’t organised our fireplace yet. We played some games of Skipbo – we love this game. Had a nice warm shower, dinner then settled in for our movies.