We are currently heading back to the coast to Gerlaldton having spend a 5 days in what is commonly referred to as the Goldfilelds.
We began at Wave Rock an amazing granite formation part of the Hyden Rock formation formed by millions of years of erosion. This is a well know tourist destination for Perth residents. Interestingly it was little know prior to a school teacher being awarded a Kodak photo competition for a picture of the rock formation in 1964 which featured in Walkabout magazine and then attracted droves of interested observers.
From here we drove through some amazing country, some of the only temperate woodland forest left in the country, red sandy soils, mallee trees, spinifex clumps interlaced with magnificent Salmon Gums. Every so often there were huge Granite outcrops which remain after eons of erosion. one spectacular example was McDermid Rock were water gathers in shallow Granite pools and sustains beautiful native collections of plants, some look like zen gardens. These pools are highly valued by indigenous owners who have used them as water sources for thousands of years.
From here we headed into the gold country of Coolgardie, Kalgoorlie, Norseman to name but a few. Every where the tell tail signs of gold fever since the the 1890s are present. Wether it be a huge open cut mine operating today or abandoned, the country is littered with evidence of white fella's obsession with the yellow metal. I joined in and purchased a high tech metal detector but alas did more to clean up the area of rubbish than make my fortune. We had some fun sniffing around the old abandoned towns of Coolgardie and Mount Ida in the hope of finding some relics to no avail. It's amazing how much rubbish we leave in our wake.
Finnally we camped out for couple of days at Lake Ballard, an amazing island lake with a huge knoll on its shore. It's notoriety is attributed to the sculptures by British artist Antony Gormley which have been positions across the lake.
We arose at sun rise and we walked out onto the lake where Robyn took some amazing pictures.
it rained most of the night and we awoke to the lake filling up, how quickly the landscape changes in the country.
once again we have brought rain to an inland lake :)
Back to the coast to return our journey northward