Now that the long weekend is out of the way and school is starting to go back , we decided we'd head to Pemberton for a look . We are dodging a lot of the hot weather that Perth & the rest of WA is currently having . The Southwest corner of WA is usually cooler and it held up it's end of the deal , we have been having pleasant days and cooler nights , which has been a relief from the sweltering conditions above us .
We arrived at Pemberton after lunch - we had some lunch at the information bay just out of town - then headed to the caravan park . They informed us we could stay for only 3 days , as they were closing for 3 weeks to upgrade the remaining half of the parks bitumen roads . We took the 3 nights , and the roads that were being done , didn't really resemble bitumen , they looked like gravel tracks !!
Pemberton pool is only a 100m walk from the end of the caravan park , and is situated in a beautiful spot , with towering Karri gums reaching for the sky .
Next , we headed out for a drive through some of the forests that surround town . This photo is a bit of an optical illusion , the road looks to go uphill behind the ute , but it is downhill and reasonably steep . More of the Karri gums - just beautiful to drive through .
This photo is also looking downhill .
After a looping drive around the forest , we arrived at Big Brook Dam . The temperature was around 30 so it was time for a swim to cool off . The dam has a sandy beach , and bitumen tracks to walk down , picnic shelters , Bbq's and tables & benches to sit at . The water was great , nice & clean and surprisingly warmer than we expected . There were some cool patches , especially deeper down as you would expect , but you could sit there , or float round with our noodles and enjoy the surroundings as you cooled off .
Back to the van , we washed half of it in the cooler afternoon temperatures , the other half will be done tomorrow !
We organised a picnic lunch for the next day and went out to the dam again . There's bitumen track all around the dam - 4.8klms of it - so after washing the other half of the van , we rode our bikes around it. This is the beach area as seen from the opposite side .
This is the furthest point of the dam .
Hard to concentrate on where you're going when there's views like this to ride through .
We finished the ride and went for another cool down swim and some lunch . After that we headed out to Gloucester trestle bridge . It was part of the old tramway that was used to bring timber to the mill . Not used anymore , it is a statement of how well they built these old bridges out of trees .
About 10m away is another curious structure , this time a road bridge across a small creek . Strange construction on this one , with the logs stacked on top of each other - there were some steel beams underneath the roadway to assist with holding it all together . As a side note , this bridge won't be here much longer , as there's a single span concrete bridge sitting on supports about 100m away , ready to be changed over . Another piece of history disappearing !
From here we continued on along the gravel road to look at whatever we could find . There was one road we went down that stopped abruptly - the bridge had been removed a while ago - but not yet replaced and more than likely won't be replaced either . Continuing on , we passed the Cascades , a section of the creek that flowed over some rocky area's , at least it would have if there'd been some water flowing !!
The tracks kept on running to dead ends , so on our way back there was one more track to try , ( we were only about 500m from town , so didn't really want to drive back 20 odd kilometres back the way we came). Heading off on this last track , brought us to the unloved side of the old saw mill on the edge of town - the roof was falling down - but the track brought us back into town , saving that dreaded 20 k drive.
We weren't far from the Gloucester Tree , so went for a look . It's closed to climbing , so the area around it had been fenced off and nobody was there . We stopped so I could take some more photos of these beautiful trees .
These couple of trees were only about 60m tall , the lower branches about 40m up from the ground .
Back to the van after a great day out , we managed to be able to wash the ute also - I asked the park owner before doing so , he was happy to let us , as the park was closing for 3 weeks , so it watered the grass a bit .
Here's a map link :- https://www.google.com/maps/d/edit?mid=1Qqc80S92ekEXOYWTxkhpmwDL8TvWl5A&usp=sharing
No comments:
Post a Comment