A Birthday Surprise!

My sister came down to surprise me for my birthday and everyone was in on it! I was watching a movie at home with some friends, when one friend’s cousin needed rescuing because ‘he ran out of fuel’. When the friend came back my sister was there too. I had no idea!

Pristine looking Thistle Cove

. We went out for dinner the night before and then on my birthday we got up early because there was a whale in the bay! We also went out for breakfast, did some beach exploring and had a roast for dinner. It was super chill and I had a great time.

We went camping at Quagi Beach. Even though it’s the beginning of winter it wasn’t too cold and we settled in front of a fire playing games. The next day we went four-wheel driving around Quagi and to Stokes National Park.

Quagi Beach

 We decided to have a look at Skippy Rock, which has a nice campsite that I think we’ll stay at one time. We checked out Torradup Inlet which was very protected and looked like a great spot to set up for the day (so we’ll have to do that next time). We also drove to what we think was Margaret Cove and what we’ve figured out is that there are so many little beaches and coves yet to explore!

Awesome little spot we found...name unknown!

A Big Hole in the Ground

We decided to spend the WA Day June long weekend on a little adventure, so we headed off to Kalgoorlie. We checked out the Super Pit and went on a tour too, it really is a big hole in the dirt! The tour took you to a great vantage point overlooking the pit, but unfortunately they weren’t blasting when we were there. Then we went through the Fimiston Milling Plant where we could see how they get the gold out of the rock. It really is quite a process to extract the gold, but clearly it’s worth it!

The Super Pit

We were amazed at how huge the trucks are that drive the dirt out of the pit. There are 793 dump trucks with a life span of about 7 years, and it costs $40,000 for just one tyre! The pit is over 3.5 kilometres long, 1.5 kilometres wide, and 400 metres deep and has produced over 13 million ounces of gold. Our tour guide told us they were training dogs to sniff out gold…golden retrievers!

The tyres more expensive than my car!

I didn’t realise they still had an operating underground mine at Mount Charlotte so it was quite interesting to go to the lookout to see that. The lookout is also based at the reservoir which is where the water is piped from Mundaring Weir in Perth. The water travels 563kms and provides drinking water to the region.

 

Overlooking Mount Charlotte and the town

We went to Hannan’s Tourist Mine where we went on a self-guided tour walking through original buildings relocated from mine sites along the Golden Mile, looked at old engines and machinery and old prospecting camp sites. We got up close and personal to some big modern mining machines, sitting in the driver’s seat of a 793 dump truck and in the shovel of a  994F loader. I’m pretty sure this is the place I went as a kid where we actually went down a mine shaft and watched them pour gold (I remember winning a Crunchie chocolate!)

We went to the Museum which was incredibly busy! There were many families as there were lots of activities for the WA Day celebrations. We were a bit old for the face painting and the petting zoo, but we found the museum really interesting. It showcased the town’s history and the gold vault displayed many golden jewels. It was a grand little adventure!

Big trucks!