Day 68: Quobba Station to Carnarvon

It is only 83 km to our caravan park in Carnarvon and we did not hurry to leave Quobba Station, but still arrived well ahead of check in time. We had to go to the public dump point on Quobba Point, so that took up a little bit of time.

Carnarvon is one of the few places that has a car wash big enough to accommodate caravans, so we called in there on the way and joined the queue. I figured our days of lots of red dirt roads are almost over and the rig is very dirty. There is a caravan in the bay and a motor home waiting in front of us, just as well we have time to burn.

Eventually our turn comes and we squeeze into the bay which looks like it was really built for washing boats as it even has a marine flush outlet. We did a reasonable job of cleaning everything up in such a tight space, but a high pressure wash is never as good as a hand wash, however at least everything looks a lot cleaner.

Even with the wait for the car wash we are still 45 mins too early so continue into the centre of town looking for a long vehicle parking space so we can have a cup of coffee. As with most towns, the long vehicle parking is near the information centre.

We found a nice little cafe opposite the Information Centre

Still with time up our sleeve we went to the information centre to get some clues on how to get the best out of a few days in Carnarvon. We were first asked where we were staying, it is Discovery Parks Carnarvon. Were we staying for 3 nights or more, yes, well in that case we are entitled for free entrance to the 3 museums in Carnarvon as part of a deal Discovery Parks are running. An unexpected bonus as at least the Carnarvon Space and Technology Museum was on our list to visit.

The lady at the info centre was very helpful and gave us a list of plenty of things we can do, so I don't think we will be short of activities.

We discovered that Carnarvon is the food bowl of WA producing a huge share of WA's fresh vegetables, tropical fruits and seafoods. There are lots of local plantations selling their produce from stalls outside their property and there is a drive they call the "Fruit Loop" which takes you past many of these outlets.

Once we were settled in to our site, we went shopping and looking for a quick lunch. Only a few hundred metres from our caravan park, we see one such outlet.

Kenjen's stall near us had a wide range of vegetables and an honesty box to pay

We stocked up and got all of this for $20 and it is so fresh

We ended up with a couple of kgs of tomatoes, a bag of cherry tomatoes, a bunch of shallots, a bag of green beans, a zucchini, 2 capsicums, a bunch of coriander, and a large eggplant.

Just down the road was and IGA with a cafe, so we had lunch and shopped for some of our groceries at the IGA. A quick trip to Mitre 10 to buy a small stepladder and Repco to buy some polish to protect some of the plastic and painted black checker plate from UV, and then we headed back to the caravan park.

Later in the afternoon there sounded like some serious machinery had turned up opposite our site and on investigation it was a tow truck picking up a caravan to tow away.

It is unclear why the van was being towed away, but there was some gossip that their car had been stolen  near a local beach.

The park management sent out an SMS at about 5 pm, warning people to lock everything up as it appears they have had recent thefts and break ins at this and a few other parks in Carnarvon. It is the usual youth crime that plagues some of these Northern and remote Communities.

Tonight we are told there will be a food truck at the park, selling seafood. Dinner is sorted. We have a fair bit of restocking to do tomorrow to refill our freezer. 

Dinner was excellent, some form of Emperor fish, not disclosed, was a great piece of fish in an incredibly generous serve. We ordered some crumbed mussels and spicy prawns as an addition which turned out to be far too much food.

It was one of the best pieces of fish I have had for a very long time and I struggled to get through it, as it was a very large and thick fillet, but it was too good to waste.