We have just done ten days free camping;and it was actually pretty good!!

Yep , it’s true we have just done ten consecutive days of “free” camping, along the glorious west coast of Australia. I may be stretching the definition of “free camping “ever so slightly, but by my standards, what we did counts as free camping. To me free camping means: either a free road side stop, station stay with no facilities or national park stay with basic facilities (long drop toilet) etc. So essentially, camping in an area that does not have power, water or running toilets and for minimal fees (typically national park stays are $10 per adults per night).  Sure we still have a caravan (with our own chemical toilet and shower), lights and fridge that run off battery and a gas cook top.  My “free” camping may not be the traditional style “bush camping” that others call free camping, but this is the most rustic I would feel comfortable with, and I managed to be ok with ten consecutive days of it!!! The spectacular locations may have helped a little!

Up until this point we had limited our free camping nights to three consecutive nights for several reasons. The first reason being that the free camps in Queensland and NT are limited and often much poorer standards than the WA free camps. Kudos to WA ! The second reason is that when free camping, we were often using the caravan to power the second fridge in the car. This unfortunately meant that the caravan battery often got too low and typically on night 2 and 3 we would be woken by a lovely beep at around 4am. Occasionally the battery was able to re-charge enough during the day (love solar energy) to avoid this, but not consistently. Finally, we have limited capacity for water. We only have two tanks and were sadly not accustomed to using water sparingly. On our first free camp stint, we went through the majority of the two tanks in two days. So, to date, our longest free camp run had been three days and to be honest I was a little glad that these obstacles prevented us from doing more!

Come along Mr. fix it (aka Ophet) and we manage to find solutions to all these obstacles. We used our jump starter to run the fridge every second night. Then we recharge the jump starter at my feet on the cigarette lighter whenever we are driving (or something like that). The point being, we don’t have the battery issue anymore.  Now, to the water obstacle. We have become experts at the splash, soap, splash routine , dishes are washed using minimal water and Ophet has developed a 6^th sense for finding any opportunity to re-fill the tank (I will leave it at that)! Availability of clean free camps; tick, battery obstacle sorted: tick, water obstacle overcome; tick. No more excuses.    

Our long stint of free camping began when we left the lovely coastal town of Point Samson. From here we backtracked a little to take the sealed but longer road down to Karijini National Park. Given the length of the drive, we decided to stay at a roadside stop (Albert Tognilini) 40km outside the national park entry.  This was free camping night 1; it had no facilities, just a magnificent view and an opportunity to have a campfire under the clear night sky.

The view from the free camp at Albert Toglilini

Nightfall approaching, campfire ready!

An early start, and onto our next free camp site; Dales Campground in Karijini National Park. Big, gravel sites, clean long drop toilets and only a short bike ride/run away from the entry to Dales Gorge. Perfect spot for days 2 and 3 and a great location for our exploration of Karijini.

Another big driving day, heading out south–east from Karijini towards the coral coast. With the distance being 500km plus, a much needed re-fuel, shop and filling of the water tank at Tom price, we knew that we would have to do it in two days with another roadside stop. This time we found one just off the  Highway at Barradale. This has to rate as the best road side stop yet, all gravel, with well maintained picnic areas, plenty of space and clean toilets. Free camp day number 5.

Days 6, 7, and 8 were at the well known and highly rated (on Wiki camps) Warroora Station. A "station stay", can vary considerably from a very established caravan park style stay with running toilets, showers and often a restaurant, to the other extreme; simply a site for parking your van or pitching your tent with no facilities. Warroora was the later, and was our second experience of this most basic style of caravanning (the other being at Willie Creek). We were lucky enough to get a beach front site, with only one other couple that were camped near enough to call our neighbours. Great site, lovely location and, a relaxing and peaceful few days, swimming, snorkelling, kite flying, shell collecting, building sandcastles/mermaids, fishing, animal spotting, reading, doing gymnastics on our stretch of sand and watching sunsets with a beverage in hand. 

The wind had its' bonus!!

Our little friend at a nearby point

Onto a stay at Osprey campground at Cape Range National Park, via a day trip to the not to be missed, Coral Bay. We had luckily been told by friends to book into these sites, as even a week out we could only get 2 nights in this region which boosts five camp grounds. Having researched our preferred campgrounds, Osprey was our pick so we were very grateful to get the two nights (others have since told us that the other camping grounds also maintained these high standards). On arrival we could see why this camping area had the highest ratings. It was super clean, had huge sites that were spaced well apart, shaded picnic tables, a bike track and was surrounded by probably the most clear and spectacular coastline i have ever seen on one side, and national park ranges on the other.  I can see why this area attracts so many.

Coral Bay

High fives to the  "Parks for People" initiative

Picnic area at Osprey

Long drop toilets!!

Our only full day in this area passed quickly as we snorkelled at Sandy Bay (which was 600m away from Osprey via a bike track) and watched some skilful kitesurfing and windsurfing.

Snorkelling at Sandy Bay

Kite surfing; I will try it one day!

We left early the next morning to stop into Turquoise bay (confused aren't all these bays turquoise)! Then a quick stop for Jai at the visitor centre (to collect more information to add to his growing knowledge ), Exmouth for lunch, an impromptu family stunting session in the park (yep that's how we roll), some window shopping, a real coffee and dare i say, some civilisation! Add to this a quick flick to land a squid that Ophet just happened to spot off Exmouth Jetty and we were pretty tired and ready to move onto our final free camp site, a roadside stop near Learmonth Jetty. A planned stop, so that Ophet could do some night and early morning squidding

Turquoise Bay

Jai in awe at the size of this Wedge Tailed Eagle

Fishing off Learmonth Jetty

Today we checked into a caravan park in Carnarvon, to fill the water tank, do several loads of washing, power up all our devices and to have a nice long hot shower.

We just did ten days of free camping and I would do it again (in these spectacular locations or somewhere similar)!