The Pilbara

While in the Pilbara we visited Port Hedland, Karijini National Park and Tom Price.
Port Hedland is an industrial town servicing a major port. You can watch the enormous ships being loaded with iron ore and heading out to China and Japan. On your way into town the Rio Tinto Salt Mine stands out with its towers of white salt. Interesting to see the loaders driving up and down the piles of salt and taking them to the conveyer belt.

Driving from Port Hedland to Karijini National Park is road train central. The national park is made of mountain ranges that are 2500 million years old. So old that no fossils are found in the rocks as the sediment was laid down when there was very little oxygen on earth and only bacteria existed. These ancient hills are the cause of all the road trains. The land is extremely rich in iron ore and the hills are being demolished and shipped out to China.

Karijini N.P. was amazing. The gorges are beautiful due to the extraordinary rocks exposed from erosion over millions of the years. They are made from layers of sediment and have been compacted over the enormous amount of time they have existed. We walked down to Fortescue Falls and then on to Fern Pool for a swim. We swam out to the falls and climbed up behind the waterfall. This walk was a very pretty wander among the fig tree roots.

Road train navigating the gorge.

Joffre Falls (from the lookout)




Tom Price is a purpose built town to service the Tom Price iron ore mine. We did the mine tour while in town and were amazed at the size of the machinery.