Western Australia April Travel Blog-Part 1
Perth, Broome & Cyclone Ilsa
After a relatively uneventful flight with a switch of planes in Singapore, I arrived in Perth on April 7, just before the Easter weekend.
I can’t tell about anything exciting during my stay in Perth. I was a bit sick for one day, and suffered jet lag for the rest of them. Also, I’m not sure if it’s only typical for Perth or maybe for Australia at large, but the Easter weekend was massively boring. A lot of places closed or closed earlier than normal, and on Good Friday I got an $12 ‘holiday surcharge’ on my dinner check, bringing it above AU$90. Similarly, on Easter Monday in Broome my sister and I were charged a 15% holiday surcharge at the Zanders Café.
On the one hand I understand that business owners in Australia have to pay their workers higher hourly wages during national holidays. On the other hand, so do business owners in my home country The Netherlands, but there are no extra charges in bars and restaurants during national holidays (supposedly the owners make up the difference by having more paying customers on such days, which indeed do tend to be very, very busy). It would only work in my country if every bar and restaurant did it, otherwise people would just avoid the ones charging extra and attend those who don’t. And there would be no end of complaining, it would rain one-star reviews, plus tips would effectively be reduced to zero.
Oh well, each country to their own.
I travelled onward to Broome on a domestic flight on Monday April 10, with the intention to stay in Broome until Thursday April 13. But that was not to be. My sister had arrived in Broome the day before, and picked me up at the Broome airport, after which we picked up our rental car. As it went, we only spent a very short time in Broome.
So we only had time to quickly go to Gantheaume Point (no Dinosaur footprints because the tide was too high, unfortunately) and witness a spectacular sunset at Cable Beach, after some drinks at Zanders Cable Beach.
The problem was that a cyclone had been forming in the Timor Sea that—according to the projected tracks—would come ashore between Broome and Port Hedland on the day that we had originally planned to drive from Broome to Karratha (via Port Hedland).
The last time my sister had joined me for a total eclipse trip was in 2019 in Chile, and on our return trip from Salar de Uyuni after our tour of South Bolivia and Salar de Uyuni (the huge salt plane after which the city was called), our new tour guide and young driver got lost in the Sierra Keñwal or in the Cordillera de Lípez—we were so lost I’m not sure where we were lost. We thought we would have to stay the night in the middle of nowhere, and at 4200 metres high it’s cold. The temperature drops to below -10° Celsius at night.
Fortunately, we eventually did stumble upon a small village where people were able to show us the right direction. But for many hours, in a 4WD on very rough mountain tracks, we thought we would never get out. So when we prepared to go to Broome—my sister lives in Melbourne—she joked: “no such horrible things can happen on this trip.” She was wrong.
Obviously, driving on the day a cyclone moves inland over the very road it crosses isn’t smart (and the authorities had it blocked, anyway), so we had to make a move. Travelling after the cyclone had moved inland wasn’t an option, because the road can be flooded for quite a while (according to a local it took almost a month before the road between Broome and Port Hedland was operational the last time a cyclone came ashore there).
So we decided to act quickly, made arrangements—booked and cancelled accommodation—and drove to Karratha on Tuesday April 11. Problem is that a cyclone can also be unpredictable and turn earlier rather than later. It was a good decision, as we made it safely to Karratha, which was far enough away from the cyclone. Cyclone Ilsa eventually made landfall in the night from Thursday April 13 to Friday April 14. It completely destroyed the Pardoo Roadhouse, while Port Hedland escaped mostly unscathed. It was the fiercest cyclone to hit the Australian West Coast ever. See also the diagrams and screenshots of Earth Wind Map. You don’t mess with a Category 5 cyclone.
Unfortunately, this meant we barely saw anything at Broome, which is a lovely town. And we had two extra days in Karratha, of which more in the next travel blog post.
Author’s note: as you’ve already noticed, the updates for this travel blog are at least a week delayed. This is because my sister and I try to see as many things as possible during such a trip, meaning there’s not much time in the evening to write these blog posts (apart from the fact that by then, I’m mostly exhaused). I do make a few quick notes, and write the full blog post when I’ve got more time, like now (8 days after the fact). I hope you understand, and please bear with me, there’s plenty more to follow!
Thanks, Maura. My sister and I are already joking which disaster will strike if we go on holiday together the next time. But that won't happen for a few years.
Glad you made it to safety, Jeste. A category 5 cyclone! Yikes!