18th July 2021 Forty Mile Beach

Sun again this morning but unfortunately still windy so we delayed getting out of bed just enjoyed our coffee and read our books.

After we were up and about we decided to get out of camp and go down the road to a dry creek bed and try the metal detector, we could not get any positive signals, it was all over the place, not sure if a lot of garbage has washed in there from quarry works, there was hornets there that wouldn't leave me alone, I had plenty of bugger off stuff on but it made no difference, I put a long sleeve shirt on to protect my arms but they were all around my legs, when they started around my face I had just had enough so called it quits, next time we go out I will wear long pants, shirt and fly net.

We left there and headed down the road further towards Karratha to a free camp area on a river that has lovely swim areas.

We were surprised by the amount of people camping there, it is supposed to be a 24hr stop but with everything full with covid travellers the rangers don't bother them, it is obvious some have been there awhile.

We had a nice swim, it was good being in all that fresh water.

We filled up the water on the truck at the gas plant on the way back.

While I was making coffee at camp Merv got the detector out and went around our camp, he found a few ring pulls and bottle caps and $3, we  are going to check other sites when there is nobody on them.

We were talking to some people today and they said they drink gin and tonic to stop sandfly blistering, they said it is the quinine in the tonic that does it, quinine is given to prevent malaria so I might drink some tonic water the mosquitoes might stop effecting me.