A Business Trip Adventure

     It seems a bit of an oxymoron, using "business trip" and "adventure" in the same sentence.  A business trip sounds sooooo cool, even glamorous...until you have been on a few.  This is how they usually function: taxi, airport, taxi, worksite, taxi, hotel, taxi, worksite, taxi, airport, taxi.  Notice an absence of words like: museums, shopping, sightseeing, margaritas-by-the-pool.  And it does not seem to matter where the trip is to - Dubuque, Iowa or St Bart's island - it usually amounts to much the same pattern.  Biz-Trippers just create fantastic stories about the locale using information found in the in-flight magazine.
     This business trip to Broome was different.  The federal commission assignment ended at midday, so we had the whole afternoon free  before making the dash to the airport.  "We" being myself and the commissioner's associate, Jess,  who is also flying on an unchangeable steerage class ticket.  The commissioner, before boarding his business class flight, hands us the keys to his rental car with the admonition, "Don't do anything I wouldn't do."
     As if.

      Wheeeeeeee, one can cover an awful lot of Broome in five hours as it is a rather small place. [see "Broome- a quick sweep" May 8, 2011]   Armed with tips and suggestions from native Broomers, Jess and I make the most of the afternoon: shopping for pearls, photographing natural sights, send a few postcards, picking up the local brew (Mango Beer by Matsoh's) for Kev, eating at a recommended  restaurant, Divers Tavern,  that is transitioning from country pub (fish & chips, chicken parmigiana) to gastro pub (ratatouille filled mushroom caps) and whiling away a couple hours at Cable Beach  beach-combing for  shells.  We were living large, I tell you.
    Oh, but all good things must come to an end. Time to go to the airport.  And wait.  The flight is delayed.         And delayed some more.        And a bit longer.        Each delay comes with a flimsy excuse.       Finally, we are getting bribed with a food voucher.  Hmmm, OK, I'll take that ciabatta bun with cream cheese, salmon and cucumber slices.       And then the flight is cancelled.         New flight 1:00a.m.     Ummmmm, I've got a book.....    Another announcement, new flight delayed until 2:45a.m.        ENOUGH!      Jess has the Commissioner's OK to get a hotel room and fly out at a civil hour the next day.  And if Jess wasn't tired of my stories yet, she offered to get a two-bed room.  

green tree frog

    Well, I am nothing if not resourceful (especially at high season when zero hotel rooms are available) and a few chats  with the right people  saw the pair of us (along with a minute number of other resourceful souls) being treated by Qantas to a night at the incredibly swanky Cable Beach Club Resort [ http://www.cablebeachclub.com ]   where green tree frogs played sentinel by our doors ( and posed for photos ) and the  veranda backed into the Ocean Pool. Harry Potter type owls swooped past my head and the Japanese Garden lily ponds were enchanting.  Why Qantas could not have cancelled the flight several hours earlier is a mystery to me.  Breakfast overlooking the Indian Ocean and then...
   We start the business trip again:    Taxi.     Airport.      Taxi. 
   But what an adventure! 

Broome - a quick sweep

     Broome, in the northwest corner of Western Australia, is an area once trod by dinosaurs and now stampeded by tourists.  And with good reason.  When rural Australia turns into remote Australia, a pleasant oasis is a secret that cannot and should not be kept.  Travel & Tourism marketers have a field day with Broome delights and I was hoping to catch a few of them on a recent business trip here.

     Broome is remarkably, and unexpectedly, tiny.  All of the the thrills and highlights mentioned in marketing materials gives the impression that it is a huge area.  In truth, good legs and a local shuttle bus will get you from the airport, hotel, every attraction and back to the airport without great exertion. And this can be a good thing especially for those time or cash poor as rarely in remote Australia is anything close by or inexpensive.

   The pearling industry and a wonderful beach started as the main attractions. The Japanese were first to come in and search for the golden South Sea Australian pearl and ultimately culture pearls in the ocean. These highly coveted beauties are not cheap but, oh, do I dream...


        Camel rides on Cable Beach at sunset are also a hallmark of this area. The sunsets are gorgeous from any vantage point. A particular phenomenon is the Stairway to the Moon sunsets occuring about three times a month.  The stair case looks horizontal on the ocean leading to the great golden orb dropping below the water's edge. During the day at low tide, beachcombing the white sand for interesting shells  is a great diversion.  The aquamarine water looks so inviting but at  the hottest time of year no one goes in the water.  A highly toxic blue jellyfish is a plague upon the ocean between October and April -- just when people want to escape the heat.


Gantheaume Point

     How about a little prehistoric sightseeing? Gantheaume Point, at the southern end of Cable Beach, fossilized dinosaur footprints are embedded in the craggy, red rocks overlooking the ocean.  Seen only at very low tide, casts have been made of them and placed at a safer location for gawking.  Geology is rarely more prominently  displayed than at the strata of the falling rocks here at Gantheaume Point.




boab tree



Also seeming to reach back to the past is the iconic boab tree - here with many nuts hanging from its branches.  Thriving where water levels are not high, the boab tree somehow seems to complement the equally ubquitous palm trees. Desert meets tropical here in Broome. The boab  nut has seeds in it - eaten mostly by aboriginal elders who still like their bush tucker over sweet strawberries from the market.  These nuts become very lightweight when dried and aboriginal artists carve pictures onto them.  This nut hardly needs decoration. He looks quite happy the way he is.

  Step into another icon of Broome- Sun Pictures. An outdoor "garden theater" and the oldest of its kind. Built in 1914 and still as it was originally, you can watch a movie under the stars or under the corrugated metal half-roof from a sling chair.  The movie "Australia" had a scene from just such a theater.  There is a modern cinema somewhere but I prefer this Chinatown fixture for a movie experience.





   Oh dear, my business trip is over and I have yet to see the Japanese cemetery (where all the headstones are written in Chinese- the language of the headstone maker) or Croc World or the Willie Creek Pearl Farm or the inside of the Walangari Sober Up Centre. O.K., maybe that last one isn't a must see. My work is at the Courthouse- a historical site in its own right.  It started out as the cable house for transoceanic telegraphy.  Its corrugated metal structure with decorative wrought iron rails makes it the most unique courthouse I've been in.

   Broome -- gateway to the Kimberley --is a great spot to spend a little time.  Some of the best things come in small packages.