Farewell to Broome

24/9/3023 – Today we farewell Broome after over 3 months there.

It’s been great.

Time to make many more friends, largely from the caravan park community, but also from the jetty and from parkrun, and relationships with regular suppliers such as farmer Wayne at the market and Angel at Chinatown Pharmacy.

Time to observe the changing seasons – changing weather, changing shadow locations, changing insects, changing bird calls.

Our dearest friends are Ying (China) and Annika (Austria), the two backpackers who have been working as Antigone’s helpers.  It has been lovely to develop social relationships with them as well as working relationships.  We took them out on Friday night – to dinner at Divers Tavern, followed by live music with the ‘International Dishwashers’ a band of backpackers who met in Byron Bay where they were working washing dishes.  It was a lovely evening.  We’ve also had other nice times this week hanging out with them at the pool and at their campsite.

We met Mark Birch near Coles on Saturday.  He’s a local guy we met years ago who goes to the Town Beach Jetty most days at sunrise.  He’s very friendly with the other regulars there, including us on various past visits as well as this one.  Martine and her dog Gertie are other morning regulars at the jetty who we befriended this year.  Taking Peppa places is often a great conversation starter.

After a late Friday night, we almost decided to sleep late and skip parkrun on Saturday.  We told Ying not to come at 6am as usual for Saturdays.  Then about 6:20 we changed our minds and raced to get ready and get to the meeting point for a 7am start.  Ying said she would meet us there.  Just as the event was starting, Ying arrived, and announced she would be running rather than pushing Antigone in the wheelchair, which rather surprised me.  It turned out she had noticed in our Parkrun blog post that most of the photos were of her and Antigone.  She set out to change that by taking photos and videos of Antigone and me together.  The parkrun organisers were appreciative of the blog post and wished us well for our travels.

After parkrun we went to the Courthouse Market as usual for our weekly fresh produce shopping from farmer Wayne – the only place for farm-fresh produce in Broome.

Yesterday, Caterina and James came to Broome.  Caterina is Antigone’s Arrowsmith Program teacher who has been working with us on brain exercises for 4-8 hours each week since early 2022.  She came to Antigone’s birthday party in May and this is the only other socialising we have had with her.  James and Caterina met us at our camp and had lots of questions about our caravan.  We took them to Gantheaume Point for the sunset, followed by a meal at the Aarli Bar, a favourite of ours where we have often eaten on our last night in Broome.  Whole barramundi was the dish of choice.

Packing up camp, we had more to pack than ever before – with additional tarps, poles, camp floor mats, water and waste hoses, and Starlink internet devices.  Also, we are packing with the intent to be able to accommodate a third person in our Golf, together with leaving the boot mostly empty for her things.  We have arranged to meet Flora in Perth.  She’s a German who worked there previously as an Au Pair.  She will share driving with me and also be a helper for Antigone between Perth and Melbourne, much as Ying and Annika did in Broome.

Preparing to clear out the boot, means finding a new place to store my tool collection (which started out in a hatch in the caravan).  My mobile workshop has gradually expanded and moved to the boot of the car for easier access.  I got two large boxes which together fill most of the space under the bed.  One is for shoes etc that we frequently (and awkwardly) search under the bed for.  The other box is for the tools from the boot of the car.

Our caravan windows have been permanently open during our stay here.  Closing one, a metal tab needed to hold it closed broke off, so I had to get out the drill and riveting tool to repair it.  That blew the 10am check-out time.

Our friends from Torquay, Peter and Gill (pronounced Jill) dropped by our camp to farewell us.  They had been in the site next to us when caravan park management had decreed that I must stop helping Antigone in the ladies toilets.  Gill had offered to help and it was great to have another support person to call on.  We also met them at the pool from time to time, sometimes eating picnic lunches together.  It was uncanny how similar their food choices were to ours, even to the brand and variety of peanut butter.

Annika worked her last shift with Antigone this morning and Ying also came by to farewell us before starting her cleaning work for the caravan park at 8.

Driving out of the caravan park, Annika was working at the amenities block and we drove past and gave us a lovely smile and wave.  We stopped at the office to thank the office staff and Ying was there and keen for final good-bye hugs.  It was really very lovely.