​From WA wild flowers to WA goldfields -1 to 2 September 2017

We were heading for Marble Bar where there's still gold but also oodles of jasper - one of my favourites. But I digress..... we pulled into a little dot on the map called Payne's Find for fuel and found a gold battery operated by Elaine Taylor. She 'retrained' as a battery operator after reaching the usual retiring age and still churns out the odd ingot but mainly runs tours of the battery. Elaine also consults on regeneration and impact issues in relation to mining activity; her family has been in the area for 100 years. We spent a fascinating hour or so there.

Inside the Paynes Find battery Elaine explains some of the old machinery she maintains.

One of the crucibles and a selection of small ingot moulds.

But we had to push on to Sandstone, another mining location via unsealed road. There we linked up with friends for some tramping in the bush after flowers and birds. On the way we snuck in an overnight camp in a gravel pit. Doesn't sound so romantic but gravel pits offer firm-based off-road camping spots and are often wonderfully secluded. The silence and the night sky are sublime.

Our favourite kind of road! Look at the colours!

We had one visitor at the gravel pit / a dear little skink. He was finger length.

The roadside was dotted with patches of silver tails, one of the mulla mulla family. The contrast between red earth, rocks, scrubby trees and cerulean skies was stunning.

We came upon a bank of paper daisies. They are so delicate and created a wispy pale cloud under the trees.

The ground was dotted with yellow button flower. When you looked closely many of them looked like golden crowns. Quite lovely.

The countryside is dotted with windmills sucking up water from the vast aquifer under the Murchison-Pilbara. We followed the pipe from the pump to a large cattle drinking hole.

And in amongst the dirt and gravel, tiny jewels happily meander providing one more food source for the insects. Systems within systems - it all works!