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    You are in: Home / Eater's Digest Blog / Community Blog: Australian Holiday
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    Community Blog: Australian Holiday

    August 23, 2010 | 12 comments | Post a Comment

    pasta
    Road Trip!
    Wish you could take off for a six-month road trip and fish all along the way? In Australia!? Read on about JustJanS's adventure and the fresh food she found in Carnarvon, Western Australia...

    At last, we've arrived in Carnarvon Westerna Australia. It's a small town of 7000 people, 904 km north of Perth on the North West Coastal Highway. We are away from home (about 4,500ks from home now) for 6 months visiting family and doing a bit of fishing. We live in a caravan as we travel and the van has a cook top and microwave and fridge inside, but we figure you don't cook in your bedroom, so prefer to cook outside. Our little freezer is full to bursting with vacuum packed fish, red meat and chicken and as we take out any of that red meat or chicken, it's replaced with MORE fish!

    Carnarvon is a busy town surrounded by banana plantations and set close to some of Western Australia's most beautiful coastline. It's 3.3 m above sea level and has an annual average rainfall of only 229 mm. The Carnarvon Shire extends from Hamelin Pool in Shark Bay to Exmouth Station in the Pilbara. Carnarvon is the only point on the Australian coastline where the desert reaches out into the sea.

    People who drive over Carnarvon's Gascoyne River in the dry season (May to December) when it is nothing more than a dry river bed will be surprised to know how important it is to the irrigation of the whole region. It does flow about 120 days each year, the rest of the time the river literally flows "upside down." The water table lies below the sands and the local plantation owners tap into it and pump the water to the surface. Crops are usually good although the area has experienced 14 cyclones, 6 floods and 7 droughts in the last 50 years.

    The town is the centre of an area which grows not only bananas but avocados, coconuts, dates, jojoba, macadamia nuts, mangoes, papaws, pecans, tomatoes, capsicum, eggplant, chillies, cucumbers, pineapples, melons, pumpkins, citrus fruits, corn and various varieties of beans. Most of this produce finds its way to Perth's markets so it's great for locals and travelers to be able to buy at the farm gates.

    bananas
    Carnarvon Bananas
    I'm not all that fond of Carnarvon (as a town), but it's a great place to stock up with groceries at the two supermarkets and to buy all the wonderful fruit and vegetables that are produced in the area direct from the many plantations dotted along the Gascoyne River (North and South River Roads). We usually come away with kilos of tomatoes, bananas and avocados in various stages of ripeness. The stuff is cheap at the farm gates and so fresh you can't believe it.

    We've found one grower who specializes in herbs that are cheap, well packaged and fresh so they last and last. Curry leaves he gave me lasted 6 weeks in the fridge, thyme 5 weeks. He also sells avocados and while they are more expensive than most in the area, he labels them "eat today, eat in one day, two days" and he's always spot on. His 100% fruit ice blocks are yummy too.

    You can buy a huge variety of local produce at the local growers' market held every Saturday from May to November. It's a good market, but it means the stalls at the farm gates are mostly closed on Saturday and you'll find the prices just a bit higher (at the market).

    The town of Carnarvon has 7 caravan parks — we've stayed in four of them over the years. Most of the caravan parks have their own fresh fruit and veg stalls where you can buy a bag of perfectly ripe bananas or tomatoes etc. at a slight increase in price. I still think it's better to get out to the plantations and buy the cheaper, greener stuff too.

    ratatouille
    Baked Vegetable Ratatouille
    One of our favourite dishes after a stay in Carnarvon is a huge pot of Ratatouille made entirely from local ingredients — eggplant, tomatoes, capsicum, zucchini, onions, basil and parsley. We eat it hot and cold (my preference) for a few days! As our avocados ripen over the next few weeks, we enjoy them in salsas, salads, dips and my ultimate breakfast — wholegrain toast, mashed avocado and sliced ripe tomatoes.

    **Mandy**'s Baked Vegetable Ratatouille is on the menu tomorrow, but I'll be adding one of the gorgeous eggplant I bought this morning to it too. Another dish we have earmarked to cook as soon as we get out and catch some more fresh fish is Peggy Leggy's Chermoula.

    We move on from Carnarvon in the morning (the shopping's done!) headed to Coral Bay on the beautiful Ningaloo Reef where we'll spend three weeks fishing, swimming and snorkeling over the coral.

    Contributed by JustJanS on August 19, 2010
     
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    Comments

    August 24, 2010 10:17am

    FABULOUS Jan, I was with you all the way as you wrote in such an interesting and vibrant way!

    August 25, 2010 11:23am

    Great read, Jan. Love the photo of the 4WD and caravan. Those landscape colours say Australia to me. I think they'd make a great flag.

    August 25, 2010 3:38pm

    Love it Jan - written from the heart - I will be back for more

    August 25, 2010 6:40pm

    Jan....great read mate...makes me "homesick" for the road again.We still haven't been West...must get mr kd to rewad it too lol.

    August 28, 2010 10:52pm

    This is wonderful - I don't think I hear about Western Australia very often at all, this was very interesting.

    August 31, 2010 2:51pm

    Beautiful! Australia is on my bucket list!

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