On the 14th of April, the family, plus our Japanese Exchange Student and Shootin Buddy headed up to the Outback. Our destination was a Sheep Station at Gabyon. This is their webpage and is worth checking out.
It's a 6 or so hour drive from Perth. And on the whole the roads are very good. There had been some recent rains and one of the bridges was half washed out, and there were a few bumpy creek crossings but it certainly was achievable and 4x4 wasn't needed.
Passed the sign and prior to the station there were a few creeks that ran down to the road which would be worth exploring in the future. This time however, we just went straight to the Station.
The turn off from the main road was well signposted, however when we got into the station itself we were a bit unsure of where we actually were to go. Luckily the station owners had seen us arrive (they had been out mustering but had returned earlier than expected) and were able to point us in the right direction.
The owners, Mike, Helen & their daughter Gemma, are wonderful and friendly people. Over the course of our stay they could not have done more to make us feel welcome.
They have two options for accommodation (and you can also camp / park a caravan), and we chose the "homestead" option. This is a wing near the main house (separated by a fence), with three rooms each with a queen bed and a single bed, a kitchen, bathroom, outdoor dining table, outdoor fire pit, and BBQ all with power. As there were 6 of us, this worked out nicely.
The property is a working sheep station on 271, 500 hectares and we were able to see them mustering sheep from one of the paddocks using quads and a small plane.
During our time there, Miss 12 got to help out with the horses, our Japanese Exchange Student got to bottle feed kangaroos, Miss 14 learnt how to vacuum a pool and then got to enjoy the pool (except it was too cold to stay in the water for long) and we all got to go on a hike and do some exploring.
Here are some more of our photos
