Cable Beach WA

Cable Beach and a selection of my photos.

The Indian Ocean

Camels of Broome

There is just something special at Cable Beach when the camels arrive to take people on a ride along the beach at sunset.  The ride goes for half an hour and more women seem to do it than men. 

Camels of course are not native to Australia but suited to out back Australia.

*The very first camel to ever set foot on the red Australian soil arrived in 1840 and came from the Canary Islands. (This was a somewhat unlucky camel, as it accidentally caused its owners death and was subsequently shot...) But this first camel was soon followed by others. 24 more camels arrived in Australia in 1860 to be part of the Bourke and Wills expedition. And in the next fifty years an estimated 10,000 to 12,000 camels made their way to Australia!

The camels came to Australia mostly from India and Palestine, and nearly all of them were dromedaries (the one humped variety Camelus dromedarius). Apparently there were only about 20 two humped camels (bactrian camels of the species Camelus bactrianus) imported during that time.
On top of that Australians also started breeding their own camels.

The first of several Australian camel studs was established in 1866 in South Australia, and the studs went on to operate for fifty more years. (Interestingly the working camels bred in Australia turned out to be of much higher quality than the imported camels...) It was the camels, and the camel drivers or cameleers, that opened up the Australian Outback.
The camel drivers came mostly from Afghanistan, but also from Pakistan and the Turkish Empire.
*Taken from Outback Travel Secrets..

Australian Camels.

Australia is set to begin exporting thousands of live camels to the Middle East after one of Saudi Arabia's richest men invested tens of millions of dollars in a ship designed to open up the trade.

The ship, on its way to Fremantle in Western Australia after being launched in Singapore this week, features super-sized doorways and two decks designed for adult camels.

The businessman made the investment after picking up on international coverage of Australia shooting thousands of feral camels causing environmental damage in the outback.

A local exporter said the camels could be exported from Broome, Fremantle and Adelaide as soon as they became available in sufficient numbers.

The Federal Government culled about 160,000 camels over four years as part of a $19 million program that ended last year.

The feral camel population was estimated at one million at the start of the cull, about 40 per cent of them on Aboriginal-controlled land.

International Livestock Export director Graham Daws said the trade in camels had been held back by the lack of a purpose-built vessel. "It is very exciting, especially for indigenous people," he said. "There is a whole new business there."

The man behind the venture, Hamood al Khalaf, has imported more than $1 billion worth of livestock over a long career.

He has spent $100 million converting the Awassi Express for sheep, cattle and camel exports and on associated infrastructure in Australia and Saudi Arabia.

Mr Khalaf will charter the vessel for sheep, cattle and camel shipments to the Middle East, pending a breakthrough agreement between Saudi Arabia and Australian to reopen live exports.

Taken from the newspaper in Western Australia. Written by Brad Thompson 

Camels on Cable Beach in Broome, Western Australia.

These camels are used to take people on a ride along Cable Beach at Sunset, it's where I took these photos a few years ago.

Waiting for a ride.