The Auski Roadhouse was a very busy place with road trains by the dozens coming and going; and it was a preview to the days riding. During todays the 2-3 hours riding to Port Hedland I estimate I passed a roadtrain every single minute and many of them were big ore carriers, like the one in the images below. The ore carrier below has 4 trailers behind the tractor, the tractor has 2 steering axles at the front each with two wheels, the first trailer has 2 sets of 3 axles (each with 4 wheels), and the subsequent 3 trailers have 3 axles (each with 4 wheels) at the front and 4 axles at the rear. Thats a total of 112 tyres/wheels (3 x 7 x 4) + (3 x 4) + (3 x 4) + 2 + 2.

I noticed yesterday that for much of the day the altitude was in the 600 or 700 meter range where as today it quickly dawned on me that we would finish the day at sea level and hence the weather would gradually get hotter. Hence in the final photo in the group below I had to work hard to find a shady spot for a break.

The red hilly country of yesterday continued for about 50 km out of Auski, and in that stretch I stopped at Bea Bea rest area and took the photos below (except that last one). The sign was a bit delapedated but the vegetation was pretty.