The Richardsons - Lake Ballard, Goldfields, WA
Emma George
My boys, aged 8 and 10 years old, and I went to Lake Ballard, which is an ephemeral salt lake in the Shire of Menzies, in the Goldfields area of Western Australia. Lake Ballard is worth visiting because it offers something different from other campsites.
It has beautiful and interesting statues scattered over the lake. When we visited, the lake was dry enabling the children and adults to walk and run on the lakebed to find every statue. The statues are spread over a great distance, providing good exercise and a sense of adventure finding them.
The children loved touching and comparing their height to the life size statues, making it an interactive experience and an excellent way of getting my boys interested in art. The flat dry lakebed has huge humps of dirt, covered in rocks and trees, providing a beautiful contrast in the landscape and something for my boys to climb.
Lake Ballard had large salt crystals on the service, providing a crunchy walk and an opportunity to teach my boys about salt and the water table – we all screwed our faces up after tasting the salt!
The mud surface was perfect for creating boondies (mud balls), which were carefully crafted and roasted by the open fire later that evening. We slept in our swags and the stars at night were some of the best we have ever seen.
