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"Slip into Broometime" is the well-worn local aphorism that captures the reclining tropical charm of BROOME , a popular and unexpectedly classy resort town of thirteen thousand people, which hangs on a drip of land over Roebuck Bay. William Dampier, the English buccaneer-explorer, passed the area in 1699 while on the run from an irate Spanish flotilla, and nearly two hundred years later the Djuleun Aborigines repelled an early fleet of prospective pastoralists. However, the imminent discovery of literally heaps of pearl shell soon led to the " Pearl Rush " of the 1880s and firmly set Broome on the colonial map of Australia. It was actually the nacre-lined shells, or mother-of-pearl , rather than the pearls themselves, which brought brief fortune to the town. By 1910, eighty percent of the world's pearl shell, used in the manufacture of buttons, came from Broome, whose rich (though not always harmonious) ethnic mix developed at this time. "Chinatown" teemed with raucous and sometimes rioting Filipinos, Japanese, Arabs, Malays and Kupangers (from Timor), servicing the four hundred luggers and their crews involved in the dangerous business of diving for shells. While Broome's cemeteries steadily filled, perhaps one shell in a thousand produced a perfect example of the silvery pearls unique to this area. Stagnation followed both world wars, although the Japanese, masters in the art of culturing pearls, invested in pearl-farming ventures around Broome's well-suited coastal habitat. Things improved with the sealing of the coastal highway from Perth in the early 1980s and the philanthropic interest of the English businessman Alistair McAlpine, who fell for Broome and subsequently kicked off its renovation. Tasteful development and refurbishment have enhanced the town's oriental and pearling mystique, enhanced by the sweeping expanse of Cable Beach , Gantheaume Point 's brick-red outcrops and the Indian Ocean's stunning turquoise hue. As word of the adjacent Kimberley's potential spreads, Broome's prosperity looks set to continue, something which will hardly disturb this laid-back, if pricey, tropical retreat for lotus-eaters.
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