Joe and his parents are willing to go through almost anything to entertain Open Road readers, but even they drew the line at the Top End’s infamous wet season.

Like wildebeest on the savannah, grey nomads clog the roads - the hot, thick air driving them south. Right across the top of Australia the weather has suddenly changed from a pleasant 27ºC degrees to a stifling 38ºC. They call it the build up. The wet season is coming and only the hardy remain. They speak of it as a test of character. "I'm determined to make it through at least one wet season," a woman tells me at a cattle station near Fitzroy Crossing. "I'm going to embrace it," says another in Kununurra. In Sydney, people do the City to Surf - up north they do The Wet.

"The Wet is not to be enjoyed," says Marilyn Tabatznik, "it is to be endured." Marilyn, a South African born artist, has lived in Broome for years and says this is her most productive and artistic time. "If I didn’t work so hard I’d probably go off my 'nana."

My relationship with Marilyn begins with a chair. I spot it in Broome's Monsoon Gallery. It is a beautiful wooden piece painted in gold and red and green and inscribed with a range of symbols from different philosophies and religions. It looks other-worldly: like something that might have once belonged in an ancient Tibetan monastery. I read the blurb. Marilyn's chair has been made from pulped police reports, because she "wanted to take something problematic and make it beautiful". It can be mine for $25,000.

I cannot afford the chair. I cannot even afford to pay for the damage I'm afraid my toddler, Joe, will do to it if we hang around any longer, but I want to meet the artist. My partner Greg and I track her down - she is warm and engaging and within an hour of that first meeting Marilyn has invited us to come and stay at her place. We park our caravan in her backyard.

It is the beginning of a long, fascinating conversation that lasts for days, meanders off in all directions but keeps coming back to the weather and what makes Broome so alluring for artists.

"Broome is extreme," says Marilyn. "There's a tremendous pull of the tides, which are much bigger in the wet season. That affects emotion. So there's lots of emotion, the colours are dramatic, the weather’s dramatic. It's quite harsh in a way, too, so there's no hiding behind prissiness or pretension. It peels a few layers of the onion in spite of oneself."

From our base at Marilyn's house we explore the rest of Broome. It's easy to see how the town's colours inspire so many artists: there's deep red desert dirt, a two-toned turquoise sea, hot pink bougainvillea and deep green, leafy trees. They are colours that definitely should not be worn together, although Marilyn seems to get away with it and on Broome they look spectacular.

The people are as eye-catching as their town. Multiculturalism has produced the most gorgeous looking shop assistants in Australia. They can trace their good genes back to the pearling industry which began in the 1880s and attracted thousands of men from China, Japan, Indonesia, Philippines and Malaya.

The people of Broome may have ended up with pasty Anglo complexions, like so many of us, but the Brits, of course, have never been known for their aquatic skills and they weren't good pearl divers. The White Australia Policy had to be ignored for the sake of the industry. Many of the children born at that time were the offspring of Asian men and Aboriginal women.

"Well, Joe," I say as we wander around the town's commercial hub, Chinatown, admiring the Benetton people, "you and I may have been spared the bright white skin if the government of 1911 hadn’t been so short-sighted."

One of the beautiful-skinned people is Cori Fong, who I meet when I pop into Betty's Frock Shop, named after Cori's grandmother Betty Fong Sam. While I'm admiring the fresh and funky clothes in her store, Cori regales me with tales of her childhood when she used to go from house to house to receive gifts at Chinese New Year. She also talks about her Aboriginal heritage. "I'm an Abrasion," she tells me, "an Aboriginal-Asian."

She bemoans the mystique, now lost, that once surrounded Broome - but hearing her talk helps transport me into the past. I can imagine old Chinamen resting in deck chairs and smoking pipes. It was a time when the lugger crews worked by the cycles of the moon and people grew bok choy, guavas and custard apples in their gardens.

Opposite Betty's Frock Shop is one of the buildings from that time. It's a cinema called Sun Pictures. Part of the venue is open-air so you can sit in a reclining chair and watch a movie under the stars. Sun Pictures has been here since the days when the king tides used to flood the town and when movie-goers were segregated according to their colour.

Much has changed since that time, particularly with the influx of mining money and cashed up tourists. "Commerce has crashed into Broome," a local journalist tells me. It's become too expensive for a lot of old timers and many residents, including the town's creative people, are moving elsewhere.

Marilyn Tabatznik tells us a similar story. A number of her friends have left recently but she's hoping to stay. "I like the influx of people," she says. "It's like the tidal thing, it brings in lots of dross but it also brings in lots of jewels."

We are on the outgoing tide. We've loved our time in Broome but we're struggling with the heat. Greg and I say we're heading south for Joe's sake. "It's just too hot for him," we explain. It's a lame excuse. The truth is we don't have the fortitude or the inclination to endure The Wet. We'll never do the City to Surf, either.

Lisa Upton is travelling around Australia with her partner, Greg Bearup and their son, Joe. Greg is writing a book about their journey called Adventures in Caravanastan.

Volvo and Jayco Caravans are sponsoring their trip.

Open Road e-zine December 2008

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