Kalbarri

Stayed on Friday night at a free camp on the Murchison River.(I tell you some of these free camps (maintained by the WA Roads Dept) are better located than many caravan parks)

before heading into the Kalbarri National Park early on Saturday morning.

The wildflowers here are just fabulous

Below is Eagles Point, on the Murchison River (can you make out the Eagles Head rock formation)

and another view of the Murchison flowing through the National Park

and the view from the road driving into Kalbarri - just beautiful

Kalbarri is a pleasant tourist / fishing town on the Murchison mouth and with the weather much improved is a place to stay for a couple of days

After watching the Grand Final (didn't envy the 14deg temp) went for an 8 km bike ride south towards Red Bluff (pic below).

This will be our last coastal stop before heading home so will make the most of it before leaving on Sunday afternoon.

On the way out stopped at the Red Bluff lookout for some final pics.. Not bad I am sure you will agree

Shark Bay

Left Carnarvon early on Thursday morning for Shark Bay - main places being Denham (where we booked into the caravan park) and Monkey Mia. Shark Bay was placed on the World Heritage List in 1991.

On the way we called into the Hamelin Pool area, an area of hyper saline sea where stromatolites (colonies of micro-organisms that resemble the oldest and simplest forms of life found on earth about 3.5 billion years ago) are found.

These colonies are relatively new being "only" 3000 years old.

Hamelin Pool is one of only two places on earth where living marine stromatolites exist (don't know where the other place is).

Walking to the coast to view these organisms some feral goats (of which we saw heaps driving from Carnarvon) were browsing the country. They are a huge problem here and the authorities have several projects going trying to control their - and feral cat - numbers)

Having checked into the Denham park we drove out to Little Lagoon - reputedly a good fishing spot being a whiting habitat. It was pretty breezy and so I got into a position to cast with the wind. Had to walk out to almost waist deep to get the line into serious water.
Half an hour later, with things starting to freeze off and not one bite, I conceded defeat and drove back into Denham to warm up. The wind really picked up and during the night reached gale force proportions.
Up at sparrows to get to Monkey Mia at 7:45 next morning - it was pretty cool and the wind was still blowing. Pity really cos Denham would be a pretty good place in decent weather.

Anyway got out and had the famous dolphin experience. Pretty interesting with about 10 presenting themselves.

Inside the car on the drive back it was nice and warm.

Looks like a flying saucer landing pad below - must be dried up lake

It was still coldish and windy and after a drive to the Francis Peron National Park we decided that discretion was the better part of valour and set off south looking for an escape from the gales.

Stopped for a break and something to eat at Shell Beach. Millions of tiny shells (10 feet deep) making up the surface.

Then drove about 300km south to some better weather just north of Kalbarri.

Carnarvon

Left Coral Bay about 8am on Tuesday 22nd and drove into a headwind all the way to Carnarvon - would have been the worst fuel consumption for the whole trip if I had been game to measure it.

Because we've done about 11,000 km so far I had booked the Prado in for a service at the local Toyota dealaer - 80,000k service and got it there at 11am.

We went for a quick bike ride around town, had lunch and soaked up some sun until the Toyota dealer rang saying the car was ready. Needed that to go and get some more beer, wine, cider and food.

Next day rode out to the mile long jetty

It hard to believe that a train could run on those tracks - but here it is

Then had a look at the small boat harbour (small boats not a small harbour, although the harbour is pretty small too)

and the "Fascine" - which is the bay formed by the Gascoyne River and sea.

We drove out to Quobba Point where there is a blowhole (waves forced up through holds in the cliffs)

There is a sign there saying "Killer waves Kill", a plaque with names of people who drowned while fishing and a couple of life buoys. Fishing from these ledges would be ok don't you think?

Anyway I chickened out and went fishing a bit further south down on a safe beach. Got a couple of small salmon (both marginally bigger than a large goldfish).

The Coral Coast

Arrived in Exmouth about lunch time on Wednesday after free camping the night before and having travelled via Tom Price and Paraburdo.

After booking into a caravan park we began to suss out camping at the Cape Range National Park. A sign in town said no camp sites available today so we drove out to have a look. The park entry point is about 50km out of Exmouth and when we got there the ranger seemed quite off hand telling us that to get in we need to get out there about 6:30am and queue up with everybody else to find out at 8am whether any sites will be available. We agreed that this is a pox set up and although we were looking forward to a few days here decided that Coral Bay would be a better proposition to snorkel over the Ningaloo reef.

We drove down to the first couple of camping areas which look pretty good - right on the beach but since consoled ourselves hearing good things about Coral Bay.

Had a look around Exmouth - when Mum and Dad were here in the early 80s they were able to look over the Harold E Holt Naval Centre. However it is now "top secret" and off limits.

There is a big Novotel Marina partly finished so it looks as though this little place will be on the luxury tourist trail.

The lookout at the lighthouse was worth seeing (see the waves breaking over the Ningaloo reef) - could see several off shore gas platforms

After buying some grub at the supermarket we settled in for the night and left early next morning.

Arrived in Coral Bay (population 190) - (note the wind generators in the background)about 11am and immediately had a good feeling about the place. It consists of 1 road, 2 caravan parks right across from the beach, a pub with accommodation, a backpackers, a few shops and houses and exists purely for tourists. We booked in for 5 days.

The reef is only metres from the shore with fish (big snapper) swimming at the waters edge almost beaching themselves. They must be used to being fed - there is a daily fish feeding where they explain about the fish life and request that people don't feed or touch them.

So far I have snorkelled a couple of days with the multitudes of fish varieties and heaps of coral. Tomorrow plan to walk a fair way to the south and drift along the reef back to town.

About 2km north of the "town" along the beach is a shark nursery where they come to breed at this time of year. Went for a stroll down there yesterday afternoon and saw about 20 (each about 2.5 metres long) swimming up and down 5 metres from shore.

Put the trailer together and took the tinnie down to one of the best boat ramps I have seen. It was only built a couple of years ago and has 2 lanes with non slip surfaces, facilities for tying up while parking trailers, shelter from the prevailing winds and a small breakwater.

Have been fishing twice - have to motor about 2km south of ramp to get out of the sanctuary - first day no good - but today got plenty of bites, lost plenty of bait but landed enough for a couple of meals - whiting (one largish one) and some emperor.

Cooked up the emperor (some type of snapper) on the Cobb using a modified recipe (using whatever ingredients I could scrounge) and it was very tasty even if I say so myself.

Walked about a kilometre south along the beach this morning and jumped in the water, swam out to the reef and drifted back to the bay. Heaps of fish to rival the Barrier reef, swimming in large diverse corals. Just great!

Had a call from the McCormacks (filling up with fuel in Port Hedland) who had heard that Coral Bay would be booked out during the school holidays (starting this weekend). Sure enough the park reception confirmed that from Sat 26th to Oct 9th the place is chocka. They asked me to book them in from tonight till Sat - having decided to detour from the current plan to head to Karajini - they will probably back track to there on the weekend.

Tried an experiment today - snorkelled out from the beach fishing zone this arvo with a handline to see if I could hook a big one. It would have worked a treat except the only bait I had left was a 2 week old pilchard which just about disintegrated when put on the hook. Managed to get some on and swam out. A fish bit at it, the bait fell apart so no cigar - but with some good bait it might just work - too bad we are leaving for Carnarvon tomorrow.

The Pilbara

The Pilbara

Left Broome about 9am on Sunday 13th and had a long uneventful drive to a free camp about 80km north of Port Hedland (De Greys River).

Nice little spot on the bank – even some water in the river bed.

Filled up with fuel at Hedland about 8am next morning and had a quick look around – I worked here for a month or two in 1976 but can't remember much except for 6 days a week, 12 hours a day, Saturday night at the pub, Sunday hangover.

Then drove on to Karijini National Park arriving about 1pm – booked into the Dales Gorge campground had lunch and then went walking. Went via

Fortesque Falls to the Fern Pool

where we had a lovely refreshing swim.

The gorges here are different from those in the Kimberley. Here you descend into the gorge rather than walk up through a river bed between mountains. They are spectacular in their own way with vivid red cliffs and clear blue water pools.

From the Fern Pool we walked the length of Dales Gorge to the Circular Pool

– no-one else there and it was not only very beautiful but also extremely tranquil. A steep climb back up to the top followed be a cliff top walk with several lookouts was enough for one day – besides it was well after beer o’clock by this time.
Unfortunately Jill grew a couple of blisters during the days outings so out with the bandaids for the following day where we drove about 40km on a good dirt road to Weano Gorge, Joffre Gorge,

Knox Gorge

and Hancock’s Gorge. Most of them had a great lookout just a few hundred metres from the respective car parks.
We then climbed down a steep path plus ladder into Hancock’s Gorge and walked along to

Kermit’s Pool

and Rankin’s Pool

(which is named after an SES volunteer who perished trying to save people caught in a flash flood)

Both were very picturesque. Once again we had these pools to ourselves this time having got there early in the morning before most other campers had made a move. This walk was a category 5 walk and reasonably difficult although not that long.
The harder walks required abseiling gear and skills so we didn’t bother about then and drove back to camp via Kaliman Falls.
After lunch a few hours driving via Tom Price (apparently the tours no longer include the actual open cut mine and since I have worked in plenty of these and since Jill isn’t interested in other mining infrastructure (crushers, screens, conveyors, trucks etc) we didn’t stay), and Paraburdo we camped at another free camp on the way to Exmouth and the Ningaloo reef.