The drive to Kalbarri was like driving through a colorful carpet of wildflowers, great variety and quantity!  We stopped at two lookouts on the way in and were treated to views of the Murchison River and the gorges.  After errands and lunch in town we did the 12 k coastal cliff drive which features a range of rock formations along a very scenic coastline with descriptive names like: Blue Holes, Red Bluff Lookout, Mushroom Rock, Pot Alley, Natural Bridge, Island Rock and Shellhouse Grandstand.  As it was a windy and cold day we didn’t walk as much as normal before checking into a farm campground with sea views.  The walking came the next day when we visited the gorges.  It was also the flynet day! (People often look at us because we use hiking poles, so adding the fly nets is another cause for more weird looks).  We started with the Z-Bend Lookout and River Trail, which was only 2.6k’s return but took 2 hours.  It was a tough climb down to the river involving 4 ladders and lots of rock climbing.  Then we tackled the Loop Lookout and Nature’s Window, one of WA’s most iconic natural attractions as the rock window perfectly frames the river below. We did some of the Loop walk which involved more climbing on cliff tops and great views of the Murchison River and how it loops around.  There were more, longer walks to be done but we left them for another time and headed off inland to more wildflower country.  Passed by the Pink Lake, which is pink due to the presence of carotenoid producing algae which is a food coloring agent and source of Vitamin A.  Made a stop at the Geraldton Tourist Info office just in case they had some useful info, and we’re very glad we did.  They sent us to an obscure country road (40 km out of the way) to see wild wreath flowers which are delightful and quite beautiful.  We stayed at the Coalseam Conservation Park where we knew the volunteer camp hosts, Pete and Sue, who we’d met on our travels. The campground is covered with a layer of yellow flowers.  Joined in the communal campfire which was pleasant and social.

Visited a couple of scenic places in Coalseam before leaving.  Another fly net day!  Treated ourselves to lunch in Dongara (Trip Advisor comes up with good recommendations) before checking into a CP famous for its wildflowers and walking tracks.  Saw more wildflowers during our 5 k walk, and also visited a frog pond with over 20 kinds of frogs – sounded like a motorcycle track, and a bird hide where we saw ringneck parrots and honey eaters.  Met an interesting couple, Sandy and Allan, so invited them in for tea and a travel chat.  Had another good chat with them before we both left the campground the next morning.  We headed to Lesueur NP which is named after a natural history artist aboard the French ship ‘Naturaliste’ in 1801. Lesueur is a biodiversity hotspot and an important reserve for flora conservation.  We drove through, admired the wildflowers and visited the lookouts but didn’t have time for any bushwalks, and did a food mission instead.  WA is famous for exports of live Western Rock Lobsters, and as we were in the area we visited ‘The Lobster Shack’ which is a factory for processing and packaging lobsters for live export.  We skipped the factory tour and enjoyed a lobster lunch.  It was raining heavily as we drove to The Pinnacles but fortunately it stopped when we got there.  The Pinnacles are thousands of ancient limestone pillars rising from the sands of the desert.  We did the 1.2k walk and the 4 k drive through The Pinnacles which cover an area of approximately 190 hectares or 470 acres.  Its quite a strange landscape to explore and our last attraction before we hit the bright lights of the big city of Perth for a few days.

Note – the wildflowers are so amazing that I’ve given them their own blog, coming next!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Started with a visit to the Quobba Blowholes – they were impressive!  Passed thru Carnarvon for a grocery stop and met our fellow Explorer owners, Pete & Ruth, who gave us fish for about four meals as they’d caught more than they could eat on a fishing charter.   Drove to Denham in Shark Bay and had fresh fish for dinner, and gave some away to our CP neighbors.  I wanted to see dugongs (large, herbivorous marine mammals aka sea cows as they graze on seagrass) again so we went to Monkey Mia and did a nature cruise on an 18 meter sailing catamaran.  Luckily we did find a dugong and saw her quite close up although it was a cloudy day so the visibility was not so good. We also saw lots of dolphins playing out in the ocean and we did see one being fed at the beach (the “standard” Monkey Mia experience) as we boarded our boat.  This is a very pretty area and Little Lagoon was another great sight we passed on the way.

Visiting Ningaloo and now being in Shark Bay, both amazing marine environments where we have seen dugongs, whales, sharks, manta rays and dolphins quite close up in the wild, has been good.  In fact, it feels like a special privilege to be able to spend time in these world heritage environments, and to see some of nature’s best being appreciated and protected for future generations.

Francois Peron NP, named after an early French explorer who made a significant contribution to recording the natural and social history in this area, is a great camping area for 4WD travellers.  There was a lot of French exploration on the WA coast, and that comes through in many of the names.  We visited the Peron homestead which has an interesting self-guided walk through the original sheep station and a wildlife display, but the best part was the artesian bore water hot tub (40C water).  After a 50 k drive along very soft sandy roads (tires were down to 15 and 25 psi, front and rear) we found a nice campsite about 2 minutes from the beach with great views.  Finished the day with a sunset beach walk and met a Swiss couple (Peter and Suzanne) camped near us.  They had a roof top tent and were freezing as it was quite cold and windy, so we invited them in for an after dinner cup of tea and chat, which was very much appreciated.  We feel very lucky to have a warm place to eat and sleep in, especially when its cold, windy or raining.

Enjoyed a slow start (ie 10:30 sleep in), and then got my sand driving practice by driving to Cape Peron where we were met by stunning scenery – red cliffs, white sand and beautiful blue oceans.  Its also the spot where bay and ocean waters converge (Shark Bay and the Indian Ocean).  Did the cliff walk to Skipjack point; lots of wildflowers, thousands of cormorants along the shore, saw seagrass meadows and a turtle and manta ray in the water and four feral goats on the land.  Very easy to understand why this is also a world heritage area.

As we left Peron NP we stopped for another soak in the artesian bore hot tub, and then met up with Pete and Ruth (Explorer owners) for a coffee in Denham.  We covered various points of interest we had missed on the way in – Town Lookout, Thong Shack (where people attach their old thongs), Eagle Bluff Lookout (saw a shark and a ray in the water), Shell Beach (made up entirely of Hamelin Cockle or Coquina shell) and then we went to Hamelin Pool to see the Stromatolites.  These are the oldest living organism and give a glimpse into life over 3.5 billion years ago.  We did see the electric feral proof fence across the narrow neck of the peninsula which is designed to keep feral animals out of the area as part of a program called Project Eden.  A number of almost extinct species (ie bilby’s) have been successfully reintroduced into this important and diverse habitat.  That completed our time in Shark Bay which satisfies all four natural criteria (natural beauty, evolutionary history, ecological processes, & biological diversity) for world heritage listing.

Note for anyone travelling in WA – buy a WA park pass as soon as you arrive.  We would have saved heaps as we visited 13 of the 18 parks in the NW area alone.