Pemberton to Albany

Last minute booking saw us searching for our next holiday home in Quinninup. As it turned out, the little timber mill cottage was straight out of Lissa’s dream home catalogue. Timber cladding, woodfire, cute bedrooms and a bread-machine to start the day in style, Splendid Wrens to greet you in the backyard. Wow, what a winner.

With clear skies we set out towards Manjimup. First stop was the Diamond tree; one of 3 fire towers now open for tourists. Climbing up the metal spikes  became a boys activity with 3 generations of Harris men reaching the top platform

Above the surrounding trees at a height of 60m we had quite a view but the thrill was in the climb. The girls managed to reach the halfway platform, a feat in itself.

Manjimup remains in the thick of the timber industry and seems to be flourishing. Hardwood plantations abound along with trucks laden with freshly cut logs. A walk around the Timber Museum grounds gives a view into the early years when big tree were brought down, transported and processed with the most rudimentary equipment. Hard work for hard men. It’s hard to imagine a modern Australian lasting very long in such a harsh world even if they snuck an ipod into the time machine.

Heading south on Day 2 to the sleepy holiday shacks of Windy harbour we got a glimpse of the Great southern coastline. The heavy wooded forests vanish, becoming low swampy marshland and then sand dunes.

Northcliffe offers a sculpture walk through the bushland with accompanying audio recordings of the artist’s reflections.  

Our final day with Nanny and Big Pop was a wet one. All aboard the Pemberton Tram for a trip through the Karri forest. 

Our guide informed us that Pemberton is home to the largest hard wood timber mill in the southern hemisphere. This may be the only fact that he managed to complete. In his anxiety to share all his knowledge, he skipped through information like a scratched CD. He was a classic case of a nerd with ADD; what grownups call a “character”.

With our guests and their credit card heading home, we hitched up our trailer ready for the home stretch. Only 5000km from home, looks like we will beat Santa.

The weather is fine and it’s hard not to enjoy coastline like this. Walpole is the first sign of civilisation as you swing down around the SW corner. It is the wet end of the state, with thick forests drinking deeply or lush pasture where trees once stood. It is a picturesque place which would be carved up by developers,  if only they could it move towards the rest of the world.

Walpole sits on the edge of the tea coloured waters of Nornalup inlet. Up the road is the Valley of the Giants tree top walk. Those who didn’t fancy clinging to the metal spikes and scaling a 60m tree in Pemberton get their chance to clear the canopy on a suspended walkway. I found the walk to be much more enjoyable than I expected. 

The drive continues through the old growth forests with stops at the Tingle Trees. These giants flare out at the base of the trunk to be up to 20m in diameter.

The tourist trail continues along the southern coast with more wineries, gourmet foods and galleries around Denmark. Scenic hilltop farmland with views to the ocean. Beautiful, but no place for the budget conscious. Our destination, Parry Beach is certainly basic but who can resist a beachside campspot. 

The water nearby was shallow and calm but we managed to find a spot to fish and we set about catching herring for our next fishing expedition. Eva and I had our own little session. Fishing is a mandatory pastime in our family. 

It’s what separates us from the beasts.

Elephant Rocks and Green Pool lie at the other end of the beach from Parrys. Beautiful scenery.

The harbour at Albany must have just cried out to the early explorers to be settled. The coastline is magnificient, bays, islands and peninsula at every turn. To me, I see fishing spots for all conditions.

The southern peninsula displays the deep water power of the Southern Ocean and the sheltered bays inside the Harbour. Crystal clear water and white sand allow you to see straight to the bottom.

Up until 1978, the local economy grew from the whaling station inside the bay. The site is now a museum detailing the history of whaling in the area. It is a gruesome business combining the roughest tasks of sailing and abattoir work. 

All this danger and carnage produced oil for such luxuries as lipstick, margarine, leather tanning, watch gear oil and automatic transmission oil. The whale skeletons themselves are mind boggling. The Blue Whale has a tongue the size of an African Bull Elephant. Cop that!

 It’s a hypocritical world. After sitting through a video presentation detailing the danger of shark overfishing, we noticed that the onsite café listed “Bronze Whaler” as its fish of the day. How Australian.

I was expecting a few more people in such a beautiful part of Australia as Albany. It is testament to the remoteness of the state that even in the temperate climate of the South, there are no real cities.

North of Albany is Mt Barker and The Porongurup Range. The ancient mountain island is covered in Karri forest and the view from the granite skywalk on top of Castle Rock shows farmland and plantation timber all the way to the coast.

We could easily spend a month in Albany, but in the name of progress and economy we push east stopping at Cape Riche for some beach side camping. These $10 a night beach camps suit us to a tee. 

Perth to Augusta

Perth has its own “central coast” in the towns of Rockingham and Mandurah. No, I don’t mean a land of salt water bogans, although I’m sure there are plenty of them. (Sorry Sare. I love Gosford and all the shanty towns up your way). Packed with a cashed up mix of retirees and commuters the suburbs are bursting at the seams. Just like Perth, everyone gets a sea breeze. You get the feeling that one big wave could moisten the carpets of millions.

A fellow chiro and friend from Uni days has settled in Mandurah. Brett and Kim kindly offered put us up on our visit. That’s right, a real house with a roof and all. Kael bunked down with 9 year old Kylan and the girls enjoyed handling the pet rats.

With the imminent arrival of Nanny and Big Pop we set up a rendezvous in Rockingham. It was a buzz for the kids to see their grandparents after 5 months away. With the kids buzzing with excitement we took our lunch on the short ferry trip across to Penguin Island. Although home to a colony of Little or Fairy Penguins, the island is dominated by nesting Silver Gulls and the impressive King Skink. Both penguin parents spend their day hunting, only returning after sunset to feed the waiting chicks.

We were informed that our best chance to spot a resident penguin was at the feeding demonstration, but eagle eyed Lissa managed to spot 2 babies sitting patiently in their nests. Naomi also spied a large Sea lion lazing under a rock ledge.

Our first 3 nights were spent in Bunbury where we had booked a cabin along side our tent site. With overcast skies and a bit of rain the extra kitchen space and beds came in handy. Bunbury is similar in size and appearance to Port Macquarie. Nice enough, probably very liveable, but a little low on the wow factor. A day trip to Donnybrook is popular with families to tackle the giant free playground.

Moving further south to Busselton we made a strategic move into a holiday house on the Abbey Beach. It turned out to be a great move with space to spread out and all the mod cons we have done without. Ping pong and toys in the back room were a real bonus. The kids devoured the lego and Kael flexed his competitive muscles playing cards and kicking the footy with Big Pop. 

Busselton seemed like a nice place with a huge jetty reaching into the Bay.

From Abbey Beach we made day trips down into the Margaret River region to gorge ourselves at the chocolate factory, watch the sheep being milked for the cheese maker, sample some locally made icecream, buy bread from the woodfired bakery. None of these activities were approved by weight watchers.

The maze and puzzle centre turned out to be a great place for inclement weather. The weather seemed to change every 10 minutes with rain clouds blown up from the southwest.

Dunsborough was our chance to chase a whale aboard one of the whale watching cruises. Our Skipper managed to track down a Humpback mother and her baby, as well as 2 brief Blue Whale sightings. There may be as few as 5000 Blue whales left, so it was quite a sight to see the gigantic creatures (for some of us anyway).

The coastline around Margaret river is wild and rugged. We made many scenic detours to examine the beaches and headlands. No signs of the famous swell as the ocean was blown out and messy. The lighthouse at Augusta marks the meeting point of the Southern and Indian Oceans. 

From this SW corner, everything now will be to the east. 

Kids Journal Entries

Kael

Kael

Naomi

Naomi

Perth minus Mum

First impressions of our mum-less home were not favourable. No pool, no playground, no kids; rather Spartan. Not so much a campground as a retirement village. But as they say: Never judge a retirement village by its toy room. They also say: If the dentures fit, wear them. With most of our neighbours we had a monopoly on the toilet block and camp kitchen. 

Each afternoon at dusk the resident Bandicoots would emerge from the sand dunes on the hunt for food scraps. There are dozens of species of little marsupials which have eluded us on our travels, so it was a buzz to have the little critters sniffing around the tent.

When Dads are in charge, stuff happens. We do stuff. Not so much house work, just stuff. Get out early, get out often. It’s a philosophy that may end in bankruptcy and residential squalor if it was allowed to continue for more than a few weeks. But, let’s face it, who would be crazy enough to leave their children with their husband for that long? Exercising my autonomy early we set the controls for the heart of Perth city with a trip Scitech: A place where kids rub shoulders with nerds in the name of Science. Where science nerd Dads go, even without their kids. If only my University physics classes were held here, it may not have taken me 6 years to graduate.

Sunday in Perth saw us team up with friends from Uni days at their church and then lunch by the river.

Big city playgrounds are always worth a look. A bit of free entertainment at the expense of the local tax payers never fails. Perth has Kings Park with it’s views of the skyline. Sadly, the much hyped park with the volcano proved to be closed; something about a lava refill.

The mint is worth a look if just for the gold pouring demonstration. Heating a gold bar in the furnace and pouring the glowing red liquid from the crucible to the mould, then watching return to solid gold. I got me a little case of gold fever just watching. According to the scales in the museum, the combined current value of the kids is just under $3 million. I think I’ll wait a year or 2 before I cash them in.

After possibly one of my favourite Dad weeks ever we excitedly drove to the airport to collect our little jet setting Mummy. With Mum safely back in the nest we sampled the delights of Cottesloe Beach, Fremantle and the city centre before exiting the big smoke.

Kalbarri to Perth

Rolling into Kalbarri without a booking in the school holidays is like turning up to the beach without your Mankini. Strangely, things worked out rather smoothly as we claimed the last campsite in town, and it had a view.

Forecasters were proved correct with strong southerly winds buffeting the little fishing village. The kind of wind that has you wondering if your tent will be standing when you return from a day out. The kind of wind that could see a Jayco take flight and a Retreat Caravan, well, retreat.

As we approach the populated south west things like libraries and Op shops are coming back into play. Lissa has taken the kids school work down to the tiny Kalbarri Library for a change of scenery.

It is a pretty little town set right in the Murchison River which cuts through the national park. Most boats stay in the river with plenty of waves at the river mouth. It seems that the town remains very much a tourist haven with masses of retirement developments hidden behind. 

Steep cliffs stretch to the south and the surrounding national park is littered with wildflowers. The river cuts deep into the land providing great viewing from the lookouts. There is a little bit of everything in Kalbarri making it popular with holiday makers.

Our time in Geraldton coincided with the annual “Airing of the Quilts” day in Northhampton. As you can imagine, one of us was busting to get there. I had to drag Lissa along. The town was alive with quilt lovers poring over hundreds of quilts. A fashion parade on the steps of the convent proved to be great entertainment with gowns from the 50’s, 60’s and 70’s on show. The compare was the most glamourous woman in the Shire who described the final outfit: “Dianne is wearing another one of Mrs McDonald’s frocks that she wore to the wedding of her eldest son. You will notice the genuine fox fur, which I must say it looks decidedly better than the one my grandchildren shot this morning.” 
Top Shelf!

We pulled in at the sleepy coastal towns of Dongara and Jurien Bay on our way past Geraldton. Kael and I caught some live bait and cast them out off the breakwall at Dongara. Our preparation was rewarded with a little Mulloway (me) and a Banjo Shark (Kael).

From Jurien Bay the road passes through stretches of sand dunes which appear like snow capped peaks in the distant sun. One of these dunes strewn with a vast collection of pointy rocks emerging from the sands. The drive through the Pinnicles is quite magical. It is a striking scene for photographs, rather subline.

This is also the land of wheat fields. Neat rows of grain and bales of hay. Fishing shacks which cluster on the calm shoreline are reminders of a time when this coastline was anyones, literally.

Detouring through Yanchep NP for lunch we were pleasantly surprised to find 11 resident Koalas waiting to be spotted in the trees.Our descent into Perth was moved forward to allow Lissa to fly to France for the Funeral of her much loved Pappy. It was a shock to the system to drive into the big smoke after months of town and country. Perth is the real deal. It looks like a city, smells like a city, I bet the coffee even tastes like it should in a city. It’s a good looking city too. The Swan river system provides plenty of waterfront suburbs to live in or just enjoy the waterside parkland.

With the tent all set up by the beach we dropped Lissa at the airport, leaving us set a week near Fremantle. Sounds like an adventure for everyone.

Before I go, it’s time to hand out the annual awards for bathroom excellence. 

And the winners are:

Coogee: hot water then cold. Best portrayal of a bipolar shower.

Jurien Bay: instant bathroom renovation. Paint over everything: Tiles, cabinets. Heck, why not paint the urinal.

Geraldton: Shower stalls so narrow that you need to eat desert after you get out lest you won’t fit in.

Honourable mentions to all those shower blocks with sticky floors, big peeking gaps around the doors, impotent showerheads and stale smokey aromas.

Carnarvon to Shark Bay

From Carnarvon the road follows the coast with a turn off to Denham taking you looping back up along the narrow peninsula of Shark Bay. Large sheltered bays are formed by the 2 fingers of land with shallow grass beds home to the endangered Dugong. Driving up towards Denham gives glimpses of the ocean to both the east and west. It is the stuff of postcards. 

The warm salty water of the bay is home to one of the few remaining colonies of Stromatolites. These ancient life forms may be more interesting to read about than observe. Our kids spent more time spotting 2 week old Welcome Swallows in the mud nests under the boardwalk than examining the 2 billion year old Bacteria. 

  

Peninsula narrows to a few hundred metres at one point where a large electric fence has been put to eliminate ferals. We passed family after family of feral goats on our way down from Carnarvon. Native marsupials including the Bilby have been reintroduced into Francois Peron NP. 

The park was our first destination with beachside campsites nearing the tip. A sandy track gave way to mud flats and back to sand. It was soft in parts making hard work for the car towing the trailer behind. At one point it required some digging, dropping our tyre pressure further and some low range power to get us out. 

Camping on the dunes at Gregorys suited us to a tee.  We woke to the sounds of a Wedgebill. The bird book provides an accurate impression of its metallic voice singing “Did you get drunk?” Manta rays and turtles were spotted from the cliffs at Cape Peron however the Dugongs eluded us. Sand and shrubs, it’s a lizard nirvana.

Denham overlooks Shark Bay exposed to the South West winds which seem to dominate the winter. It is more a gateway to the bay and the miles of coastline. It’s too windy to fish and swim. Denham’s Aquarium gives us an all weather window to the aquatic world. Our guide informed us that he was having trouble getting the large shark up to feed after he attacked and ate a smaller shark in front of an earlier tour group. Lucky them.

One of those overhyped but inevitable attractions is the resort of Monkey Mia. Crowds are drawn to chase the turtles, dolphins and dugongs or just lounge around the beach. When Naomi was chosen to step forward to feed the wild dolphins, she wasn’t so keen. No prizes for guessing who took her place.

Along with Ningaloo Reef, Shark Bay has to be the must see spots on the WA coastline.