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| Watching the Perth sunset |
Another hot, dry, sweltering weekend! This relentless weather doesn't seem to be cooling off, leaving us little option but to only head outside in the cooler evenings, after sunset. We spend the beautiful twilight evenings walking around Perth's lamp-lit streets, strutting over the front yards full of beige sand.
The sunsets in Perth seem to last forever and are absolutely magical, showering the sky in oranges, pinks and purple hues.
After a busy week at work for John we decided to take some time this weekend for a relatively impromptu camping trip up the North West coast.
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| King Neptune watching over the Indian Ocean |
We packed the car with the bare essentials. A mini two person twelve dollar kmart tent, swimsuits, a towel, our little black gas cooker, frying pan, the duvet from our bed, some pillows, a couple of beers, a can of tuna, a bottle of wine, six eggs and a packet of cheese sausages. Sorted.
The sun bore down as we drove off, probably blistering our sad little burnt car further. Counting our lucky stars that we seemed to avoid most of the Friday traffic and off we raced through the city.
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| Two Rocks beach |
Our car chugged it's way North, driving along the coast until we reached Two Rocks marine park, where a ginormous King Neptune head bore down on us! We stopped to investigate although we didn't realise until later that we had wandered into an abandoned and derelict theme park. Built by Japanese investors in the 1980s it's been all but left to ruin. As the sun began to set, we took out a couple of Coronas, our can of tuna and sat down on the beach for dinner. The sky was beautiful and the birds seemed to dance and play with each other before us.
Back in the car later, we drove on. When we arrived at our planned destination, the small coastal village of Guilderton, the campground was full! But not disheartened we decided that roughing it a little wouldn't be so bad- it was only one night! Back off the main road we had definitely passed a rest area that looked passable as a place to camp. Turning around we found it just three kilometres down the road and a small sign indicated we were by the Moore River. It looked good, a little too much gravel perhaps, but enough bush to make our site secluded and there was even a large concrete table to cook breakfast on.
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| Getting ready for a night of camping |
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| A quick night cap |
The next morning we woke with the birds after a freezing cold restless sleep, constantly woken by trucks barreling past bouncing along on the tarmac.
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| Sausages for breakfast! |
It was just before sunrise while the sky was still a hazy grey blue. We brought out the little cooker and packet of cheese sausages frying them to a nice golden brown colour.
The eggs, fried on the dry pan.
Not only had we forgotten oil, we'd also forgotten the coffee, oh dear. It was a bit much for our foggy brains to comprehend.
Our day was just beginning, it was another 85kms to our destination: Nambung National Park. If we didn't make a stop for coffee the ride might get ugly, tensions were already high with the lack of caffeine flowing through our bodies.
Shortly after our breakfast, which we ate sitting in the car to warm up, we ventured off in quick search of a good tree/ablution block.
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| Roadside bush |
As well as the tree we found an interesting information board that explained that Moore river (National Park) had once been the location of a Government-lead aboriginal camp. The settlement was first opened back in 1918, with the intention to be a farming area for Aboriginal people, with local schooling and health facilities and employment opportunities.
But, during the 1920s its purpose shifted: residents were often brought there against their will and it grew to become an orphanage, creche, relief depot and home for old people, unmarried mothers, and the sickly. Many Aboriginal and mixed-race children were also sent to Moore River, usually forcefully, as part of the Stolen Generations. Other than a mass of trees and some clearings, there was very little to show that once hundreds of people had lived there.
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| Keep an eye out! |
Soon we were on the road again driving past the vast Indian Ocean and to our right, nothing but dry barren land. We were on our way to the Numbung National Park.
The park is a drawing factor due to it's wide collection of thousands of naturally formed Pinnacles, resembling a landscape from another planet. The unusually shaped limestone rocks 'pinnacles' take on an array of interesting formations; many have been given interesting names for their similarities to animals and everyday life objects and some look like hard erect appendages jutting out of the sand.
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| Playing around in the pinnacles |
The pinnacles are made of a limestone which is believed to have originally come from sea shells. However, scientists are still unclear on how the pinnacles were formed into the tall solid individual objects we now see.
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| Hectares of pinnacles |
The theory which sounded coolest to us is that the pinnacles are preserved tree casts that were once buried thousands of years ago. Due to natural processes the trunks hardened and then several millennia later wind erosion brought them out from under massive sand dunes to their present day level. However the dunes shift so much annually it's said that if you return years later you could be looking at an entirely different landscape as new pinnacles are uncovered and others reburied.
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| That''s a strange sight |
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| John and Kara kangaroo hunting |
By the time we arrived, the park information centre had just opened. We continued driving through the entrance gate into the desert, the wheels of the car slipped on the soft golden sand.
The first records of Europeans at the pinnacles dates back to the 1650’s, when the north and south coast were first chartered by the Dutch. They believed this area was a lost city. Local aboriginal people also believed that the pinnacles were the transformed bodies of the dead. As we drove through the large park we contemplated both interesting ideas. The landscape was serene and the pinnacles huge! Between them we saw an array of live. Shy grey kangaroos bounced past and large brown birds flew over our heads looking at the mice scurrying between rocks. There were animal footprints softly marked into the sand and plenty of tire tracks.
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| A quick rest stop |
We stayed over an hour, driving around then hopping out at different locations to play around the rocks before finishing off with a quick look in the information centre.
Leaving the park, we drove on along the desert-like highway, closer towards the coast. The warm air rushed through the car as we opened the windows. We really needed a coffee. It wasn't long before we finally reached Jurien Bay and falling from the car we skipped into a local cafe.
At the Jurien Jetty Cafe we bought two ice coffees sat outside on the picnic tables and watched the calm ocean water frolic against the sand.
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| Ice coffee all round! |
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| Jurien Bay |
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| Cervantes Bay |
Jurien bay was first settled around the mid-1850's and in 1885 a large jetty was constructed which lead to the growth of a small fishing village. However due to poor water supply the village remained small and shanty for generations. Today it's a booming holiday resort area with absolutely stunning clear water, a surrounding marine park and temperate weather year round. Not surprisingly there isn't much to see in Jurien bay. It's quiet and a perfect place to escape the hustle and bustle of city life. We walked down to the water and checked out the jetty but decided to move back down the coast and pick up lunch in a small town called Cervantes.
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At Cervantes Beach, Jurien Bay
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Cervantes, in the Shire of Dandaragan has a population of 472. There's one small strip of five shops, neatly in a line next to each other, a church, community hall and a petrol station. We stopped for a short rest under a massive pine tree, pulling the duvet from the car and napping under the hot sun.
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| Lake Thetis |
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| John in front of the stromatolites |
After a short rest that didn't at all help refresh us, we went to explore Lake Thetis on the village's east side. This unusual saline lake is one of the few places in the world with living marine stromatolites.
We didn't really know what those were, so when we arrived we hovered around the information board umming and ahhing.
The board read: "stromatolites are layered bio-chemical accretionary structures formed by the trapping of sedimentary grains in nutrient poor, alkaline water". Well, we weren't really any closer to understanding, so following the wooden boardwalk we checked out these old rock structures.
That's just what they looked like! Weird shaped rocks like as if some animal had come and dug a hole in the mud, perhaps a dog burying a bone. For something said to be billions of years old, it was sure growing slowly! We walked back to the car chatting about which route we should take back to Perth.
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| Amazing sand dunes in the distance |
We decided to drive more inland, which was a good choice.
It was hot and with the windows down because of our hobo air conditioning, the warm wind blew through the car. But we sat back and let it run over our skin. Winter's coming and who knows how cold it will soon get?
Tot siens,
John and Kara
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The long empty road home
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