The wild australia

We, Caroline Cat and I, started our trip in western australia on the 19th of January after flying from Melbourne to Perth. There were two loops to be done in western australia sleeping on campings and national parks in the middle of nowhere. The first one in the south west and the other one going north from Perth until Exmouth and then coming back through the outback. After buying all our camping gear and the first shopping, we were ready to start our trip!!!

the one at the end is not Pau

Nothing is cheap in australia, and camping is not an exception, but it is an amazing experience. We were starting to know australia slowly, from more touristic places to more remote and isolated areas.
The first swim on the sea was weird. We were not sure if there were sharks in the area. Nobody was getting in the sea for more than a few meters, so we did. Then we move down and there we found the biggest waves I have never seen. It looked like an aquatic park. You could try to get in the sea when the waves were breaking but it was impossible, the wave took you back to the sand. Sometimes you had the water coming back from the previous wave and you could not even control when to breath. It was the best aquatic attraction in my life.

try to get in...

Then we went to the Margaret River region, where we enjoyed a day of wineries and wine tasting. By the end of the day we had our first wild life contact. We went to a beach were you can see rays that come to the sand and even wait for you to touch them. Some of them were already quite big, very nice!!! This is australia, where wild life is close and accessible to everybody!!!

rays by the beach

That night we slept in a national park. It is really nothing but a bush toilet and a barbaque. When you arrive to the national park camping area, you pay around 8 dollards per person per night that you put in an envelope in a box and go to put your tent up. Then you start preparing the dinner and have some drinks on the dark forest.

The day after we started moving east to the forest of the giants. They are this ecaulyptus trees that are amazingly tall. From one natinal park to another we passed by very nice landscapes, starting to drive in graved roads, what we should not suppose to do with our rented car, but this is western australia and graved roads are very common and they are part of the experience.

some roads

In one of this national parks we went up to the tallest tree in western australia, 68 meters. It does not look that high, but I can guarantee that it is really high, and even more when you are climbing it by yourself. There are some iron pins stack in the tree to allow you to reach the top of the tree. From there you could see all around. You could feel the high, the fresh air, and you could not see clearly the bottom. But the worst was to come, getting down. In a different park, we did the tree top walk that goes through an elevated walk way that goes up to 40 meters high from tree to tree. This one was a touristic thing, but still worth it.

what a tree

When moving on towards the est, we came back to the beaches and the natural pools. In the south, the sea is very rough and you must be very careful with the courrents. So you have to be aware of where you can swim.
Next destination was Fitzgeral National Park. This was the australia that I expected. When you get into the national park, you can read a signal that says: 'No water in the next 80 km'. But it was 80 to get to the place by a bush landscape and 80 more to come back. During the trip we found only one car before reaching the camp site, and there, there were only 3 cars more. There we were, in the middle of nowhere, 7 people in 80 km all around. There, you feel in the wild. The girls went out for a walk and saw two snakes, during dinner time in the dark, we heart some noise, and suddently a Kanguro came towards us from the bush. He stopped two meters far from us and stared at us for a while before leaving. We stay one night there with a massive wild white beach for us and a few people more.

wild, wild, wild

The morning after we move to the next national park, only 300 km away. Getting into the park we saw the first wild emus that are like an ostrich. Cape Le Grand National Park is meant to have the nicest and whitest beaches of western australia...

You can not see it.. but it was amazing

This was the south of western australia and now, we were ready to discover the real outback of australia. We drove for at least 400 km before reaching the biggest city in the australian outback, Kalgoorlie-Boulder. As almost all the cities in the outback, there was a mine, the biggest one in western australia. What a city!!! With 30.000 habitants, the city looks completely dead... a few shops and nothing else in the big red dessert. We did a day excursion of 400 km to see the Anthony Gornley installation in the middle of a dry salt lake. There were around 52 statues of the members of a town. It was amazing, being in the middle of the lake in the middle of the installation close to nowhere.

In the way back to Perth, we passed by the wave rock.

surfing the rock

Then, we were ready to start the second part of the trip in western australia. This loop, as the first one was going to be full of amazing landscapes. We visited the pinnacles, a pink lake, a shell beach, a beach with no sand only white shells, and a bunch or rays and reef sharks from a clif before arriving to monkey mia.

pinnacles

and more dunes

what a clever prince

Monkey Mia was the first place were we felt on holidays in australia. We have been travelling and visiting a lot of places, but this place was so relaxing that it makes you feel like summer beach holidays. We were in a camping by the beach and every morning the dolphins came to the beach. But we were not very lucky and the first day, they did not come. We went on a cruise on a very nice catamaran looking for wild life. We saw some turtles, dugongs and a few small reef sharks. When we got back to the beach we saw a few dolphins by the beach, they were really swimming with you, only a few meters far.

donphins by the beach

Then we kept going north till Coral Bay. As the name indicates, there were corals, and which corals. All king of shapes and a lot of different fishes. It was really amazing. We went on a boat tour for a day which included two dives and one snorkle with the manta rays. The first dive was not very amazing. The manta rays snorkle was amazing. We followed a manta ray for a few minutes, what an amazing animal, so big, between 2 and 4 meters width. On the last dive the coral was amazing and we could see a shark cleaning station. What the hell a shark cleaning station is? (that is the same that I asked myself) It is clear, a natural area where the sharks go to be cleaned by small fishes. Around 8 sharks were in the cleaning station at the same time, queueing to be cleaned. When it is their turn, they put themselves in a 45 degree position (mouth on top), they open their mouth in a way that I could see their teeth and a bunch of tiny fishes clean them... isn't it amazing? it was like a documentary on the TV.

We still had a lot of coral and tropical fish to see in the next stop around Exmouth. The first day, I went with a german friend to dive in one of the 10 top dives for short distance in the world. The exmouth navy pier. It is a marine pier created by the american marines and now controlled by the australian navy. I have never seen so many fishes, so many fish schools of and of course a few sharks just lying down at the bottom of the sore. But the most amazing thing was the Big Friendly Grouper. This is a huge cod that is like a kid and only wants to play with the divers. I was just diving enjoying the amount of fishes that I was seeing when the instructor pointed to my back. I turned around and I saw a huge fish head a few centimeters from my face... I was really scared... this cod is soooo big that anyone would be amazed. It is more than 150 kg and he is not scared of people, all the oposite, he gets really close to you and tries to play with you what is ok if you have seen it before, but at the first time ... At the end you even had to push him to make him go away.. but in a few minutes, he was back... so amazing. I was with a big group but I lost my buddy...
WHERE IS MY BUDDY, PABLO!!!!

There, we stayed for four days in a national park where there were not drinkable water in 50 km. We did have the beach and a tap of not drinkable water. It was really hot but the beaches were plenty of corals, so every day we had a snorkle seeing very nice and shaped corals. The last day just before getting into the water, a german friend that just finished snorklying, saw two sharks that were going around him in circles. Would you swim? Of course we did, it was meant to be the best snorkling of the region, so we could not miss it. But likely, we did not see any shark, even though we did not stay enough time in the water to let them come to meet us...

The beach was finished and we got inland to visit the Karijini national park. That day we had to drive for more than 500 kilometers. We were getting into the real outback. There are petrol stations each 200-300 km and if you miss it....that's it. In this national park there were no beach  but some amazing rivers in canions. In this area there were Dingos, that are like wild dogs, so you have to be careful. On the last day, we saw a few snakes, and one of them in the water that passed only a few centimeters from Cat's head... scary. It was a small one, only 30 cm long, but later on, we were told that the small ones are very dangerous, because they do not know how to control the amount of venom that the release in each bite. And it was in fact, one of the most dangerous snakes in western australia.

When we though that our trip was finishing and we were returning to Perth, we had the most interesing western australia outback experience. We camped in a road house and on the bar we meet Travis, an australian truck driver. What a night!! He started to pay us drinks and we did so with him. We ended a bit drunk playing pool, dancing very old songs played from the music box and having a very nice night. The day after, it was not that good.

Now flying to the east coast...