Our last day at Karijini and I was determined to get wet today despite there being no other willing particpants in our group 😉

We planned to tackle Dale’s Gorge, the one our campground was named after, the closest to us and home of the famous Fern Pool and Fortescue Falls.

We were rewarded with an almost empty Fern Pool and I wasted no time jumping in!

It was absolutely beautiful! Others who came along later informed us that the water was much colder at the Falls, but it was very pleasant in the pool. When it started to get a bit more populated and noisy we began the long walk back up, stopping for a breather at the falls before the climb.

Russell and I decided to do the rim walk around to Circular Pool viewpoint and back, very scenic but very hot and I was ready for another dip when we got back but couldn’t face doing the 280 steps back up.😂

You can do a similar walk down in the gorge but not all the way to Circular Pool now as a recent rockfall has blocked the trail.

The next day we headed north, stopping at scenic Tognolini Pass lookout from where we could see what was in store for us on the Great Northern Highway, namely numerous massive road trains heading to and from the mines…

We had almost made it unscathed but as we went up on to a bridge and a road train came down off of the bridge we were hit with rocks, one of them puncturing the windscreen. Fortunately it was not in the line of sight and so far has remained unchanged – we have decided to leave it until our return to Adelaide in case we get another one.

Our destination today was Port Hedland and we had a pretty special reason for visiting. Port Hedland is the home of my ‘newest’ nephew and we were excited to meet him and his family for the first time. I’m sure you can see some family resemblance. 😂😂

Cape Keraudren is just west of Pardoo Roadhouse which took a direct hit from recent Category 5 Cyclone Ilsa and the vegetation on either side of the road was almost flattened for many miles as we approached the turn off near the roadhouse. The roadhouse was completely destroyed and Cape Keraudren’s infrastructure has also been significantly damaged.

Nevertheless we had a great little stay with Kieran and his lovely family, beach combing with the kids at sunset and chin wagging around the campfire at night. The wind was incessant but did keep the legendary Cape Keraudren insects at bay. 😂

The next morning we said goodbye to the ‘new’ family as they prepared to head back to Port Hedland and we continued north toward Broome. Hopefully we will be catching up again in the not too distant future and thanks for your wonderful hospitality. 😍

After a good nights sleep we were ready to tackle day 2 of Karijini and drove over to the visitor centre for maps and tips.

We had heard of the infamous Banjima road (they sell a T shirt saying “I survived Banjima Road”) which the helpful lady in the visitor centre confirmed was possibly worse than yesterday’s drive but also considerably shorter so we decided to risk it in order to get to the Joffre, Hancock and Weano Gorges area.

 

 

It was pretty rough but much more scenic and before long we arrived at our first stop, Kalamina Gorge and its picturesque little waterfall.

John and Steph opted not to climb down so Russell and I explored the waterfall first and managed to get down to Rock Arch pool, another great swimming spot.

 

John and Steph were patiently waiting up top when we staggered up, we ramped up the car airconditioning and continued on to Joffre Gorge, just another corrugated road away 😂

Next stop a little further down the road, was Oxer Lookout from where it is possible (with a drone I’m sure) to see the junction of three gorges. It was still worth the short hike (without a drone) and we saw a very sad memorial to a local SES volunteer who had lost his life saving a tourist stranded in the flooded gorge below.

We subsequently saw dingoes most nights roaming through the campground and there was prominent signage everywhere warning about the dangers of human interaction with these native animals.

Russell and I stopped on the way home to do a little flying in front of imposing Mt Bruce. At 1,234m high, it is Western Australia’s second tallest peak.

We made it back to camp with just a little light left and planned an early night in order to do it all again on our last day tomorrow.

Leaving the coast behind, today we entered the Pilbara, en route to Karijini National Park which seemed to be on everyone’s “must see in WA” list.

To break up the journey from Exmouth we had overnighted in a free camp and then along the way caught up with a familiar character – the famous Red Dog of the Pilbara.

His statue sits in Paraburdoo where he was apparently born! Aussie readers will know him well thanks to the wonderful movie of the same name and non Australians should definitely google him and watch the film if they can access it. 😉

Next we had a one night stop in Tom Price, an iron ore mining town which is today under the control of mining giant Rio Tinto and has the distinction of being WA’s highest town.

We stocked up on groceries and other necessities as we were free camping in Karijini for three nights afterward with no facilities at all apart from (allegedly very clean and well maintained) drop loos!

We checked in to our campsite just after lunch leaving the afternoon free to get started which was fortunate as our first target was Hamersley Gorge in the north of the park. One hundred and ten kilometres later, half of them on bone jarring corrugated red dust roads, (thank god we ignored the visitor info lady’s suggestion to go there en route with the motorhomes) we arrived with our fillings intact.

The afternoon sun was illuminating the gorge wall as we reached the lookout and it was all worth it.

We could see down in the base of the gorge several families swimming in the rockpools and Russell and decided to venture down.

The dramatic beauty of this gorge has yet to be beaten thus far in our travels in my opinion.

Swirls of ochre hued rocks encase pristine pools which were getting well utilised on this hot afternoon, I wished I could join them but alas hadn’t come prepared for swimming 😒

Reluctantly putting my camera away I hiked back up to where the others were waiting, all of us aware that we had quite a long drive home and the sun was sinking quickly.

Deciding not to tackle the same road home we headed north through the gorge emerging eventually on to the road which would take us through the former town of Wittenoom. Wittenoom was once the centre of a thriving asbestos mining operation but the mine was shut down in 1966 due to its unprofitability, and growing health concerns about the longterm effects of asbestos. The declared contaminated site comprises 50,000 hectares (120,000 acres), making it the “largest contaminated site in the southern hemisphere”. It was also the inspiration behind Midnight Oil’s “Blue Sky Mine” for all of you rock stars.

Note John’s car on the far left of the first photo to get an idea of scale, he’s not that far past them!

It was fully dark by the time we reached Auski Roadhouse and fueled up, surrounded by massive road trains doing the same, and then we had another eighty odd kilometres to go, thankfully on bitumen this time.

An exhausting but awesome first day in Karijini, can’t wait to see what tomorrow brings.

Getting back on to Highway One our next point of interest was the Carnavon Space Museum. This facility in its original guise played a very important role in America’s space missions in the 1960s and early into the seventies, it was the last station to communicate with the space capsules leaving the earth’s orbit, and the last to make contact before splashdown in the Pacific Ocean. It is run by a group of passionate volunteers and a cat called Buzz and was an interesting and worthwhile stop, more info here.

After a brief overnight roadside stop we headed toward tiny Coral Bay with its beautiful white beaches and World Heritage listed Ningaloo Reef, the world’s largest fringing reef, on its doorstep. We arrived here quite early but with only one night we tried to make the most of it and chose a local 4WD track to Five Fingers Reef which proved to be very challenging but worth the effort. One of us got bogged (not us and no photographic evidence unfortunately 😉) but help was at hand and we all ended up at the beach where I was the only one brave enough to get wet. Even very close to shore the marine life was abundant over the reef with quite different corals to what I had seen in Queensland and I wished that I had had a snorkelling buddy to venture a bit further…

A relatively short drive the next day brought us into Exmouth on the tip of the North West Cape and the stepping off point for many activities including those based on the Ningaloo Reef. Our four nights here allowed time to attend to the mundane chores like overdue hair and beautician requirements but left time to check out the local attractions as well.

My bucket list activity here (for many years) had been to swim with the Whale Sharks and with Russell accompanying me as a non-swimmer (for moral support) it was with equal parts nervousness and excitement that we waited to be picked up at 0730 by the “3 Islands” bus.

After a short swim here it was out to sea for the main action. A spotter plane overhead was communicating with our skipper who followed these directions getting us into prime viewing area. We were dropped off the back of the boat in two groups probably about 100m apart, each with a guide who then positioned us to be in the right place as the whale shark swam by and then we swam like crazy after it for as long as we could keep up 😊

When the whale shark had outpaced us the boat came and retrieved us and we got back in ready to do it all again. We ended up repeating this four times for some absolutely amazing encounters but boy was it strenuous! The exceptional staff were on hand to offer assistance to those of us not in the Ian Thorpe league but the overall experience was surreal.

These creatures are the largest sharks, and indeed fish, alive today and can grow up to 18m long – the largest we saw was estimated to be about 7m, close to the size of our motorhome!

They feed on plankton and as with human fingerprints, whale sharks have a unique pattern of spots which allow individual sharks to be identified. 

We were to learn later in the day that the large female that we saw was a newly identified animal which everyone was quite excited about, for an as yet unknown reason the Ningaloo Whale Sharks are 75% male. Conversely a population studied near Portugal are about 75 % female.

Can you tell I was enthralled??? Along with the bear expedition in Alaska last year this would have to rank as one of the best activities I have ever undertaken, if you have time and funds to do it I highly recommend.

Over the next couple of days we drove the coastline of the Cape Range National Park, punctuated by stunning beaches, turtle hatcheries (just out of season for us), ship wrecks and diverse bird and wildlife.

We managed to squeeze in a short cruise up the gorge at Yardie Creek which is as far as you can go south along the coast toward Coral Bay before potentially dealing with the creek crossing. When we were there 4WD vehicles and caravans were going though fairly easily with only sand to negotiate, the water hasn’t been over for quite some time according to our tour guide.

Just north of Exmouth is the Harold E. Holt Naval Communications Station, a joint operation between the Australian and United States which provides very low frequency (VLF) radio transmission to the Unites States navy, the Australian navy and allied ships and submarines in the western Pacific Ocean and eastern Indian Ocean.

The town of Exmouth was built at the same time as the communications station to provide support to the base and to house dependent families of US Navy personnel and if our guide is to believed, once housed a baseball diamond, hot dog shop, cinema, bowling alley and olympic sized swimming pool.

We loved our stay on the Ningaloo coast and once again hope to re visit in the future.

North of Yanchep was totally new territory for me so I was more excited than usual as we headed off on the Indian Ocean Drive toward Cervantes. The road was in excellent condition and we made good time, stopping for lunch in Lancelin and then pulling into Cervantes mid afternoon, a perfect time for an ice cream at the Lobster Shack ((more on that later.)

John and Steph arrived a little later and we were treated to another stunning sunset that evening.

One of two reasons for staying here was to visit the peculiar Pinnacles in Nambung National Park. Thousands of tall limestone spires rise out of the sandy ground creating an eerie ‘other world’ setting best experienced by driving the 4.5 km track amongst them. Scientists have various different theories about their formation, more info here if you are interested.

An early start meant that we had plenty of time to get back to the Lobster Shack for a tour of the factory which was very interesting, who knew that unlike the Southern Rock Lobster, the Western Rock Lobster doesn’t have front claws???  This is a half billion dollar industry and over 95% are exported live overseas, previously to China but now to a more diverse market including the US and UK. 

 

The next couple of days saw us continuing to track north, visiting many picturesque coastal communities en route as well as a brief stop in Geraldton where we visited the HMAS Sydney memorial.

 

We had been intending to stay in the free camp at the Geraldton port but it was fully occupied so we pushed on and found delightful little Coronation Beach campground, somewhat fitting as the royal coronation was happening that week 😉

Our destination the next day was Kalbarri but on the way I had earmarked Hutt Lagoon as a ‘must see,’ reportedly one of the best pink salt lakes in the state and very Insta worthy. It didn’t disappoint and we spent a while there trying to capture her best angles.

 

We arrived in Kalbarri in time for the sunset cruise which departs from the Murchison River jetty and heads out through the mouth to track down the coast, providing wonderful views of the red cliffs as the sun sets.

The Kalbarri National Park is home to some stunning geological formations which are very easy to experience thanks to its newest attraction, the Skywalk. Completed a few years ago it consists of two cantilevered steel structures, anchored deep into the sandstone which allow visitors to look down into the gorge below through steel mesh. The larger of the two extends 25 metres over the edge of the gorge which is 100 metres below. It was a sensational view -but the flies! The flies were sooo bad we thought we were going to picked up by them and dropped over the edge. We had flynets for this eventuality but of course they were back in the motorhome 😒

Russell and I also climbed down to Nature’s Window (picture in the header above) but the flies really did impact our experience here and Steph and John had already given up so we headed back to the caravan park and relative peace.

Leaving the flies behind the next day we moved on to Denham, the main population centre of the World Heritage listed Shark Bay area. We hadn’t been able to secure accommodation at nearby Monkey Mia but planned to be there the next morning for the ‘scheduled’ dolphin visit. Denham itself was a lovely surprise with its beautiful clean beach and multiple car parks full of boat trailers, they take their fishing very seriously here!

The next morning we were up early to travel the 25 minutes or so to Monkey Mia where the world famous dolphins visit – in the words of the National Parks Wildlife Officer – “if they want to.” Many years ago when the dolphins first captured world wide attention they came in great numbers to be fed but it was to their eventual detriment as they lost the ability to feed for themselves, couldn’t pass this skill on to their offspring and numbers started to decline. These days the activity is much more controlled, the dolphins are all known to staff and if they do come in to shore they are only offered a very small proportion of what their daily requirements are, therefore they still have to hunt for themselves. Only a few females that have been ‘registered’ for the program are offered food and the whole exercise is very carefully controlled by the attendant Wildlife Officers. That said, it still enables tourists to get a very up close and personal view of the dolphins that do come in. We saw a total of five including a youngster who was practicing his fishing skills whilst mum came in closer.

As the dolphins headed back out to sea so did we, aboard a 60 foot catamaran for a scenic cruise that we hoped would show us the dugong or “sea cow” which inhabits these waters which are rich in sea grass. This was a fun experience, I even got to show a few guys how to hoist the sail and we did indeed see turtles and several dugongs but I think they are probably best photographed from below the waves….

The sky put on another show for us at sunset as we prepared for our departure the next day, I certainly hope we will visit again and allocate more time to this pristine and special part of Australia.