On our way out of Shark Bay we made a brief stop at Shell Beach – a beach made entirely of tiny fragments of the Fragum cockle – conditions here render the water twice as saline as the sea and this is the only organism that thrives here with no natural predators. In some places the ‘sand’ is 10 metres thick. We have noticed that WA National Parks do a wonderful job in these very remote areas with interesting and informative signage and good facilities. Apparently the WA Govt. spent a lot of money in this sector during COVID and it certainly shows, we have been most impressed.
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.
We first travelled by bus for about 40 mins to the boat ramp on the western side of the peninsula and were then tendered out to the catamaran which today was being loaned from another company (Ningaloo Discovery) due to an engine problem with the 3 Islands boat. The hybrid staff did a fantastic job and before long we were off to our first snorkelling spot on the reef – I suspect for them to suss out our proficiency in the water – a lovely spot which once again yielded lots of marine life.
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.
Our crew explained that the photographer would be taking a photo of the area right above their pectoral fins and behind their gill slits which would then be uploaded it here where sophisticated software would either identify it as a ‘known’ animal or catalogue it as a new identity.
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.
