Half-lap Day 88: Cape Range National Park -> Coral Bay

The wind did not pick up much overnight, it was a fairly still, quiet night and we all slept really well, such a relief! I was up before sunrise and was going to sit outside the tent and do some blogging, the sight of the sun about to rise over the ranges though convinced me to head up to the beach. It was a little windy and the tables would have been a bit uncomfortable, so I found a sheltered spot down on the sand and sat and typed and watched the waves and the sunlight and the whales. Tony and Millie came and sat at the tables and watched the ocean for a while too, and I joined them. A pod of dolphins swam past again, very exciting to see.

It was a bright, sunny morning and the water was a light blue and almost completely clear, we could see all the rocks and where the coral was, and there was no swell at all. It looked so inviting and it felt rather sad that it was time to leave. Millie couldn’t understand why we couldn’t just stay another day – bookings here need to be made online and the whole National Park was booked out for days in advance, so there was no chance of us being able to extend our stay even by a day.

We wandered back to the tent and had our breakfast, and started packing up a little. I had charged the other homeschooling family’s camera in our car overnight, as they didn’t have a USB charger they could use, and the mum came to collect it so we had a bit more of a chat. Once she left it was 8.30 and we still had most of the packing to do. The single guy next to us (who had a magnificent long grey beard) looked at all our stuff and wondered how we could possibly get it all into our car and trailer.

The kids went to play on the beach and found a hut made from driftwood, up above the beach to the south of our main beach. They played happily there for the rest of our pack up time, which went really smoothly and we were done by just after 10, one of our quickest pack ups ever, especially since we’d taken a lot of stuff out of the car. I went up to tell the kids it was time to go and they showed me the hut, there were stones for tables and chairs, and a log to use as a couch. Millie was decorating it with shells. It was a fantastic place to play, and very very difficult to leave.

The National Park in general was hard to leave – the beaches were so beautiful and the setting just amazing with the low ranges to west. Our campsite at North Kurrajong was Tony’s favourite campsite yet, being large and flat and with a great view across the bushes to the sand dunes. The toilets here were the best drop toilets we’ve used – clean and fresh and in quiet nice buildings – better even than some of the flush toilets at places we’ve stayed.

We tore ourselves away and drove out of the park and up to the Turtle Centre near the point of the cape. This had a display explaining the life cycle of a turtle and outlining all the dangers turtles face. It was quite interesting and well laid out. While we were there the family we’d met on our first night at Karajini arrived – the 4yo girl who Millie had played with her toys with. We chatted about what we’d done since then – they’d driven up the Rio Tinto road alongside the railway from Tom Price to Karratha – I only found out about it when they told me they were doing it, and we didn’t really have time for that detour, but I’d love to do it one day. They said it was great, driving alongside the trains!

We wandered down to the beach, very different here close to the point of the cape, much rougher even though it was still inside the reef. The rocks looked more worn and it didn’t look like a good place to snorkel. We think though that this is where the turtles tend to nest. The kids found some fishing line stuck in some molluscs on the rock, so they pulled the line free and we put it in the bin.

We drove around to Exmouth – the VLF aerials didn’t look quite so freaky on a clear sunny day. Tony dropped the kids and I off at the water play park in town, and he went off to get new tyres for the car. We were all excited that the weather was good enough for the water play (it had been too cold and wet to consider it earlier in the week when we were in Exmouth) – there was a sign on the gate saying that it was closed for maintenance. We were surprised, because all the water was running – then a council employee told us that there had been a problem with the pump, it was fixed but now the chlorine levels were too high, they’d be testing it throughout the afternoon and it might be open again in a few hours. We weren’t planning on sticking around that long so everyone was very disappointed.

We thought we might go for a swim at the public pool instead – we got there and it was closed for winter. We walked over to the shops, and found a newsagent/souvenir shop and browsed in there, finding a few more gifts for people and a pack of Ningaloo Reef playing cards that I had planned to buy at the Visitors Centre in the Park, and forgotten to go back and get. Millie bought herself some Shopkins, the first she’s had, so she was quite excited. We also found a book called ‘A snorkelers guide to common fish of the Ningaloo Reef’, which was the kind of book we had been looking for at Cape Range – it was $35 though, so we didn’t buy it on top of the book we already had.

We went to the bakery and bought some day old cheese and bacon rolls for lunch, and day old finger buns for an afternoon snack. Then to the IGA and got a packet of Magnums to share, as compensation for not being able to play in the water park. We went and ate them in the park, and chatted to a couple from Perth who had a French Bulldog with them. The guy worked in the mining industry, running a company that services the villages, so it was great to find out more about how the employment situation works out there and the challenges the industry is facing now as the boom is ending. When Tony came back we went over to the IGA to stock up on supplies, and ran into the family from Karajini again. Tony filled the car up with petrol and topped up our gas tank (we’d run out during breakfast this morning), and then we were ready to go.

Our Kings Canyon friends were staying the night in Coral Bay, and we were leaving Exmouth with plenty of time to get there (it’s only 150km). I rang the caravan park they were staying at, but they were full, so I rang the other one – they said that there’d be room in overflow, they never turn anyone away. So we drove down to Coral Bay – the terrain was pretty uninteresting for the most part, red dirt and low plants, fairly sparsely scattered. There were hills in the distance to the west, not much to the east. We had to slow a few times for sheep who were wandering around on the side of the road.

We reached Coral Bay around 4.30 and checked in – we were in overflow, which was a grassed area across the road from the caravan park. We were only allowed to stay one night there, and check out was 8am!!!! The only alternative was to go back out to the highway and drive further south to find a free camp, so we took the early checkout. We were allocated a tiny site next to the corner, and our tent was going to block the corner site’s car in. Next to us a group of young people had 2 sites for their 2 cars and a boat, they said they didn’t need all that room so for us to set up first and they’d just use the space that was left, so that worked much better. We put the tent up and the kids went to explore the caravan park. I found our friends and took Millie’s friend to find the others – they were all playing on the jumping pillow so she joined them there, and her mum came over after she’d got some groceries. We sat and chatted and Tony set up the beds then chilled out at the tent for a while. We discovered that Millie’s friend had bought the exact same packet of Shopkins when she was in the Exmouth newsagent earlier today as well!!!

We had planned to go to the beach to watch the sunset, and talked and played for so long that we missed it. The half an hour or so after sunset is even better here on the West Coast, so we all headed to the beach to see that bit at least. The bay was beautiful, white sand and reddish headlands, clear blue water and a few orange clouds. We walked out towards the point, the kids played in the sand, Caitlin practised her gymnastics, and we all enjoyed the early evening peacefulness and the beautiful view.

It was nearly dark when we walked back towards the caravan park. We’d bought a hot chicken in Exmouth, so went and got that and some breadrolls, cheese and mayonnaise, and our drinks, and rejoined our friends on tables out the front of our park, and they ordered pizza and wedges for their dinner. They shared a bit with us and we sat and chatted and ate and played for another couple of hours, great company as always. Caitlin had bought a selfie stick at the IGA that afternoon and was happily taking photos of herself and the other kids, they played hide-and-seek for a while, and we adults got out our maps and started talking about our respective plans for our last few weeks on the road.

By about 9pm everyone was very tired so we went back to our sites. The girls really wanted to have a hot shower so I took them over to the caravan park and had one as well. The water was from the artesian bore and was quite salty, not quite as refreshing as we’d hoped (and no good for our hair which is all knotted and feeling caked over from swimming in salt water for so many days without a freshwater rinse). It was good to get sand and dirt off though – and we didn’t have to scrub our feet for the first time in ages. We’ve all had incredibly dirty feet for the past few months, the red dirt gets in to every crack and crease and it doesn’t come out with a very hard scrub – the salt water cleaned everything up nicely though and now our feet are smooth and white and clean, they don’t even look like the same feet.

Back to the tent for a very quick reading of Inheritance before going to sleep and hoping we’ll wake up early enough for our 8am check out tomorrow.

Half-lap Day 58: Kununurra

Our plan was to leave for our Lake Argyle Cruise at 6.30am – with the sun coming up around 6, that wasn’t a problem. We all had a quick breakfast, and packed swimmers and sunscreen and snacks, and drove out to the lake, about 70km from Kununurra. The road in from the highway wound between tall rocky hills with scrubby brush. As we got closer we caught a glimpse of the Ord River down in a valley, then spots of blue as we saw the lake.

We pulled up at the Resort/Caravan Park and they said to wait outside for the bus. We had a bit of a wander and looked out over the lake – so big and blue! – and at the infinity pool at the resort – the water flows over the edge so it feels like you are actually swimming right up to the mountains and the lake. The kids browsed the gift shop and Millie bought a curly straw with a crocodile on it.

The bus came (with people already on it from Kununurra – that would have cost extra) and took us down to the boat ramp. We had a view of the dam wall as we drove, then the bus went down a steep (13% grade) road to the boat, we all got out of the bus and onto the boat while the driver reversed back up part of the road, turned around, and reversed down again so the bus was ready to go when we got back.

After a quick safety talk and letting us know that there was a toilet, as well as tea, coffee, biscuits and water available at all times on the cruise, we set off and went around the first point to see some wallabies. They were quite small and extremely agile, leaping around on the rocks in huge bounds. The driver threw some food onto the rocks and a couple of them came down close to the boat – the kids were so excited and the wallabies were very cute.

From there we went around closer to the dam wall – a very impressive structure, made of a clay core and then rocks (no concrete). The dam was built in the late 1960s to give a permanent water supply to the farmers in the Ord Irrigation Area – the Ord River before that would dry up a lot in the dry season. Now it is at a constant level year round and provides enough water for everyone in the region. The lake is 21 times the volume of Sydney Harbour – really massive. The islands throught the lake are the tops of more of the hills like the ones we drove through coming in. Some are just little rocks sticking out of the water, some are still massive hills in their own right.

We went to the deepest part of the lake (42m at this point), seeing a freshwater crocodile on the shore along the way, and heard a bit about how they’d decided where to put the dam wall. Then we moved on to some of the islands, where we saw several crocodiles and the boat was able to get quite close to the shore where they were sunning themselves. A couple of times one of the crocodiles slid into the water – so silently and gracefully we wouldn’t have noticed it move if we hadn’t been looking at it. The boat moved around into a little bay where we are able to feed the fish – holding out bread above the water so that the archer fish could shoot it with their little jets of water (lots of fun and something I’d been so keen to do ever since I heard about it) and dropping bread into the water for the archer fish, catfish and black bream. At one point I was standing and taking a photo of a freshwater crocodile and the driver sneaked up behind me and grabbed my leg. I shrieked and fell onto the seat – everyone thought it was pretty funny.

We continued further into the lake, and soon came to places where we couldn’t see any land in a couple of directions. During the tour we covered a quarter of the lake’s distance and we didn’t ever see the ends even on the horizon – it is massive. We cruised past a male jabiru standing on his nest up on top of a little rocky island, and saw lots of pelicans, cormorants, kites and other birds. We saw a wallaroo on one of the islands, much bigger than any wallaby we’ve seen anywhere up in this northern part of Australia. Before the dam was flooded, people came up and removed as many of the animals from the hills as possible, with some of the bigger hills that would become big islands, they left the animals as their island would be big enough to sustain a population.

The lake was so massive we couldn't see the end of it

Cruising to a few more parts of dam we learnt more about the history of the area and the farms that were here before the dam. People made cups of tea as they felt like it, and the kids had several biscuits from the tin. LiAM also had a cup of tea. Millie got her fingers jammed in the toilet door – she had indents in both sides of her fingers and they swelled up quite quickly – luckily I had my first aid kit with me and a bit of arnica and strapping helped them to feel a bit better.

Caitlin had been worried about the idea of a swim as part of the cruise – on the shore of one of the islands would feel risky because of the crocodiles, but swimming out in the deep part of the lake would feel scary because of the unknown nature of all that water below us. This cruise stopped in a deep part – around 22m deep – for us to swim in an area safe from crocodiles –they don’t come out that deep. Tony was the first person in off the back of the boat. Caitlin was still unsure and I suggested she just jump in and climb straight back out. Once she’d done that she felt more comfortable and was able to go back in. They provided pool noodles so we could hang on to them and feel even safer, not having to worry about the depth of the water. About half the boatload went in for a swim (there were only 10-12 other people on the cruise). LiAM went in and loved it and I joined them – the water was beautiful temperature and it was amazing to be swimming in this large lake with all the rocky mountains around. Millie was unsure about whether she wanted to swim or not. She ended up sitting on the top step of the ladder and putting her feet in, and she was happy with that. LiAM was the last one out of the water when it was time to get back in the boat, he really loved the experience.

We heard a bit more history of the area then headed back to the boat ramp and back onto the bus, which took us to the resort again. We all loved the cruise and were happy that we’d chosen this one instead of paying more for the sunset one. The driver was funny and friendly and so knowledgeable about the area (and the owner of the cruise company).

Back at the resort we wandered around and looked at the views a bit more. We enquired about the day use fees – they were $25 for the family, which felt like a bit much to pay just to use the pool, as cool as it would have been. Millie was extremely disappointed when we decided not to swim there – I forgot that she hadn’t swum in the lake and so was really wanting a swim, and it was such an incredible location. I do wish that we’d just spent the money and let at least Millie use the pool.

Looking at the Infinity Pool and Lake Argyle

After we looked at the view and explored the grounds for a while – and saw a helicopter take off on a scenic flight, and dip excitingly down into the valley immediately after takeoff – we drove down and over the dam wall, which was pretty incredible. There was a picnic area alongside the Ord River on the far side of the wall, so we sat in the shade at a table there and had some lunch, then the kids and I went for a wander down to the river where some people were fishing. They soon left and we had the area to ourselves. There was a great view of the base of the dam wall and the outlet pipes, and along the river between the very tall cliffs. We watched the river and the fish in it for ages, then LiAM discovered lots of tiny little frogs jumping around on the edge of the water, which kept us fascinated for a while. Eventually the sun got too much for us and we headed back up to the car. On the way out we drove back down to the river’s edge so Tony could see the view and the frogs – LiAM caught one and as he was showing me it jumped into the car, it took us a little while to get it out.

We drove back into town and went to the op shop, catching it just before it closed. LiAM bought a water bomb set – with a bottle and spray nozzle to fill up the water bombs, and the girls and I found a t-shirt each. Tony checked at the post office but his wine still isn’t there. We went around to Target because LiAM wanted to get more of the cheap Skylanders – he and Millie bought some each, Tony found a t-shirt, I bought more swimmers for myself and LiAM as ours are starting to disintegrate, and we bought more of the cheap bags of lollies, great for in car snacks. We also went to the discount store next door and got some paints (Caitlin wants to do more dot painting), snorkels and masks to replace the 2 of ours that have been broken, and a box of cup-a-noodles at a third of the price we can get them, on special, at Coles.

After our very satisfying shopping trip we went back to the caravan park, and I asked if anyone wanted to head in to the National Park to see if we could get up to the top of the rocks and see the views. Millie wasn’t keen, and I’d been a little way in the day before, so Tony went with Caitlin and LiAM. Millie and I went for a swim, then went back to the tent to play some games. The others were gone until after dark, then went straight to the pool to cool off. They had made it up to the lookout and seen a cool view across Kununurra – the path to the lookout was a long walk through the National Park from our tent, so it had taken them quite a while and they were pretty tired.

 Back at the tent the kids played on the computer for a while. We had pasta, bacon and pesto for dinner, and Caitlin was very keen to get to bed quickly as she was getting up early for a horse ride in the morning. We went to bed and started to read Inheritance, until Caitlin fell asleep in her tent.

Half-lap Day 48: Darwin

I’m not really getting used to the heat in terms of being able to sleep, we’re all having quite uncomfortable nights. I got up after it became light, and went for a walk to McMinns Lagoon, which is only 500m from the house where we are staying. I chatted to a guy on the way who was walking out there, he told me what kind of birds to look out for and to be careful of whip snakes. The lagoon was pretty, not a lot of water in it (but way more than Fogg Dam). There were a few birds around – and also a lot of mosquitoes, so I didn’t stay long.

Back at the tent we had breakfast and the kids played, then we got ready to meet another friend for lunch. We went to Howard Springs Nature Park, not too far from here, which had a great playground and a waterplay area (with a waterfall). Our friend bought a heap of fruit, and we took bread and ham for sandwiches, and we had an enjoyable morning/afternoon, chatting and eating and the kids playing in the playground and water on and off. It was hot and humid, although we were sitting in the shade, and I found that my eye flared up again once I started sweating and the sunscreen seemed to run into my eye. I hope I can find a way to avoid that happening again, it was quite unpleasant.

We were at the Nature Park until around 3pm, then said our goodbyes and we heading in to town to AquaScene for the fish feeding. We had debated whether or not to bother – it now costs $43 for a family which seemed quite a lot, but the kids were very keen to get some hands on fish feeding and it is such a Darwin thing to do, so we decided to go. The feeding time varies so that it is always at high tide, today it was from 4-6pm.

We arrived a bit after 4 and wandered in. We stayed until after 5.30 and really got our money’s worth. At the end of the ramp we could stand ankle deep in water and feed lots of fish (sweetlips I think, although I also heard the lady tell someone they were mullet) who loved to be hand fed, they would nibble bits of bread out of our hands, and swam around brushing against our legs or going between them. There were also catfish, which we didn’t get too close to because of their barbs, so we threw bread to them. In deeper water there were flat, white fish with yellow fins, and big flat brown fish the size of dinner plates, they were very cool to watch. Off the side of the ramp were milk fish, large greenish fish that looked kind of like sharks (but had no teeth). We discovered that if we held the bread a bit lower in the water they milkfish would come and suck it out of our hands, and sometimes suck on our fingers or knuckles as well, that was fun. As the afternoon progressed the rays started to come in to shore – at first they were hard to see, then we noticed a whole lot of black lines on the sand and gradually realised they were ray tails – then we started to see the bodies of the rays. There were cow-tail rays and shovel-head rays and maybe some others, I really loved watching them slowly move in closer. There were a couple of barramundi too – one of them lurked around next to the ramp, almost completely hidden in the shadows, and occasionally surfaced trying to catch some bait fish. He looked pretty fearsome. Several of the friendly fish had remora attached to their backs, little sucker fish that clean the scales of the bigger fish, I was excited to see them too. The tide came up higher and then started to go out and we feed lots and lots of bread to the fish and walked around looking in the water at everything for ages. The kids also spent a bit of time talking to a cockatoo in a cage and it was a great afternoon.

Milkfish

stingray

Ramora on the back of a larger fish

From there we grabbed a hot chicken and headed back to Mindil Beach so that Tony could finally see a sunset over the water. We got there about 5 minutes before sunset and it was quite beautiful watching it go down. We laughed though when a boat moved directly between us and the sun just as it slipped over the horizon. We sat on the beach and ate hot chicken and avocado rolls, and the kids ran around on the sand, and the sky and water continued to change colour and become even more spectacular for at least half an hour afterwards.

We packed up and drove back to the tent (after Millie did some balancing along the tops of the fences in the carpark) and went to bed as quickly as we could, reading Brisingr for a nice long session.