Exmouth - Broome

Phew - we've finally made it as far as Broome. After an easy 21 hour bus trip up the west coast, we have finally made it as far as oasis-of-civilisation (and mobile reception...), Broome.

Unfortunately we don't have much time here. After the sedate pace we've set for the rest of Australia, we find that we now need to step up a gear to get everything done by the time we leave in July. Therefore we're leaving on a tour tomorrow morning and will be away from civilisation (and the civilising power of the internet) for 5 days until we reach Darwin. Trace says hooray.

Anyway, in the meantime I'm uploading some photos of the Ningaloo peninsula for your perusal - I may even get them linked here, but if not they'll be available to those on facebook until I can add the link.

Coral Bay - Exmouth (whale sharks!)

We've now snorkelled with whale sharks, the biggest fish in the world!!! What an amazing experience...


We're here in Exmouth at the northern end of the Ningaloo Reef, where whale sharks pass through on their migration between April and July. They're filter feeders, and they like coming here to feast on the mass coral spawning that occurs about April each year. These fish are massive and gorgeous with loads of spots and stripes. We've been looking forward to seeing them -- let alone swimming with them -- for over two years now.

We were in a group of 15 passengers and five crew on an all-day tour of Ningaloo Reef. First up, we had a lovely snorkel session to get used to our snorkel gear and wetsuits (very flattering -- NOT!!! [...says you - I thought we looked pretty fly - Ed]). There were such beautiful fish and corals as well as two big, gorgeous sting rays. But of course we were all anxious to get to the whale sharks!


We then relied on a spotter plane (shared by at least three other boats) to locate a whale shark for us to see. When one was found, we zipped over to it, joining three other boats. The whale sharks are unpredictable; they can dive deep at any time or just swim quickly away. We didn't actually get to see that first whale shark; he dove deep before the other boats' passengers finished swimming with him. But soon enough we found another whale shark.


We passengers were split into two groups because a maximum of ten people can swim with any whale shark at a time. (It's great to see these rules in place to protect the whale sharks.) Luckily Iff and I were in the first group to go in. As soon as the shark was spotted, our group assembled on the back of the boat with snorkel gear on and ready to go. As soon as the boat was near enough to the whale shark, we were told to jump in quickly; there's no time to waste when the shark might disappear at any second, and there's another group (and possibly other groups on other boats) waiting to jump in next. So in we jumped with a distinct lack of grace but a whole heap of excitement.


We'd been given strict instructions about spacing out around both sides of the whale shark and how to stay far away enough from the shark so as not to stress him. So the first few seconds were taken up by positioning ourselves. As soon as I could dunk my face in the water, I was a bit confused to see a mass of bubbles from my and the other swimmers' efforts to get into place; I couldn't see any whale shark even though our team leader was pointing dramatically in one direction. Then I looked the right way and the bubbles cleared, and my jaw mentally dropped onto the ocean floor. This absolutely massive, gorgeous whale shark was looming just a few metres away from me. I was so stunned by the beauty of all his spots, I forgot to swim. I just floated there, gobsmacked and thrilled to bits. I'd expected to be scared, being so close to a big fat shark. But each whale shark we saw was completely unconcerned about us; he was just swimming gently along with mouth opened to filter through any small fish/plankton in the water. These things are so powerful, they barely move their huge tails to propel their massive bodies through the water. Course, if they want to speed up, their tails move quite a bit!


With that first whale shark, I was too busy being amazed by his size and spots to notice the many other things about him: his stripes and other markings, his fins, all the fish on/around him, any movements of his head, etc. I quickly remembered I needed to swim along with him, or I'd lose my good view of him. And then after what seemed like a lifetime but was probably only a minute or so, we were told to stop swimming so our other group could get to the whale shark. We got back onto the boat with huge smiles on our faces.


That experience alone would have been thrilling enough. But there was more! We swam with a whale shark three more times; I believe they were four different sharks, but I'm no expert. All I know is that every time was so thrilling and amazing. The last shark we saw actually circled our boat a fair bit; before our group jumped into the water to swim with him (the other group went first), we could see him clearly from the boat, and he looked so huge. I should note that the whale sharks seen on these tours are usually juvenile males (they're so huge and they're not even fully grown yet!), which is why I refer to each one as a he!


It was so wonderful to be in the water with these glorious animals, I can't even think of strong enough words to express it all. Suffice to say, our expectations were so high after waiting so long to do this, and the whole experience far surpassed our expectations. Absolutely brilliant! And as if the whale sharks weren't enough, we saw at least a few humpback whales arching over the water and breaching as well as some big manta rays with their mouths open to filter food. It was a perfect day!!!


The rest of our time in Exmouth has been very relaxing (ie lazy!). We've wandered around the wee town a fair bit, checking out various types of cool cockatoos and several wild emus roaming around. We were in a park in town, where a big emu was looking for food, and we heard a little girl say, "You're not supposed to be in town, emu! You're a wild animal!" Cute!

This part of Australia -- Shark Bay and Ningaloo Reef -- is such a gem for life of all sorts. The marine animals are so amazing, but so are the stromatolites and all the birds and reptiles. It's thrilling to be here and such a worthwhile adventure. Tonight we get the bus to Broome, and we'll miss this corner of the world!

Photos Added

I've added some pictures from our west coast adventure.

Coral Bay Magic

We're still in Coral Bay, a wee town on the Ningaloo Reef. Today we had even better snorkelling and swimming with the fishies! We went on a 6-hour "nature tour" that was worth every penny.

First off, we went snorkelling with a giant manta ray (in the wild rather than in some aquarium!)...Iff reckons she was about 13 feet across. She was huge, gorgeous, so graceful and seemingly unconcerned about the 8 of us trailing her from a respectful distance. It was brilliant. Then we searched for humpback whales but couldn't see any. We did see a lovely dolphin, though, so that's ok. Next we snorkelled in some lovely, calm waters full of corals and fish. We spotted a starfish, and I looked out for eels and sea snakes but luckily didn't see any! We then went to a shallow area known as a turtle sanctuary. We just watched from the boat to see what was around. Right away we saw two dugongs: a mother and baby! I squealed of course. Dugongs are basically manatees with whale tales rather than paddle tales. They're big, fat vegetarians who eat sea grass (hence their common name, sea cows), and we were absolutely thrilled to see them in the wild like that. They surfaced several times to breathe, quite close to our boat, but then they decided to swim off. While in the turtle sanctuary, we also saw a big green turtle and a few rays. It was really lovely. Next up we snorkelled around a fish cleaning station, where there was a big reef shark (not huge, Iff reckons, but it sure looked like a big shark to me) and various other fish getting cleaned. It's so amazing that these places exist where fish call a truce and help each other out rather than hunt each other! The water was really cold there, but it was thrilling to see all the colourful corals and fish and the shark. After that, we headed on back to dry land. Such a magical experience!

We're getting the hang of snorkelling and are working up to whale sharks (first small fish, then bigger fish, a shark and a giant manta ray). One of the girls on our tour today did a whale shark snorkelling tour recently and saw 10 whale sharks, 8 of which she snorkelled with! Here's hoping we have an experience like that, but then again I'll be happy if we see just 1 whale shark. We shall see...

Denham - Coral Bay

We arrived in Coral Bay before dawn was even thinking of cracking - 3am! Luckily we'd booked a room ahead and had told them we would be arriving late - one poor unfortunate was stuck sleeping outside on a poolside lounge chair - and it's not warm here at night I can tell you... Despite all our good planning, they hadn't seen fit to grant us a blanket, so we had to fall back on the sleeping bags we picked up for the overland track. We're not supposed to be using them in here, but we figure that they can stop us using a sleeping bag by giving us a blanket when we check in. We found out the next morning that we can get one if we leave them a small deposit. Problem solved.

Today we had a quick look around Coral Bay and have found that it's a lovely little place. The whole town seems to consist of a few hotels, camp grounds and little shops huddled up against a beautiful shallow, coral filled bay (hence the name I guess...) with crystal clear water, teeming with little (and some quite big) fish. We managed to get ourselves onto a glass-bottomed boat tour of the bay with some snorkelling thrown in too. It was my first shot at snorkelling, but I figured I'd need some practice for when we get to Exmouth and those whale sharks. Anyway, snorkelling around the bay was wonderful. We got to see plenty of the bay's inhabitants up close - both the coral and the fish. The fish were amazing! There were scoals of tiny silvery fish shimmering through the coral all synchronised together as though they were all part of the same animal. We also encountered all manner of muti-coloured fish, blue, yellow, black & white striped - the variety is incredible. Tomorrow we hope to snorkel with manta rays - some of whom can reach 7 metres long and weigh up to 2 tonnes (so I'm told...).

There have been rumours flying around here that there aren't many whale sharks in the region and that we may not be able to see any... Depending on who you speak to there may/may not be humpback whales, should (or not) be dugongs and there is (or is not) the possibility of seeing "Old Greg" or even a kraken. I guess it's all about who you believe... but we've booked the whale shark tour anyway so we'll see.

Perth - Cervantes - Denham

So the morning after we were in Rottnest Island, we got the bus from Perth to Cervantes. Shortly after we arrived, we took a sunset tour to Nambung National Park, home of the amazing Pinnacles. On the way to the park, the tour guide very nicely took us on a wee detour to the stromatolites at Lake Thetis...very cool! Then to the Pinnacles, where we wandered around and saw the sun set. It was all really lovely. (Dianne, the tour guide, even let us view the whole place through her rose-tinted glasses. At sunset, those glasses make everything especially beautiful. Seriously, they're really rose-tinted!)

We stayed in a really nice hostel in Cervantes, and it was just a few minutes walk to the gorgeous beach at Thirsty Point. I managed to swim in the cold water, but Iff stayed on the sand! We really chilled out in Cervantes. It's a lovely, peaceful town with the beautiful beaches, stromatolites and Pinnacles right on its doorstep. What a gem.

After three days there, we got the bus to Denham (with a night at the bizarre Overlander Roadhouse en route -- the whole place was covered in bugs, but we got into our room to find accommodation worth five stars compared to all the bugs outside!). Denham is the gateway to Shark Bay, a gorgeous place which is World Heritage listed. Denham itself is a wee, quiet seaside town of 600, but from it is easy access to the sites of Shark Bay. We got a day tour of the highlights, including more stromatolites at Hamelin Pool (noted by Bill Bryson in his Down Under book), the amazing Shell Beach and wonderful Ocean Park with marine life found in Shark Bay. We also took a short trip to Monkey Mia to see the famous dolphins there. We were worried that it would be far too touristy and that the dolphins were being exploited, but it wasn't like that at all. It's all very well done and eco-friendly. So far we haven't been able to see any of the 10,000 dugongs which live in Shark Bay because they've gone to warmer waters. But hopefully we'll see them when we get to Ningaloo Reef. Fingers crossed!

Today is our last day in Denham, and it's been lazy so far. We rented bikes and went to Little Lagoon, a beautiful lagoon near Denham. We've been beach bums all day basically! Tonight we get the bus to Coral Bay, and we'll arrive at 3am! Getting closer to those big, fat whale sharks...

*For pictures of this stuff, see the links in the right-hand panel.

Rottnest Island

Today we were on the beautiful Rottnest Island, a wee distance from Perth. It was a gorgeous day -- no rain to spoil our fun. It's such a pretty place, only 11 by 5 km but full of lovely beaches and bays. We rented bikes and went about 20 km of hilly distance. Our legs and butts are killing us, but it was so worth it. While on the island, we saw the most gorgeous coast waters sparkling with reflected sunlight, loads of cool birds, adorable quokkas (quite small marsupials, like a mini wallaby) and even some manta rays! There were two "baby" rays (at least a foot across) and one big, fat ray (at least three times bigger than the baby ones). They were so cool! It was an awesome day.

Tomorrow we head further up the west coast...getting closer to those whale sharks!

*For pictures of Rottnest Island, see the link to them in the right-hand panel.

Coober Pedy - Perth

We're a bit behind on the blog! We've been travelling like mad things but also getting over a nasty cold...poor Iff caught it right when I was near the end of it. We haven't let it stop us, though!

I'll carry on from Iff's Coober Pedy posting. From there, we got the overnight bus to Adelaide. We arrived early in the morning and had all day to make further travel plans for the west coast. We caught the train that evening to head to Perth. The train was interesting...two and half days to Perth, me with the nasty cold and a small child (in the seat right in front of us of course) screaming pretty much constantly the whole way. Fun! On the plus side, no one mistook me for a man trying to enter the women's loo like on the train from Sydney to Adelaide. That was an interesting experience! I reckon that this time people were too busy dodging my cold germs to wonder whether I'm male or female. Ha!

During the train ride, we went along the Nullabor Plain, the longest straight section of railway in the world (478 km). We thought of Mary from the Koala Hospital, who once drove the road there by herself, yodelling at the top of her lungs, the wind in her hair as a wild emu ran alongside her car! Genius. The train made a stop in Cook, where only a few people live (as they're in the middle of nowhere, they rely on the train we were on to bring them supplies and even water -- it is amazingly desolate there). We just walked around there; there's not enough to warrant a tour! We also did a whistle-stop tour of Kalgoorlie-Boulder, a pretty cool place built up on gold mines.

We were very glad to arrive in Perth and escape the screaming child (and stretch our legs!). We spent the day exploring the city centre. The Western Australia Art Gallery and Museum in Perth are really cool. The museum even has a megamouth specimen; it was frightening to look at, but I still would rather see one live -- from a safe distance, of course!

We only spent the one night in Perth at that time. The next morning we rented a car for four days in the southwest corner of Oz. Iff has already posted about the Margaret River area and Walpole. We went to Albany (some amazing rock formations nearby), Walpole (with an awesome, rather scary treetop walk as well as the Swarbrick features Chris has mentioned), Pemberton (a base for loads of natural features and gorgeous scenery), Augusta (usually great for whale-spotting, but we didn't manage to see any), the Cape Leeuwin Lighthouse (very cool, but again no whales spotted), Hamelin Bay (looking for giant rays, but no success -- still a beautiful beach), Margaret River (good food!), Bunbury (famous for dolphins, but we didn't see them -- par for the course really!), Busselton (with the longest wooden jetty in the southern hemisphere) and Clifton Lake (my highlight -- millions of thrombolite mounds AND some random guy walking two gorgeous husky puppies which I VERY NEARLY stole off him and would have gotten away with if Iff hadn't restrained me) before heading back to Perth. By this time, Chris had the cold really bad, so we didn't dawdle as much as we might have in the southwest. It was really beautiful, though! Oh, and Iff bought FINGERLESS GLOVES in Augusta, much to my dismay. He's also taken to wearing socks with sandals. But I digress!

So now we're back in Perth for four days. We've found a couple cool vegetarian restaurants. (Tom, one of them is a curry place where you eat as much as you like and pay whatever you think is appropriate -- we told them you'd be there as soon as you can!) We spent some time in the lovely King's Park, where we found a P Swarbrick among the list of fallen soldiers in the WWII RAAF memorial. That's one time I wish we hadn't managed to find a Swarbrick. We also went to hear the Swan Bells, which sound amazing. It's thrilling to know their history! We then checked out Freemantle (or Freo as the Aussies call it), a Perth suburb where we saw the biggest, clearest, fullest rainbow ever. It was absolutely gorgeous and made trodding through the rain worth it! I was actually strutting around in our bright green Wimbledon pancho...that's me, fashion icon!

Tomorrow we're spending the day on Rottnest Island. We plan to rent bikes and explore it that way, so hopefully the clouds have rained themselves out by then!

Then the day after that, we're heading up the west coast via Greyhound. I can't wait to see those whale sharks in Ningaloo Reef!!! We intend to snorkel with them. I AM GOING TO FAINT IF ONE COMES NEAR ME!!!

*For pictures of all this stuff, see the links to them in the right-hand panel.

On the Trail of Swarbricks...

While in Walpole, WA, we came across "Swarbrick Jetty". We went and had a look and found out that there was also a Swarbrick Street! A little more digging and we found a whole book about the Swarbrick family who stayed in Walpole and what they got up to.


The Margaret River area is a beautiful area south of Perth in Western Australia. It's very green and pastoral. There is a huge wine industry here and there are wineries every 250 metres or so. There are also amazing coastlines and beaches all the way around the coast. We have been trying to spot whales off the coast - so far without success.


There's plenty more to talk about - but I'll save that for next time, when I post more pictures. In the meantime, check out the photos bottom right!