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Published: June 16th 2012
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Friday June 8th 2012 We woke at 5:45am and left Exmouth at 7am after buying fuel, to get in the line for a campsite at Cape Range National Park. We arrived 5
th in line at 7:30am. The office opened at 8am and we got the last campsite available in the park tonight! It’s at Ned’s campground, right near the beach. There are good composting toilets and a few trees. The other campsites don’t appear to have trees. We set up the camper and then went for a snorkel at Turquoise Bay. It certainly lived up to it’s name, being a lovely turquoise colour. We snorkelled the Drift section, where you can drift parallel to shore then walk back to the start. There are lots of colourful fish. The water was very comfortable after the first plunge. Kyle decided he didn’t want to swim but did play in the shallows. Alex was a bit concerned about sharks and very pleased not to see any.
As we went to leave, Mike couldn’t find his car and house keys. He retraced his steps on the beach but couldn’t find them... we drove off using my keys.
We
went to Sandy Bay for lunch, another lovely beach area not quite as busy as Turquoise Bay, which was very popular. Then went to the visitor’s centre to have a look and ask after Mike’s keys. They have a massive preserved loggerhead turtle in the centre, among other specimens. No keys reported on first enquiry, but before we left the centre the staff came out to tell us that the keys had been handed in at the park entrance office. That was quite a relief as it would have been inconvenient to get them all cut again.
The boys spent some time on their homework and Mike showed them how to play Backgammon.
Saturday June 9th Our second day in Cape Range National Park. We started by driving to Yardie Creek for a bushwalk, and saw emus, eagles and wallabies on the way there. Yardie Creek is an estuarine creek currently separated from the ocean by a sandbar. We followed the rocky trail, getting good views of the creek and the red gorge walls. On the way back, Alex saw a small, fat, striped snake on the path. It had moved in a
flicking motion as we had approached, then just stayed still and we walked around it. We took a detour on the way back and Alex, Mike and I had a swim in the creek. It was a little chilly but quite nice. The echoes are good there too. We also saw a black footed rock wallaby hiding in a hole on the gorge wall opposite where we were swimming.
We then wen to Oyster Flats where Mike had a snorkel and the boys gathered some nice rocks so we could photograph them (we left them there), and on to Turquoise Bay where Alex rode on his boogie board for a while. The wind was pretty strong at this point. Next stop was the visitor’s centre to check out the preserved snakes – and we confirmed that the one we had seen was a Pilbara Death Adder. The staff at the visitor’s centre said he had only seen one in the years he has worked here (the one in the jar, which had been hit by a car). So we were lucky to see one (and even luckier not to step on it).
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jack
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cool
hi was up i like those picturs do u