Back on the Road

Well we're back on the road and boy is it a good feeling! Dirt under your fingernails, sun on your face, life does not get any better.

We're currently doing a little 2,5 week trip to the south-west of WA. Right now we're in Yallingup, which is near Dunsborough just below Cape Naturaliste. It's a beautiful area of rugged cliffs, eucalypt trees, shrubs and rocky beaches with big surf.

On our way out of Perth we stopped in Yalgorup, a national park just below Mandurah for our first night of bush camping. It was great to be able to light a fire and be surrounded by animals again. We had a little mouse in our tent, were visited by a possum at night which woke us up by going through our dishes and in the morning a flock of splended wren (that's not an opinion, that's their name) visited our site. Shortly after, on a walk, we saw a group of kangaroo.

In Australind, on a walk out into the bay which consists of little islands connected by bridges, we saw our first dolphins for this trip, a mother and a calf cruising through the shallows. At the campground here we watched the sun setting behind a lake full of black swans while surrounded by ring neck parrots and we met some guys who had been down to Dunsborough for a day of successful salmon fishing.

Sunday was Janine's birthday and -apparently in keeping with tradition- it was the first cloudy day. We visited the Swamp Wildlife Park in Bunbury which is a nice small park hosting parrots, various waterbirds and some red and grey kangaroo. The parrots stole the show as they climbed all over me, pulling on my necklace and pecking at my cap.

On the way to Busselton, the clutch suddenly stopped working. We got a tow into town and checked into the backpackers as it was sunday and all the garages were closed. Next morning we dropped it off at a workshop (very interesting, driving a car with no clutch!) and went to view the Busselton Jetty which, at two kilometers, is the longest jetty in the world. Unfortunately it's also closed due to its dilapitated state. Very disappointing as the view from two kilometers into the bay would be pretty cool and besides, we had nothing better to do. Luckily for us there seemed to be a large number of second hand clothing stores in town for some obscure reason. There was the usual Salvo (Salvation Army Store) but also Vinnies, the 2nd hand store of the St Vincent charity and at least three other stores. Since I only have one very thin hoody in the warm clothes department, I had been freezing my ass off the last few mornings and evenings so I bought a fleece windproof jacket, a fleece sweater and a flanel long sleeve shirt for the grand total of $18. I've been much warmer since so yay for poor people.

We also found a very nice 2nd hand bookshop, one of my favorite things about Australia, and picked up some Agatha Christie classics. As we were having a coffee in the sun the mechanic called back and broke the bad news. $295 down the drain. Oh well, that's life. At least we could get underway again so we went to Dunsborough to spend the night before what we hoped would be a good day's fishing. Unfortunately it turned out to be different. As always with fishing we 'should've been here yesterday'. The day before we got here they were catching heaps and then it went dead quiet for two days. It's not my poor skills this time as there are plenty of locals fishing as well who are similarly catching sweet F.A. The only ones who seem to be doing well is the commercial fishermen who go out a bit further and drag nets filled to the brim with big salmon onto the beach. Funny thing is that since the Australian Salmon is not regarded as a very nice table fish, most of the fish go off to be canned as petfood and such. Lately they've been imposing quota to move the fishery more towards the recreational fishermen, who release most of their catch, and away from the seasonal commercial fishing which I think in this case is a good thing as they can make more money off tourists coming down to catch an epic sportfish than destroying whole schools of salmon for catfood.

However all has not been bad, quite the contrary. The scenery here is beautiful, we've done nice hikes through the region and today we went to some of the many, many vineyards in the area. The last one, Windance, is family operated and quite small, they sell 90& of their vintage through the shop at the vinyard. The daughter of the owner took us through the whole range of Semillion-Chenin Blanc, Chardonnay, Rose and various years of Cab-Sauv and their Shiraz which has won many prizes in Australia. It turned out she had been traveling in Europe even more than we had in Australia so we had a pleasant chat and taste. I reckon if you've got a bit more money this region is particularly nice. Drive around the various vinyards, trying wine, buying a few bottles and some nice cheeses and bits and pieces or having dinner in one of the many good restaurants in the area. We had to make do with a nice bottle of Windance rose and some brie and camenbert.. hard life, I'll tell you that straight up.

When we got back to the campground we found a galah (small grey and pink parrot) trapped in fishing line on a nearby site. Of course it wouldn't let me help it get untangled without trying to take of various fingers with its beak but once I had it covered in a towel it settled down enough for me to cut the wires off and set it on its way again. Dutch Animal Doctor Down Under part III :-) So kids, don't ever leave fishing wire lying around, it kills birds! Unless you don't like birds of course.. then it's all good.

Shortly after dark, about 2/3 of the way through the bottle of rose, we were joined by a possum who, in the opportunistic spirit of possums everywhere, was very tame. I even got it to sit on my arm while feeding it. Yes, I know you're not supposed to feed wildlife but we're in a campground in town.. not exactly wild, is it.

Anyway that's about it for now. We're having a pretty good time despite the cold. Life is much better when you're camping. Tomorrow we head down past Margaret River towards the very south and then out east to Denmark and Albany before heading back to Perth on the 25th or so. I'll post another update in a couple of days.

Join us in having a nice glass of wine and some cheese and enjoying life, as we say goodbye for now.

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Part of trip: Around Australia in 12 months (turning into 24)

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