Exmouth and Cape Range (Ningaloo Reef)

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Exmouth and Cape Range(Ningaloo Reef)

We had camped at New Beach just south of Carnarvon, where we checked out another 1 mile jetty (a few hundred metres shorter than Busselton’s). We headed to Woolworths to stock up on food, and fuel at Caltex -98.3L @ 166.0c/L and decided to continue north along the coast.
Although the Easter long weekend had come and gone, school holidays seemed to fill every resort throughout the Coral Bay and Exmouth area.
Being a bit late to get into the National Park to camp, we stayed at Yardie Homestead Caravan Park $30/powered site, which enabled us to power all our batteries and charge up the camera before spending 5 nights out in Cape Range National Park.
We woke up at sparrowfart and waited in line at the Ranger’s station to get a campsite at Mesa Camp, a picturesque location where Ningaloo Reef is a very short swim off the beach from the camping area. We stayed here 5 nights, enjoying many days of snorkelling and lazy happy hours as well as some moderately challenging walks at Mandu Mandu Gorge.
Lakeside and Turquoise Bay ‘drift’ snorkelling was amazing, as we could enter the water straight off the beach and exit a few hundred metres further north where the current had taken you, so not a lot of effort required. The coral was not magnificent in colour as in some parts of the Whitsundays, but we found plenty of bombies where friendly fish such as trevally, parrotfish, wrasse and angelfish could be found. We some blue spotted rays, and quite a few black and white tip reef sharks. Also had to make a quick exit from the water at Turquoise Bay after being stalked by a tiger shark of around 3 metres length!
Local wildlife was abundant in emus, kangaroos, black footed wallabies, butterflies as well as many many dragonflies. We awoke one night to the sound of lapping water, and unsure of it’s origin we peeked outside to see a great big kangaroo drinking out of a bucket we’d left outside to wash sand off our feet!
Had some very windy nights at Mesa Camp, testing the Jayco (or foldable door in particular). I think the ranger said around 30knots, but it felt much worse! Our poor neighbours in their tent we heard hammering pegs in all night, as well as a few broken fibreglass poles.
Sheree insisted on creating a sand sculpture, but not sure how her fish would rate in comparison to the touring sand sculpting team that created castles and bugs in Frankston earlier this year.
Starting to see a few termite mounds along the roadside, deep red in colour, and not the spectacular height of those found further north in the Cape.

Km’s to Exmouth and around 701km
Km’s so far this trip 8982.2

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Comments

[Greg and Joan Gamble]

Great travel stories and pictures
We have enjoyed all the pictures you have sent, also with very interesting stories, it sounds like you are having a great time Keep well, and we are looking forward to the next one Love Nana

[Sherlach]

Hello from Broome
Hi Nan & Pop - glad to see you are enjoying our blog! Hope the photos of places you visited are as you remember them. Take care and will talk soon.