The Dolphins of Monkey Mia

---

It was a long, long journey from Kalbarri to Monkey Mia (pronounced my-ah),
but we put the foot down and rattled out the 500+ km without stopping very
long anywhere. By the time we reached Denham, however, we deserved a break
and we used the free hotplates along the boardwalk, to cook ourselves up
some delicious toasted sandwiches. Since the peninsula of Shark Bay is
a world heritage listed site, we had to ask at the county offices for
permission to camp at the remote Eagle Bluff, 20 kilometres before Denham.
This we planned for the following night, on our way out. Meanwhile, it was
on to the famous Monkey Mia resort with it's friendly and hungry dolphins.
Being the school holidays, we had booked ahead and just as well as the place
was packed with families. The Monkey Mia Resort is an expensive proposition
because of the daily visits of Flipper and his friends and although you pay
a "special" national park fee for the privilege, it feels more like an expensive
resort than a NP. We set up camp and went for a stroll along the beach, striking
up conversations with fishermen along the way and out of nowhere a dorsal fin
pops up and glides along in the water, not 10 metres from the shore. The blowhole
confirmed it to be a dolphin and not it's mortal enemy, the Tiger Shark. Just like
that it was gone again, but at least it had appeared 12 hours ahead of schedule.
The next morning we were out of bed early for once, at 7:30 and scurrying along
the beach, with other sleepyhead campers to squint firsthand at the reason for
driving the 150km along the peninsula. A huge group of people (50+) were already
lined along the beach, before the jetty. Everyone from toddlers to their grannies,
were full of expectation in the buttery, winter sunlight that didn't quite take all
the nip out of the morning air. The star performers eventually showed up: first two,
then three and eventually five hungry and agile dolphins. They headed straight for the
volunteers with the buckets, giving away their main motivation for this "rare
interaction with humankind". The CALM people allowed us to step ankle-deep into the water,
which sent a shiver through all but the hardiest souls or those on serious drugs the
night before. No touching our fellow mammals, but some of the chosen were allowed to feed
a creature one fish while taking due care with their fingers. Knowing the routine well
after 40 years of training, once fed this free breakfast, off they disappeared to hunt
for something more substantial, knowing that in any case two more feeds were scheduled
before one o'clock. All a bit more like showbiz than interacting with nature, the reason
for it's huge popularity (I suppose?) is that ever since a woman in a boat in the 60's
started throwing them fish, they and their offspring have returned nearly every day,
even though the boat has long disappeared and the feeding is strictly controlled by CALM,
so as they don't become dependent on it. The authorities claim that they are monitoring
these animals every day and learning lots of new and interesting things about them. I
learnt that they have 105 sharp teeth, can give you a flick of their tail that will
leave you black and blue for weeks and they will put up with a lot just for a free breakfast.
The whole experience left me a bit cold and not just around the ankles. It looked like a
lot of toddlers felt the same as the proceeded to build sandcastles and play with slimy
seagrass rather than observe these magnificient specimens in close proximity.
Anyway, we carried our unimpressed tourist opinions back to the camper, still a little
disorientated at the early hour. The big breakfast of bacon, eggs, toast and a few obligatory
bits of healthy stuff helped us munch our way to a happier and less cynical outlook on the
whole affair. Fair play to the dolphins! Long may it continue and all that! We won't be back
though.
We tried to get the most out of our extra NP fee by taking off on the 2 hour nature walk at
the resort, but it was already too hot to encounter the local birdlife. We cranked up the
camper and headed to the Francois Peron national park. We were only permitted to go as far as
the, now defunct, sheep and cattle station. Like a lot of national parks in Australia, this
is not what you have in mind as a national park. Semi-desert with no trees, just bush and
spinifex. Not a very inviting place, but it continues to support a large amount of small
marsupials. Unfortunately, they have been nearly eradicated by feral cats and foxes, so
CALM has laid a lot of poison baits in a continuing effort to wipe out these invaders and
allow the native fauna to recover. Project Eden here on this peninsula has been one of the
success stories, with nearly all the non-native predators killed off. We walked around the
old abandoned shearing sheds and upon catching a whiff of the barbie being cooked up nearby
by a group of Aussies, we hit the road for Denham, where we made use of the facilities again.
We fluted around Denham a couple of hours before heading out to our camping spot at the
deserted Eagle Bluff. It was really camping in the bush and we retired inside to cook up
hot food after watching the sun set over the Indian Ocean with a couple of coldies. We thought
that we would have a really quiet night, with no-one around for miles .... our little friend
Mickey had other ideas. Sometime after 1 a.m. something ran across Agnes's pillow and scurried
away. She was startled and so was I after she woke me exclaiming that we were under attack.
All lights went on, but the culprit could not be located. Do they have rats in Oz? Yeah!
Probably just a harmless mouse. Lets go back to sleep ... Pitter-Patter. PitTER-PATTER. PITTER-
PATTER! Across the pillow again, the cheeky little bugger. THere were a few more episodes like
this until about 3:30 we heard something clanging the tins together in the rubbish bag. I sprang
up, light on, torch poised to defend myself and/or batter this monster to death. More rustling
and Mickey leaps out and makes an lightning dash for it under the bed. A jet black mouse, as long
and as wide as my thumb with a tail just as long. What a laugh. Lights out, back to sleep. I
don't think that worked as well for my other half.
On our way back to the Brand Highway we stopped in at Shell Beach and got chatting to some
Argentinians - no habia hablado ninguna palabra en espanyol desde hace mucho tiempo. Que extranyo!
We were to run into this group several times in Coral Bay and I was foaming at the mouth to
speak spanish, but the Australian husband looked less than impressed? Maybe if this gringo
could do it then so could he was the expectation? Anyway, even more so than Asia, it's rare to
bump into any spanish speakers in Oz. After that brief top up of latin fuel, we deftly ignored
the Hamelin Pool with it's boardwalks to view the stromatolites - descendants of the oldest living
lifeforms on earth from 3 billion years ago. We convinced ourselves that the people who said that
there was nothing to see were dead right, but the simple fact was we were exhausted after our
fun night with Mickey. We reached Carnarvon by mid afternoon and we had rang ahead to secure one
of the last camping spots. It was a beautiful evening and after a shopping trip into Woolies, we
relaxed by the camper after setting up our 2 newly purchased mousetraps. The oldies around us
laughed and said that we would never catch the little critter, besides you need the irresistable
lure of peanut butter - not cheese - to catch the little lads. They were right. We didn't catch
our little tormentor, but he never bothered us again. THe 3 possibilities we came up was that he
was a local and jumped ship before we left or the poor mite was rattled to death on the
corrugated dirt road or he smelt peanut butter or something better in our neighbours camper and
upgraded.
The next day we turned off the Brand Highway once more to visit the Blowholes at Point Quobba and
stay at an unpowered campsite with only bush toilets (pits with no water) for only six bucks.
The blowholes were suitably noisy and dangerous looking, so we kept our distance as the king
waves pounded the rocks and caused the water to spout high into the air like a geyser. The
campsite was all along the beach where I got chatting to a friendly fisherman from Albany in
the south, as he cast his line out and waited for his son to keep his stubbie holder full.
He invited us for beers later that night, but after the oldie neighbours had shut down their
generators we walked a good two km to the other end to dump our rubbish (in case Mickey was
still lurking). Since reaching Carnarvon the nights had got warmer and we walked hand-in-hand
in the darkness with only the trillions of stars from the clear southern sky overhead to guide
us (we had a torch with us as well, but we tried not to ruin the moment and switch it on too
much).

---

Photos

Aussie place names ....
They really have some good ones, like Lake Disappointment nearby and Mount Nameless, the highest in WA. Funny thing is the Aboriginals had already named everything, but nobody bothered to ask them!