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Published: February 24th 2007
Old Tree By Roadside
Its incredible how these trees survive fire and droughtHo hum, off we go again. Our new ride is also a Hyundai, but it's the smallest model in the range and a bit of a come down after The Beast. It's a manual gear change and Willy has experienced some difficulty in trying to make it start in whatever gear it was in when he stopped at the junction. I didn't drive the Beast or any of the other automatics enough to get used to not having to change gear.
The trip down to the south coast was very uneventful, heaps of traffic for the first 20km out of Perth and then nothing for miles and miles. It rained on the way down - proper rain - we haven't seen rain like that for ages, probably since we left Scotland. (Willy obviously doing his weather wizarding again).
We're stayed in a motel in Albany right on the south coast. It's not a very touristy town, although it's in a lovely spot, with gorgeous blue sea, incredibly fine white sand, coastal walks, dramatic cliffs and lush green foliage. If I had to pick a place to live in Oz, it woould be here - though to be fair, we
haven't actually seen very much of this huge country.
We climbed up to a view point on Mount Clarence, which is the site of a war memorial to the 1st World War Anzac troops who sailed from here. The momument is of a couple of cavalry horses - must have been the last war where horses were used in battle. It's incredible to think that way back when they'd only just invented the motor car and they hadn't got as far as telephone links between AUstralia and Britain, the British Empire could organise the transport of people from the bottom of the world to muddy ditches in France - or for most of the guys from here, Gallipoli. (and they'd be sailing for weeks on a ship, not simply flying in less than 24 hours).
We saw some very friendly wildlife - skeets - some kind of lizard, which let me get really close to take photos. (I only photograph things that virtually walk up to the lens, none of this lying in ditches or hanging about in broiling sunshine with flies biting you).
We got back in the car and took a trip along the coast
to Emu Point and Beach: stunning sea and 3 mile long beach of white sand.
Exhausted by our exertions, we went back to the motel and immersed ourselves in Australian TV: the Simsons, the Good Life and West Wing. Globalisation has a good side! (though Benny Hill was on the other station and that would be pushing it a bit too far).
We went across to what we thought was another beach to watch the sunset, but it was in fact a wind farm on a cliff above a very rocky beach. The wind farm is a tourist attraction, with patchs meandering through the turbines, info panels and scenic viewpoints. It's the largest windfarm in Australia although only a dozen or so actual windmills. Given the winds around here it seems a terrible waste. The turbines are really big: each blade is 35m long - and I really like them. Overall we've been disappointed in the use of renewable energy here especially given the amount of sunshine and wind they get. The sunset was a bit disappointing: no pinks, or oranges - it just set behind a cloud.
The windfarm was also next to a long distance
footpath, the Bibbelmun Track, which I tend to call the BubblegumTrack. It's 952km long (about 600 miles) and goes from Albany to Perth, though not as the crow flies. It's a good track and very well maintained - I don't like many of the tracks through the bush here, as they're covered in leaves and bark, which could hide snakes and spiders - still a bit paranoid about the deadly beasties, though we haven't seen any.
The coast is really scenic - we took a gravel road (this hire car's allowed on gravel roads, as long as they're marked on the map) and visited some of the bays along the coast. Salmon Holes had a beach with waves crashing onto huge granite outcrops offshore. Blow Holes had believe it or blow holes, where the sea is forced up through cracks in the cliff and spray comes out of these holes at the top. The seas weren't rough enough to get much spray out the top when we were there, but the booming noise of the waves hitting the inside of the cliffs was incredibly loud. We spent our last afternoon in Albany walking along the main town beach: a
The Bibbelmun Track
Even the walks are staggeringly long distance nice sandy beach, safe enough to swim in.
Next day we moved along the coast a bit to Walpole, which is only about 50 or so miles further west. Elephant rocks is a group of rocks on a beach that look like elephants: have a look at the photo and see if you can see them. Green Pools is just beside them and these are beautiful toothpaste-advert green pools sheltered behind big rounded lumps of granite.
We stopped in Denmark (town in WA :we haven't suddenly switched continents) for coffee. Denmark is billed as a hippy haven in the brochures but isn't really. It had a good eco-shop, where I found a straw bale build book that I haven't come across before. Naturally I bought it and am saving it to read on one of the long plane journeys that's coming up soon. During the purchase of said book, we discovered that there had been a tour of straw bale houses in the area only a fortnight ago and that the owners of the second-hand book shop in town had built a straw bale house, so we went along there and had a quick chat with one of
them. Although quite friendly he didn't offer to take us out there and show us round but did discuss some of the issues they had encountered.
We drove through the Tingle Forest drive (more ridiculously large trees), went to the tourist info in Walpole and were booked into a splendid cabin for three nights. It's on a farm, out in the bush, and is very well-appointed. It has proper fridge, freezer, cooker - and enough pans to be able to cook a meal with. Even better, because we're there for three nights, we get a box of chocolates and a bottle of red wine , which we have yet to open. This place is cheaper than just about any other cabin we've stayed in - and beats the rest hands down. The couple who run it are nice folk - gave us a bag of homegrown tomatoes when we arrived.
First full day in Walpole, we climbed a local hill topped by a huge granite boulder, called Mount Frankland, from which you could see miles of tingle, jarrah, karri and marri forest (all types of eucalyptus): then we walked round the base of the mound, being as
Beach to the West of Albany
Incredible colours and huge waves - there's nothing between here and the Antarctic noisy as possible to scare snakes and watching our feet so as not to step on them. Needless to say, we saw no sign of anything scary or poisonous.
Later we went into the forest to do an aerial walk through the great tingle trees. Tingle are a only grow around here and they're huge: some are 200 ft high and 20 ft in diameter. Karri, marri and jarrah are the other main types of eucalyptus that grow round here - they're not quite as big. The walkway climbs safely and gently up to a height of 40 metres. You're higher up than some tree tops, but many still tower above you. When the wind blows, the walkway moves, but not as much as some suspension bridges we've walked over. Willy enjoyed the experience so much, that he insisted on going round a second time, so we did. On the second time, he looked down at the ground - and even walked without holding on at the sides.
There's also a ground level walk through the forest which is just as impressive, and much less nerve-wracking. The multitude of forests around here are filled with these huge trees
and they stretch for literally tens of miles (many individual forests are larger than the central belt in Scotland).
In talking of the forests we seem to have ignored the remaining flora and fauna. Australia has been incredible for exotic birds all sorts of parrots - parrakeets, lorrikeets, cockatoos -crested , white and black, gallahs, rosellas. Also ibises, several different herons, various hawks including wedge tailed eagles and at least 2 kinds of harrier, kookaburras, fairy wrens of various kinds, emus, willy wagtails (different from ours) and lots more. Plus kangaroos, wallabies, koalas, platypus, lizards but fortunately no snakes. On the downside we have mosquitoes and bloody flies!
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