WESTERN AUSTRALIA

Perth, aka the sunshine city, certainly lived up to its name. The city centre itself is nice but there isnt really much to do there. The highlight was climbing up to Kings Park where the views back down over the city are amazing. There are bushwalks and botanic gardens so it is easy to spend a whole day up there, a little oasis where you can escape the city.

The suburbs of Perth were awesome though. I went and spent a night down at Cottlesloe Beach and stayed in a great hostel literally right on the sand. The beach was beautiful, full of surfers enjoying the massive waves and the whole chillled out-beachy lifestyle you associate with Australia really shone through.

My favourite place in Perth was definitely Freemantle (Freo to the locals). It has such a relaxed, laid back vibe to it with cobbled shopping streets, beautiful buildings, parks and an awesome fishing harbour waterfront where you can gaze out to see whilst having a beer. I met up with a friend there and we spent the afternoon soaking up the sun in the famous Little Creatures brewery. Perfect.

I decided to travel the West Coast on a hop on-hop off bus service called the Easyrider. It turned out to be the best decision as I met some awesome people to spend my 3 weeks up there with. First stop after Perth was the Pinnacles Desert. This is a desert where time and nature has eroded away the rocks leaving hundreds of pointy, spiked rocks jutting out of the sand. It really is quite a sight and was a great introduction to the natural beauty that was still to come on my trip of WA!

We spent the night in Kalbarri, a beautiful rugged coastal town full of outdoor activities like fishing, cycling, surfing and sailing. We did a trek down into the gorges and explored the loop, Z-bend gorge and Nature's Window. Climbing down into these beautiful gorges is awesome. The rocks glow bright red and the sky is so blue. The heat at the bottom of the gorges is pretty sticky though!

All the journeys in between our stops are immense. Western Australia is so remote and you pass a lot of nothingness bushland and not much else! The roads are so long and straight and the scenery doesnt change for hours and hours, in which time you might pass a handful of cars or trucks! There is loads of wildlife to see on the roadtrips though - kangaroos, emus, lizards, snakes, echidnas, camels....

Shark Bay is a World Heritage Region and it is easy to see why. It is very beautiful and full of natural beauty and wonders. We stopped off at Hamelin Pool to see the Stromatolites, which date back thousand and thousand of years in evolutionary history. This is one of only 2 places in the world you can see them so it was pretty cool. Shell Beach was also an amazing sight. A massive beach made up entirely of tiny, perfectly formed shells. The white glare from the shells makes the sea glow this awesome aquamarine turquoise colour.

I hopped off the bus for a few nights in the tiny town of Denham, which consists of a couple of shops, a butcher, baker, a pub and a post office. I knew Western Australia was remote but I was not expecting the towns to be so few and far between and so small! It is an added bonus though cos this is exactly the kind of authentic, non-touristy experience that I love. I met some great people here so had a fun few days! I went out on a shark safari 4 wheel drive day trip up to Francios Peron National Park. Wow. This is like no place I have ever seen before. The rocks are so red, the sand is glowing orange and it feels like the desert...then you hit the coast line and the red sand turns white and the sea is the most stiking turquoise colour I have ever seen. I think the contrast of colours just make everything look so beautiful! We went to a lookout point where you have the most amazing view of the coastline and because the water is so clear and shallow we spotted tiger sharks, reef sharks, loggerhead turtles, dugongs and dolphins. Then we drove 5 minutes round the coast and got in the water to go snorkelling!

My next stop in Shark Bay was Monkey Mia, famous as being a spot where wild dolphins come into shore every day. I stayed in a great hostel on the beach where I could just sit and eat my breakfast with dolphins swimming around the bay. It was a really special place. I went every morning to see the dolphins come into shore. They are such amazing animals, so playful and constantly bump into your legs. Even better than this was one afternoon when I was sitting on a remote bit of beach with noone else around and i looked up to see a dolphin right in front of me in the shallows. The beach in Monkey Mia was beautiful, which was a good job as there was nothing else to do here at all! I had a nice relaxing couple of days relaxing at the beach and did a wildlife spotting catamaran cruise.

Beautiful picture perfect paradise-like Coral Bay was where I spent the next few days. I feel like I have been totally spoilt with amazing beaches but this one is probably the best I have ever seen. Shallow turquoise water leading straight out to the Ningaloo Reef where you can snorkel amongst the coral and sea life. I loved this place. Great company, great beach, great snorkelling, great weather. I did a day trip to the outer reef which was teeming with life and where the corals and the fish were so colourful. Even saw a turtle, stingray and a shark! The highlight of the day was swimming with manta rays though. These amazing animals are absolutely huge - they measure up to 4metres from wingtip to wingtip and gracfully glide and barrel roll around the water. They feed with their mouths open, sucking in any plankton floating around. This does mean that there is a moment when they feed and all you can see is this massive wide open mouth coming straight for you and you can see all the way through them! Its pretty awesome to be in the water with them. Had to put to the back of our minds that we had had a 4 metre long tiger shark circling our boat 5 minutes previously! eeek!

I was gutted to leave Coral Bay behind but we carried on up to Exmouth, stopping on the way at the aptly named Turquoise Bay. The snorkelling here was also fantastic, I love the underwater world here and my fear of the sharks is slowly subsiding! Exmouth is a small diving town so only stayed here overnight before heading on up to Karijini National Park. We stayed out at a campsite in the heart of the national park which was so peaceful and a great place to see the stars. We had an evening swim down in one of the gorges which was fantastic. We were swimming in warm, freshwater with huge towering cliffs either side of us and as the sun was setting the red rocks all glowed an amazing orange colour. Had a kangaroo steak BBQ (yum) and enjoyed being out in the middle of nowhere! It was an early start the next day for our trek down through Dales Gorge to Fortescue Falls and Circular Pool. Had an awful moment when a snake slithered out in front of me - scared the life out of me! The gorge was massive and remote and beautiful. The best part of the day had to be reaching the sacred Aboriginal site of Fern Pool having trekked through the boiling hot gorge. This tropical oasis was a big pool with a backdrop of a waterfall surrounded by fern forest. It was incredible - hard to believe it was the outback still!

Our next night was spent at Pardoo Cattle Station. Another very remote, out-in-the-middle-of-nowhere night where we just had a chance to appreciate where we were. Had a very fun evening here with lots of games, sillyness and goon....

From Pardoo we began the last leg of the journey up to Broome. Another very long day on the road but totally worth it when we finally made it! Passed by Eighty-mile beach, another beautiful, deserted shell beach. Broome is the hottest place I have ever been...you cant go outside in the daytime without roasting alive and it is impossible to sleep through the nights. We went up to an amazing lookout point where you get a great view over Cable Beach and the coastline. Again the dirt red rocks against the turqouise ocean are pretty incredible. We got takeaway and went over to Cable Beach to watch the famous sunset. It lived up to all my expectations witht he sky turning ther most increduble colours and the sun sunk into the ocean. Had a fun few days in Broome at the beach and pool, avoiding the sun. One evening we went to the open air cinema to watch 'Australia' which was pretty cool as you are sitting under the stars with bats flying all over the place and lizards crawling up the screen. Even saw some shooting stars. A perfect end to my time on the West Coast.

This trip has been absolutely awesome and many times I have had to pinch myself to believe that places this beautiful exist. The best part is that everything is completely unspoilt and so remote. No people, no resorts, no big buildings, even no mobile phone signal or internet! Just nature at its absolute best :)

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