Denham and Kalbarri - Central WA

---

Moving on again, I left Carnarvon for Denham, which is the main town for the Shark Bay World Heritage area. The trip was another of the long haul, not much to see, driving through high wind areas, and only a couple of roadhouse stops along the way.

This leg was about 329 kms, and in fact was a "J" type trip, in that Denham is located on a peninsula, Cape Peron, which effectively divides Shark Bay into two halves. Shark Bay Marine Park is over 700,000 hectares in area and encompasses about 1500 kms of coastline, and is home to many species of marine life, the major ones being the habitat for the largest number of dugongs in the world (over 10,000 at last count), along with the usual dolphins, rays, turtles, fish, prawns, crabs and so on.

Much of the tourist activity is water related and depends of course on the season for viewing. There are a number of significant sites in the genearal area. Monkey Mia is often quoted as a must see, doplhins hand fed by tourists from the beach. In actual fact, all that there is at Monkey Mia, is a resort which encircles the beach and the dolplhin feeding is a "staged event", once a day and controlled by the resort, and there is a charge to accees the resort to see the feeding. I gave this a miss as I don't think it is right for these events to be commercialised in a special heritage area.

Denham is home to a modern concept, in this case called the World Heritage Discovery Centre. This is a one stop infomative display, covering natural and cultural history, in state of the art displays, soundscapes, historical film clips laced together with current video of local identities and conservation and rehabilition scientists working in the area.

I learnt something new from this centre, a French explorer left a bottle (on display) when on a visit to the area in 1772, and annexed Australia (not that it was known by that name then of course) for FRANCE. Just as well that Jimmy Cook beat them to the punch on the east coast in 1770.

Probably worth someone writing a book about an alternative history, starting with - "What If ?"

Also in this area is Shell Beach, no sand, just trillions of tiny shells, called the Hamelin Cockle, which live and die in this area of very heavily saline seawater. The beach is up to 1 km wide at low tide, over 5 km's long and the shells have been measured down to a depth of 10 metres, simply awesome. At one time, small bits of the beach was dug up as building bricks, and a number of buildings with "shell bricks" still survive in Denham.

Another feature is Hamelin Pool, which has two claims to fame, one being an old major telegraph station built in 1884, and also on the shoreline, one of only two places in the world where living marine stromatolites exist. The microbes in these are the same as those found in 3,500 million year old rocks, making them living fossils.

It would be a good place to revisit in the right seaon to cruise the waters and see the sites in some more detail.

After two nights here I moved on down to Kalbarri, a little sea town, on the mouth of the Murchison River. This is another spectacular and diverse area, to the south about 12 kms of spectacular cliffs, with a few photo sites, natural bridge, orphan island and grandstand, whales were seen briefly coming up for air a couple of kms out to sea, generally quite spectacular.

Also behind Kalbarri was Meanarra Hill lookout which gave great views of the town and river and area. Also near Kalbarri is the famous "Narures Window", accessable by 4WD, in the Kalbarri National Park. I was taken out there by David and Bromyn (a Sydney couple who I have been bumping into from time to time since Halls Creek) in their 4WD, AND it truly was worth seeing. A walk of a km and a bit, along a rocky track, climb down and around a rocky outcrop, quite difficult and no room for error, and then out onto a small spur.

The Natures Window feature is in a fact a hole (roughly rectangular) that has been eroded in the rock, and looking through it down onto the Murchison River Gorge (at least 500 metre below) was incredible. also the 180 plus degree general views were spectacular. The window is about 6 x 4 metres, and is a photo oportunity not to be missed.

The walk along the track was not all that dangerous, but was near the limit of my 71 odd years physical ability, so I don't think I'll do this walk again.

All in all, I think both Denham and Shark Bay area, and Kalbarri are as good as it gets and worth the trip. Nearly forgot, also did a trip for a few kms up the Murchison River, from the ocean mouth. The river itself, does not run year round so the ocean outlet is tidal.

My next move was down to Geraldton which I will cover in my next blog.

PS, Up to 80 fishing boats operate out of Kalbarri when the crayfish season is on. Next one starts around end of October.

TRAVELLING PETE

---

Comments

[Robin Loan]

We need pics!
Hi Peter, Where are the photographs mate? Robin