Day 53 – Tuesday 21st August – Monkey Mia/ Cape Peron This morning the unthinkable happened – when we woke up there were proper dark grey clouds in the sky it really looked like it would rain. How could this happen? Clouds and rain for our morning at Monkey Mia! We decided that we would drive the 40 minutes to Monkey Mia resort and hope that the wet weather would have blown away by the time it got to the first dolphin interaction scheduled for 7.45am. The clouds persisted but the rain stayed away – hooray! At Monkey Mia resort we paid our $16 entrance fee and happily found that it was happy hour at the coffee shop. Rangers keep the crowds off the beach before the dolphin interaction is supposed to start. Over ... read more

Day 51 – Sunday August 19th – Quobba Blowholes When we woke up this morning the outside of the tent was covered in a heavy layer of dew. However it didn’t take too long for everything to dry out in the warm sunshine. Even though it is a Sunday and not a school day, Anna and Luke were forced into doing some diary writing and literacy work before we allowed ourselves a visit to the lagoon beach. This time the tide was quite high and the lagoon was full of beautifully clear turquoise water. We could see the reef and the kids got straight in to check out the coral. Anna came back out of the water saying she had seen a shark and was not going to go back in! Luke did a ... read more

Day 49 – Friday 17th August – Coral Bay Our gravel pit campsite was just as scenic in the morning as it was when we arrived in the dark. We were surrounded by mounds of gravel, a few cows and some grazing land! Luckily the wind had died down and we were able to make a quick cup of tea before packing up and driving into Coral Bay for 9am. We got kitted out with wetsuits with the rest of the holiday makers who had booked on our trip, then had a short coach ride to the Coral Bay harbour, where our boat, the Kurni Ku, was waiting for us. The weather forecast was for pretty much no wind and 28 degrees, so we knew we would be in for a fantastic day. After ... read more

Day 47 – Wednesday 15th August – South Lefroy Bay, Ningaloo Station More snorkelling, reading (Mark has now started the 3rd Millennium Trilogy book), diary writing, swimming with turtles, dolphin watching, dugong hunting (there is apparently a resident dugong in the next bay but Anna and I couldn’t find it while snorkelling), dune jumping, sand boarding and relaxing. Lots of relaxing and looking at the aqua sea. We were happily minding our own business in the afternoon when we had a surprise visit from two officers from the Fisheries Department, who politely asked if they could have a look in our fridge (and freezer!) to check that we have been fishing according to the regulations. We dissolved into laughter and said they were welcome to check the fridge but the only fish we had ... read more

Day 45 – Monday 13th August – Ningaloo Station, South Lefroy Bay During the night the wind picked up considerably and it was very blowy when we woke up. Worse still, the unthinkable had happened… there were clouds in the sky! Not just any old clouds but grey ones and they seemed to be galloping in around us with the wind and it started to look a little bit like it might rain. Shock horror! This girded us into action to pack up before the rain came. We had put the awning up for a bit of wind protection so packing up the tent took a little bit longer than usual. Not sure how strong the winds actually were but it was definitely the windiest it’s been all trip and the gust were very ... read more