Tickled Pink

Our final destination on the roadtrip was Cervantes, however we made a slight detour on the way to visit the Hutt River Province. I came across the Hutt River Province in my guide book (Backpackers Ultimate Guide - highly recommended) and up until that point I had never heard of it. The Hutt River Province is a really interesting place to visit, not only because it is considered an independent country within Australia (you can get your passport stamped on entry) but also because of the people that live there. The Hutt River Province seceeded itself from the Australian Commonwealth in 1970 and claimed independent sovereignity. As you enter you are met by "His Royal Highness Prince Leonard I" who is more than happy to give you a guided tour of the Province including the Government ... read more

Day Four of our roadtrip was a long day as we drove further North to Coral Bay. We decided to break up the driving with a stop in Carnarvon which is a small town halfway between Denham and Coral Bay. We took the tourist drive into Carnarvon which had us driving past orchards and banana groves as we wound our way into the town centre. We didn't spend much time in Carnarvon, just long enough to walk down to the shore which is also the mouth of the Gascoyne River and cross part of the old steam train tracks which used to run from the town out to the Jetty. Back on the road we continued up to Coral Bay passing an unbelievable amount of road kill on the way. There were so many dead kangaroos, ... read more

Day 2 of our roadtrip had us driving up to Monkey Mia which is a small tourist resort in the Shark Bay Marine Park famous for the daily feeding of bottlenose dolphins. As we began our drive North of Geraldton we began to notice the difference in our surroundings. The wildflowers that we had been driving through the day before were beginning to thin out and were replaced by the great Australian bush. We were also beginning to drive for longer distances without passing another person on the road; at some points the road stretched out for miles ahead of us without another single vehicle on it. The temperature had also begun to change; we had finally left the grey skies of Perth behind and were driving into beautiful sunshine...and heat. On the long stretches we ... read more

I've just got back from 6 incredible days in Broome so I've got lots to write about today. We arrived in Broome on Thursday and the first thing we noticed as we stepped off the plane was the change in temperature. Having come from a wet and windy Perth the average temperature of 30 degrees in Broome was very much welcomed and gave me the opportunity to crack out my summer clothes for the first time since being in Oz! Broome is completely different to Perth (for a start there are no traffic lights?!) but exactly how I envisaged Australia to be. It's a small, laid back place, with beautiful weather, pristine beaches and lots of dusty red earth! I definitely felt like I was on holiday here. Our first day was spent getting our bearings ... read more

It's been a while since my last blog as we haven't really been up to much touristy. The weather hasn't been too great so we've been trying to dodge the rain and on the good days we've tried to go somewhere new. We spent an afternoon driving around the Avon Valley which is a real picturesque region to the east of Perth. The area is named after the Avon river in the UK, although here they pronounce it Av-on (instead of A-von). Some of the views are stunning as you can look out over the valley and the rapids running through it. It was also the first time that I had seen the red dusty earth that Australia is famous for. Unfortunately my photos didn't come out very well and just don't do the area any ... read more