Day 7 Perth to Broome - Karijini

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We had a bit of a lie in until 7.30am this morning and then had a hearty breakfast of bacon and eggs cooked on the barbie.

Today was our first day exploring the gorges in the Karijini region. We stared with a stop at the Visitors Centre to learn a bit more about the nature in the area as well as how the Aboriginals used the land and how this has changed over time. We also got to meet some of the local wildlife outside the visitors centre as there were a few large spider webs and spiders along the pathway to the visitors centre.

It was then time to start the descent into the gorges. We walked down a steep track which brought us down to the floor of the gorge and then walked along the bottom of the gorge until we arrived at Circular Pool. It was a very hot day with the temperature in the high 30's so it didn't take much persuasion to get us all to jump in the pool and cool off. Circular Pool is a naturally formed rock pool with a waterfall running into it and it was a much needed rest from the heat of the day. We stayed at Circular pool for a couple of hours and ate lunch here too before continuing the walk Fortuesque Falls. This was a much larger pool with a larger waterfall running into it and after an hours walk to reach the pool we were all happy to jump in for a swim and cool off. The last stop of the day was Fern Pool, this was a deeper rock pool and had little fish that were happy to nibble at anyone's feet! The water was really clear in all of the rock pools so you could see whether there were any other creatures joining you for a swim - we were happy that the fish were the only others enjoying a swim with us as we are now nearing croc country.

From here we walked back up the gorge to the buses and took a 30min drive back to camp. Today was Neil's (one of the tour guides) birthday so everyone dressed up in fancy dress and we had a bit of a bush party, with chocolate cake and balloons to celebrate. The fancy dress costumes were bought for us when we were on our whale shark trip so our tour guide Jess chose our outfits from the op shop - Jo got a nice comfy pair pyjamas and Will got to dress as a school girl, which he actually seemed to enjoy a little too much!

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