November 8, 2009

Oceania » Australia » Western Australia » Perth » Perth City
November 8th 2009

Published: November 8th 2009

So I went on my big trip up north! It was amazinggg. The first day we left Perth city bound for Kalbarri. We took Highway 1 to get there and apparently this highway goes all the way around the continent in a giant circle - 17,000 miles! On my trip there were three other Americans, a Scottish girl, a Japanese girl, and a Korean guy. The tour leader was Australian and he was excellent! He knew so much about everything we saw and was so friendly - it was fabulous. Our first stop was the pinnacles. These are super cool. They are limestone peaks that were formed by seashell being buried deep underground. The seashells turned into limestone and then once all the soil eroded away, the limestone peaks were revealed. The second stop that day was to a beach to go sandboarding. Sandboarding is basically like sled riding, except on sand. We sandboarded down this MASSIVE sand dune - and let me tell you, sand really hurts. I got brush burns on my legs from the sand. We stopped for the night in Kalbarri.

The next day started at Kalbarri and ended at Shark Bay. We went to the Murchison Gorge in Kalbarri National Park. Here we hiked down into Z-Bend Gorge where I went abseiling down a cliff (very cool!), saw the gorge, and also went and saw what they call the Loop and Nature's Window. We went to Red Bluff - which has beautiful views. After this we went to Shell Beach - this beach that has no sand but seashells instead. Seriously, there were millions of seashells about 6 inches thick across the entire ground. They were teeny tiny perfectly made shells. At the end of the night, we had reached Monkey Mia and the resort there.

The third day we got up early at Monkey Mia (Shark Bay) and went to Northampton. At Monkey Mia in the morning, we went out and saw the dolphins they are famous for. They basically swim right up to you! It's the craziest thing. I have pictures of them so you can tell how close I am. Then we went out on a Catamaran. They helped us spot dolphins, dugongs, and birds out in the ocean which was fun. Too far away to get any good pictures though. Finally, we left Monkey Mia and began to head back south. We stopped at Eagle Bluff and took a bunch of pretty photos, as well as spotted sharks in the water! We also saw stromatolites - which I was super excited for. We stopped for the night at Riverside Sanctuary - this really cool farm that used to have something like 20,000 sheep on it. But the sheep were ruining the land so severly the farmer sold off all the livestock and is now committed to revegatating the area and making it as the former habitat once was. It was really neat. They took us out stargazing and showed us constellations!

The last day (today!) we did a lot of driving. We went from Northampton back to Perth. We went to the Hutt River Province - which is super interesting. This guy succeeded from Australia and formed his own country back in the 1970s. He and his wife are crowned Prince and Princess of the province and have stamps and all this other stuff. Then we went to Greenough Wildlife Park which is basically ran on part of a woman's property. She takes in animals that have been hurt or injured so that they cannot survive in the wild and takes care of them for their entire life. She has kangaroos and birds, a horse, some goats, and snakes. It was really nice!

Now it is late and I have a final tomorrow at 9 am, followed by a lot of packing and getting things together to leave. I fly out of Perth and get to Sydney at 6 am. I'm there Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and leave for Melbourne. I'm in Melbourne Thursday night, Friday, Saturday. I get to Sydney Domestic Airport at 8 am Sunday. Go from there to the International Airport. Fly out to LA then to Charlotte then to Pittsburgh at 12 midnight Sunday! So almost home - just a couple more adventures! = D

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