GERALDTON - KALBARRI - SHARK BA

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GERALDTON - KALBARRI - SHARK BAY

We packed up at Port Dennison just as the rain and wind started and headed off to Geralton about 300 Km North. We later found out that this turned out to be a very good move. Several hours after we left the approaching storm caused quite a bit of damage at the park. The rock sea wall near our caravan site was washed away together with about 10 meters of the sand and foreshore.

Our caravan park at Geraldton was 4 Km North of main shopping area and right on the beach. We spend several nights sitting on the beach watching the sunset. I am starting to build up quite a collection of sunset photo’s.

I spend a day and a bit doing some modifications to the vans plumbing. While I was doing this Jacquie wandered around the shopping area.

Then there was the “hair do”, words can’t quite describe the change in Jacquie’s appearance. I drove past and didn’t recognise her.
The pictures show the change, it’s like changing wife’s half way thought a holiday.

Oh! I nearly forgot to mention we are now the proud owners of a band new pearl.
It is apparently an Abrolhos Isand black pearl, I have not seen it or the bill yet. I am building up the courage to look at both soon.

We took a tour of the Lobster Factory one morning. Very impressive!, they store thousand of lobster for live export. We saw one of the boats come to the wharf at the factory and unload crates of lobsters direct on to a conveyer that takes them to the sorting area and into the holding tanks.
A hundred or more lobsters were unload, sorted and stored in about five minutes.

We were in Geraldton for 4 days, mostly restocking with food and relaxing.

Our next stop was Kalbarri, the caravan parks were mosty full here and we managed to get the last vacant site in the park we chose.

All the literature mentions the pelican feeding that occurs at 8am every morning on the beach in front of the town.
The first morning we walked down to the beach to watch this spectacle to find 50 tourists, a volunteer feeder, a large bucket of fish and one Pelican (not very hungry).

The Kalbarri national park surrounds most of the town. The costal cliffs have roads going to the edge of the high red cliffs and walkways along the top of the cliffs. The sunset light turns the cliffs different shades of red much like Ayres Rock. We took our chairs and wine out there one night and spend a very pleasant hour overlooking the water and cliffs at sunset.

The park also extends east along the Murchison River valley. We were a bit early for the wildflowers that turn this area into fields of colour.

We drove 60 km over corrugated gravel roads into the park to view the river gorges. The walks around and into the gorges were a bit of a challenge but the scenery made it worthwhile.

Our next destination was Shark Bay, we booked into Hamelin Pools caravan park because this was the closest place to Steep Point.
We wanted to drive to Steep Point as this is the most westerly point in Australia. We have been to the North, Eastern and Southern points so this was the last on our list.

The drive was a bit of a challenge, 360 km of corrigated gravel, narrow sandy tracks, steep soft sand hills and a stretch along the beach just above the water line.
The trip took us nine hours including about half an hour for lunch at the point.

We met some fishermen who were camped at the point. They were fishing with helium balloons that took their line out to sea. The results were mackerel that weighed 22 Kilos and a range of other fish.

We arrived back at Hamelin Pools just in time to walk up the sand dunes (with bottle on wine) to watch the sunset over the bay and chat with the other people all doing the same.

Hamelin Pools is a world heritage area because of the stromatolites that are living rocks that date back to the beginnings of life on earth. This is one of three area’s in the world that these stomatalites still exist.
The beach is this area is made completly of small shells up to nine meters deep. The shells have cemented themselves together over many years. In the past they have been quarried and sawn up into blocks and used for building.

The science of these shells and stromatolites is fascinating but a bit much to go into here.
Refer: - http://www.sharkbay.org/default.aspx?WebPageID=129

Our next move was to Denham, 26 Km from Monkey Mia. We based ourselves here to be able to explore Francois Peron National Park, Monkey Mia and the surrounding area.

We spend all day at the Francois Peron National Park firstly at the old homestead that traces the history of the sheep station that once covered the whole area and then out to Cape Peron.

Track out to Cape Peron was a challenge. We had to reduce tyre pressure to negotiate the deep soft rust red sand that extended 45 Km over narrow tracks to the Cape.

The walk around the cliffs at the Cape was worth all the effort. We saw beaches covered with hundreds of sea bird, we watched turtles swimming around in the shallow water and Dolfins fishing close to the shore. The Dolphins herd the mackerel up to the shoreline and come completely out of the water to grab the fish.

We have been told by many people that the Monkey Mia dolphins are all too commercial now and not worth seeing, we went anyway.

Yes, it is a bit controlled now but nothing beats the experience of having Dolphins swimming around your legs in 18 inches of water and seeing twelve or more Dolphins playing with their young right in front of you.

Jacquie was really excited when she was chosen to feed a Dolphin. We watched for a hour or so then sat in the beachside cafe having coffee and scones watching the pelicans and emu’s wandering around the grass in front of us.

After lunch we walked down to the pier to watch the fishing boats and bought a big snapper for $10 from one of the commercial fishermen.
Fresh snapper for tea capped of a really good day.

We leave here soon for Carnarvon, Coral Bay and Exmouth.

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Photos

Jacquie
This is the new Jacquie.
We haven't decided if the new hair style is good or bad yet.

Lobster Sorting
The fishermans co op at Geralton was very efficient. The lobster are loaded onto the conveyer direct from the boat. Grading and storage to only a few minutes.

Geralton Caravan Park Sunset
This was taken at the beach in front of our caravan park at Geralldton

Geralton Foreshore Sunset
This is part of the foreshore in front of the Geraldton City centre.

Kalbarri Sunset
This was taken across the road from our caravan park at Kalbarri.

Murchison River
This is the Z bend gorge of the Murchison River in the Kalbarri National Park.

Pot Alley
This is the coastal part of the Kalbarri national park. These red cliffs rise out of the water all the way around the coast.

Natures Window
Part of the Kalbarri National Park. It was a 2 km walk over a rocky trail to get to this place.

Parrot
This is one of the birds in a huge walk through avairy at the Kalbarri parrot breeding centre.

Bird
This is another one of the birds in a huge walk through avairy at the Kalbarri parrot breeding centre.

Steep Point
This is the most westerly point in Australia. The trek out here was a challenge.
360k of gravel roads and soft sand tracks.

Monkey Mia Dolphins
This is Jacquie getting closeup to the dolphins.

Dolphin
The dolphins at Monkey Mia swim right up to you. They roll on one side and one eye takes a good look at you.

Feeding the Dolphins
The National Park officers supervise the dolphin feeding to make sure each dolphin get the right amount of food. Jacquie said it took the fish from her very gently.

Pelican
This Pelicans at Monkey Mia are very friendly.

Sunset Windmill
This big windmill was part of the original homestead at the Francois Peron national park at Shark Bay

Windmills
I just liked this picture. These two big windmills were used to pump underground water more than 10km to watering troughs at the old sheep station at Denham.

Bob's Diet
My new diet seems to be working very well

Comments

[suzie]

love photos
Jacquie hair cut a winner. Bob your diet is really working. photos great suzie