20 years roaming in WA

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Back in WA and I realise its the 20th anniversary of my trips to Australia. This time apart from topping up on the vitamin D I hoped to be visiting some old haunts around the coastal fringes. To cellibrate my return I thought it worth looking back through my "Gone walk about" visual diary to remind myself of a few highlights. An encounter at Wharton with a fisherman I remember well.

To the east of Wharton lies High Island and Table Island which illustrates well a stage of coastal erosion where the dunes have been washed away and even at low tide one is obliged to wade across the shallows. Having walked around and climbed to the summit of High Island and played the wind warn granites like a natural stone xylophone I descended to the flat Table Island. I left my cloths at the waters edge to wade across; there's something wonderful about taking absolutely nothing with me to investigate this small crop of windswept rocks. I'm accompanied by a lone black back gull. that seems curious to find a naked man wandering around on his patch. On my return a fisherman greets me not batting an eye lid at my lack of clothing, offering me a cold Coca Cola from the esky and he talks of the joys of walking and fishing from such a wonderful spot and how lucky he was that the wife walked out on him.

I include no illustration of this wonderful spot but offer instead an image of the beach Traigh Mhor that I walk to from my croft house on the Isle of Lewis. This beach is often totally deserted even in summer and the mile and a half of sand provides a perfect contemplative walk.

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