Francois Peron National Park

Since we had caught up to the McCloskeys again at Monkey Mia, we thought it would be a good opportunity to check out Francois Peron National Park together. The drive to the homestead is a 2WD road but the rest of the national park is 4WD only with a lot of deep sand. We always feel safer tackling that kind of thing with another family. The homestead was built back in the days of sheep farming. The land was bought by the government in the early 90's and turned into a National Park. The kids were very excited to try out their natural hot spa using hot artesian bore water. It is about 40 degrees so a bit hot when it is over 30 degrees outside!



We then drove for about an hour to get to the northern area of the park and have a look at Bottle Bay. It is spectacular as the cliffs are red and the sand is either white, red, orange or even black in some areas.









Dion found some rock oysters and the boys tried them and decided they like them now. They are developing expensive sea food tastes on this trip. Tom requested red emporer fish for his dinner the other night at $65 per kilo! And Jack wants crab and crayfish to try as well. Even though it is all caught around here it doesn't make it any cheaper. Maybe just fresher.

We then got back into the car and had a look at Cape Peron and Skipjack Point. Beautiful scenery again and we saw enormous stingrays, lots of fish and lots of cormorants diving for fish from the look out.













We then went back down the sandy road to Herald Bight.



Beautiful clear water and a bit more sheltered from the wind but unfortunately no fish. The kids made another city for the toy cars but with no fish biting we decieded to head back to Monkey Mia. Really worth the long sandy drive to get in here. You can camp here and it would be a lovely spot to spend a few nights in a camper trailer or tent.

More from Monkey Mia

We had quite a busy first day in Monkey Mia. After the dolphin feeding we went to have a quick look around Denham. On the way we stopped at a place called Little Lagoon. It is almost perfectly round and is connected to the sea by a tiny channel. It looked so beautiful that we wanted to swim but there are lots of stonefish in the area which are nearly impossible to see and can kill in a couple of hours if you step on them. So made the lagoon a bit less inviting. At least you could see a shark or a croc coming for you up north!




It didn't take very long to look around Denham as it is a small town. Very pretty and it had a great Visitor Centre with lots of information about the area. Jack filled in a questionnaire that they have for kids and Tom and Charlie spent the time fighting and throwing tantrums. Too many late nights I think.

We then drove to Ocean Park which is the aquarium. We had a look through various tanks and saw lots of fish and other creatures. However I think the highlight was the shark feeding. They had a big outdoor pool with lots of Lemon and Sandbar sharks.








Tempting place to throw naughty children!

After Ocean park we went back to the resort for a rest then went on a sunset boat cruise. We were on a catamaran called Shotover which was lovely. The wind was up so we were sailing along pretty fast with plenty of spray. Not very easy to drink on though, we all kept spilling them!



Michael helped with raising one of the sails.



The kids enjoyed sitting on the net as we were sailing along.



The sunset was really beautiful too. We even had a few dolphins swimming along behind us.

For those of you who watched a tv show called Farmer Wants a Wife a couple of seasons ago, we kept sailing past the Pearl Farm belonging to one of the farmers!

Feeding the dolphins at Monkey Mia

I was very excited about seeing the dolphins at Monkey Mia. It is something I have been hearing about for many years so it was really great to be here. The whole interaction is very carefully managed by the park rangers. You have to get to the beach by 7:45am and wait on the boardwalk then finally you are allowed down to the water's edge. The dolphins are there from about 7:15 or so and you can see them swimmimg arund waiting for their food. We werer lucky enough to have a baby dolphin at the moment called Piper who is 3 weeks old. Very cute!










Because it is breeding season we had to stay out of the water so that the dolphins don't come right into the shallows. If they do it can mean that their babies are not able to feed. There were 4 wildlife volunteers each holding a bucket with a dolphin's name on it. Each bucket contained only 4 fish as they are careful not to overfeed and have the dolphins rely too much on the food. The volunteers pick people out of the crowd to come into the water and give a dolphin a fish.

Jack and Tom were very lucky to be picked out of the crowd and have a turn of feeding a dolphin. They got to feed Surprise.







On the way back from the dolphin feeding we very nearly bumped into some more emus who were just wandering around the caravan park!

Carnarvon to Monkey Mia

From Coral Bay we drove to Carnarvon. We were planning on calling in at a place called Point Quobba for a couple of nights before we got to Carnarvon but we had discovered a broken shock absorber and needed to get that looked at if we wanted to go off road. Repco fixed it very promptly and at a reasonable cost for WA so would recommend them if you ever need a mechanic in Carnarvon. We stayed at a Big 4 Caravan Park which had a jumping castle. It kept the kids entertained all afternoon so we were very happy. Really friendly people running the caravan park for a change so I would also recommend this as a place to stay. The McCloskeys arrived later that afternoon after spending an extremely windy night at Point Quobba. They left the next day to go to Monkey Mia but we thought we would stay another night in Carnarvon and have a look around. Carnarvon is well known for it's produce so we went to a farm called Bumbaks and had mango smoothies and chocolate dipped mango icy poles. We picked up some strawberries and other fruit and veg from the Coral Coast Strawberry Farm. We also got some whiting and red snapper to eat from the fish shop.

On our way out of Carnarvon the next day we stopped at the One Mile Jetty for a look. Unfortunately it had been burnt a few weeks earlier by some disgruntled fisherman who had their illegal catch confiscated but it was still worth a look.







We also stopped at a place called Pelican Point to let the hermit crabs go. The boys had cared for them really well but we were worried about taking them too much further south. Plenty of tears as they said goodbye but the promise of a chocolate covered banana ice cream cheered them all up!

The drive to Monkey Mia was long and very very boring. Took about 4 hours or so. We made one stop on the way in at Hamelin Pool where you can see the stromalites. For those like me who didn't have a clue what they are I will do my best to explain. They are the earliest form of life that occurred on the planet many billions of years ago. They are these algae rock like things that produce oxygen, hence the beginnings of life on earth. They thrive in Hamelin Pool due to the high salt levels. Very hard for the kids to get their heads around. Here are some pictures.












They are extremely slow growing, only 0.4mm a year so these ones are very old. I think Tom was more impressed by the old shell quarry that we saw at Hamelin Pool Telegraph Station. They dug the compacted shell out and used it to build a church and houses many years ago.













We finally made it to Monkey Mia and checked in at the Dolphin Resort. Looked like a great place and we were really looking forward to meeting a few dolphins the next morning.

Coral Bay Part 2

We didn't do much else in Coral Bay other than swim and snorkel and eat birthday damper! However Tom has been carting a box around for ages wanting to make a diorama, as you do when you are travelling around in a caravan. I kept saying no however Tom and Jack got together with Jade and after pooling their resources came up with one.






They did a really great job and were very upset that I wouldn't let them take it with us!

One of the tours available at Coral Bay is a ride on a quad bike. Since we spent so much money on boat trips we had to give it a miss but the boys got to sit on one anyway.



It was very hard to get Charlie off!

After a week in Coral Bay it was time to move on again. We really enjoyed it here and would love to come back and swim with the whale sharks one day. On to Carnarvon and hopefully some cheaper groceries. WA is expensive but Coral Bay wins so far. I bought 2 litres of milk and some Kraft mayonnaise and it was $11!

Jack's 9th Birthday

Two days after Tom's birthday we got to do it all again for Jack's day. He was also very pleased to receive a stock whip!

He was then lucky enough to go on a boat trip to swim with Manta Rays. Michael, Dion and Jade went too and they had a great day. They saw heaps of beautiful fish and coral of course but also a huge manta ray, a turtle, 2 sharks and a dolphin.



Here is Jack jumping off the boat with Jade.



Once they got back we had a birthday damper, this time with Nutella, choc chips and marshmallows. It was beautiful!






Happy Birthday Jack, hope you enjoyed your birthday in Coral Bay.

Tom's 7th Birthday

What a place to have your birthday! And what a list of birthday present requests he had. Very different to a year ago. This year he wanted a stock whip, a pocket knife and a flint for lighting fires. It's like a boys own adventure around here. He was very lucky to have all his wishes granted.
Here he is demonstrating his whip cracking abilities.

After Tom' birthday breakfast of bacon and egg rolls he and I went out on a glass bottom boat to get a better look at the coral.



They found out that it was his birthday on the boat and he even got a little birthday surprise!



Although he found it a bit rough and cold to snorkel for too long he really enjoyed seeing the reef from the boat. I snorkeled and it was amazing.

We had a pie for lunch (another birthday request) and then a birthday afternoon tea with the McCloskey family. Instead of a birthday cake Tom requested a birthday damper which Dion and Sue kindly helped me with. We aren't allowed to have fires here so they put it in their camp oven and into their oven. It was a chocolate chip and marshmallow damper and it was delicious!










After the birthday damper we went to the pub for Friday night happy hour and a game of pool. Then his birthday was finished off with a pizza for dinner at the local restaurant. Not a bad day at all!