The last blog entry (#18) had me arriving in Coral Bay, but on our way there Michele and I pulled into Bullara Station Stay, which we were told has a great coffee shop with beautiful home made scones on offer. We thought we may have even stayed a night, but when we arrived it was very hot, blowing a gale of red dust and the coffee shop was closed as the Station was about to close down for the season. The coffee and scones will have to wait for another time!!!
Bullara Station
Many trees, in regional communities, that have died are being painted blue to raise awareness about mental health. I've come across quite a few in my travels. Here's one at Bullara Station
When we arrived at Coral Bay we parked our vans at the Bayview Caravan Park. I booked in for 7 nights, Michele booked in for 3 nights. After setting up we took a walk along the beach and up to the lookout...OMG...it's so beautiful 😍
Before Michele departed we wanted to do one more adventure together. This ended up being 4 hour "Off Road Rush" tour, driving these dune buggies over the sand dunes and along the coast. It gave us a fabulous look around the area and the roads we travelled were very sandy and extremely corrugated so were great fun to drive. We had a tour guide in the lead vehicle and we both drove our own vehicles...this was another fabulous adventure 👏 And it was just our two vehicles with one of the other Roller ladies as a passenger with our tour leader.
It might not look it here, but this hill was quite steep. Our guide gave us instructions to go over the crest slowly and then hit it about half way down👍...that was an off road adrenalin rush!!
I thought I was riding on the big dipper !!✌️ 😝
A photo taken by the tour operator as proof I was driving 😎
During the afternoon we saw a few goats, big red kangaroos and these baby kestrels. The tour guide had discovered the nest a few days before when he saw an adult kestrel landing on the cliff face and disappearing into the rock face. He took us for a short walk along the cliff and we leant over the cliff to get a look.
So cute 😍 There appears to be three babies here, but our guide says he's seen five.
In case you didn't see them in the photo above 💖😍
A relax on the cliff face to watch the sunset over the Indian Ocean and Ningaloo Reef and then a drive back to Coral Bay at dusk feeling very hot, sand swept, but pumped...it had been a great afternoons entertainment.
We finished the day with a dinner and few drinks at the pub with the other Rollers who were still in Coral Bay. The next day, October 31st, Michele and I said goodbye 🤝😢 She was heading off to Perth on her journey back to Sydney. We had travelled together for almost four weeks and never had a cross word or uncomfortable moment!! And we'd had so much fun. We agreed we had both done lots of stuff that we may not have done if we hadn't had each other to go with, which is sometimes one of the drawbacks of travelling alone. It's not always the safest activity to go clambering over rocks and down gorge walks, walking trails or swimming in oceans and rock pools on your own. So THANK YOU Michele. Having a mate to explore with and enjoy the experiences was awesome. I'll miss you, but know that our paths will cross again, probably on the eastern seaboard next time. Safe travels on your journey east.😘
I also said goodbye a day later (November 1st) to the rest of the Rollers 😢(Bev, Leone, Sue and another Michelle) who all started to head for home (Canberra and Sydney)
For the next few days I was a bit deflated and not 100% fit!!! I read, slept, walked, swam, snorkelled and generally had a very quiet time getting rid of a mild case of "Shingles". I thought I'd just got another midge bite on my collar bone, but the pain was piercing up into my chin and quite different. Then I realised!!...
Uh Oh...Shingles! (self diagnosis...I'd had cold sores for the past three weeks) Coral Bay doesn't have a resident doctor, only a nurses station who sees the patient and then relays what she's seen to a doctor in Exmouth and they do a remote diagnosis. I immediately took myself off to the Nurses station and she agreed it appeared to be shingles. Later that day a script arrived via delivery van and the shingles never had a chance to get a good hold. (BTW she did her nurses training at Latrobe in Wodonga...small world/country)
I figured Coral Bay was a beautiful little seaside village to take a quiet break from my trip so I booked in for another week, which meant I'd be in Coral Bay for Melbourne Cup day. The resort pub runs a rather large purse "Crab race" and it's become a traditional event for the locals and any tourists still in town. Of course I went along!!! As I walked to the pub around 11.30 (2.30 EST) I spoke to a lady (Jan from Cairns) who had just arrived and we ended up spending al afternoon together chatting, eating and drinking. We both failed on the cup.😎 😝 After the cup we were then joined by another couple of ladies from Bunbury WA.
The punters bought a crab at auction paying anywhere between $250 to $500 for their crab and there was quite a large field of crabs on offer. The pool was split with a portion going to a charity, and the rest in winnings. I think the winner took home somewhere between $4000 to $5000. Jan and I just watched!!!
With the friends I met at the pub on Melbourne Cup day ...a few bottles of champagne later and you would have thought we were long time buddies🤜✌️👋 Karen and Jan from Bunbury WA and on the right is Jan from Cairns.
Medication for the shingles has worked a treat and I'm feeling ready to party again!!!
Before leaving the Ningaloo Reef area I took a yacht cruise out to the reef. It was a beautiful day and whenever we weren't snorkelling we just relaxed. Although I didn't see a whale shark (too late in the season) or a mantra ray (further out on the reef to where we were, I did swim with turtles, saw lots of beautiful giant clams and an amazing array of fish and coral. I took my IPhone into the water with me in a waterproof pouch for the first time to try taking photos . I think I need more practice...The pouch worked a charm and the phone stayed totally dry, BUT the photos weren't good.
One of my IPhone photos...clear enough, but the colours of the coral I saw in reality didn't come through in the photos😕
My office for the day...Enjoying the ride
A visit from some dolphins
With Nile, our yacht's captain
Our small water craft
Monday 11th November I left Coral Bay for Carnarvon and I parked my van at The Wintersun Caravan Park booking 4 nights (pay 3 get 4 deal). I'm desperate for a haircut so first on the agenda finding a hairdresser, which I booked for the following day (12th) 👍😃
On 13th I drove up the coast to the "Quobba Blow Holes" about 70kms from Carnarvon. The drive in from the highway was quite stark passing through the McLeod Lake area where there is kilometres of dry salt flats.
Lake McLeod salt flats
One of the salt farms
Arriving at the blowholes you have to walk over quite sharp rugged rock to get to a good vantage point. Initially I walked to about a metre from the edge (where others had been so it wasn't a dangerous spot)and and as I got there a particularly large jet streamed out of the blowhole drenching me 😳 I quickly moved back a metre!!! This is quite a spectacular blowhole and coastline. I'll let the video speak for itself.
NOTE: The best bits are at the 14sec, 25sec, 52sec and 1minute marks.
I got game enough 😊 to move forward again to my original viewing position a little later to take this next photo so I could get a closer look at the main blowhole that sends the biggest water jet into the air. It's a surprisingly small hole in the rock!!!
A lot of the rock you walk over to get to the blowholes has large deposits of sea salt lying in the crevices... it looks like snow. It tasted great!!! The rock formations along the coastline, both north and south looked stunning with the waves creating constant waterfalls. I was told there were lots of oysters on the rocks by the guy you can see out on one of the flat rocks just right of centre in the photo. (A little dot on the rock) I think he's got "rocks in his head"...so dangerous!!! I spoke to him about 15 minutes later and he was climbing down another section closer to the blowholes to get oysters.
About 500 metres further up the coast is a beautiful swimming and snorkelling beach with a camp ground. I took a walk along the beach, but didn't swim.
Another beautiful beach...
Over the remaining time in Carnarvon I visited 2 art galleries, the Carnarvon OTC Space Centre museum and the Historic Precinct, which houses a railway and shearers museum, the one mile jetty and the lighthouse. Carnarvon played such an important role in NASA's Apollo mission and was the first OTC centre to broadcast internationally in the world. The centre has been personally visited by almost all the NASA Apollo crew over the years.
One of the main OTC dishes
A view from the lower platform of the above photo looking over Carnarvon's food bowl
The Historical Museum was a really moving experience. There was a lot of history about the Battle between HMAS Sydney where all the Australian soldiers (around 660) died and the German Ship The Kormoran, which most of the sailors were rescued. Here's a link for anyone interested
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_between_HMAS_Sydney_and_German_auxiliary_cruiser_Kormoran
Then there was the story of the "Carnarvon Lock Hospital" with a very beautiful statue of a distressed aboriginal girl with her young brother clinging to her. Another very sad story. If interested here's some info.
https://www.carnarvon.wa.gov.au/Library-and-Gallery/Local-History/Link-to-Lock-Hospital-Project
All in all I really enjoyed Carnarvon. The weather was superb, low 30's max, evening cool breezes, virtually no flies or mossies and a delightful caravan park that is almost empty (it's now getting very late in the tourist season) and lovely drinking water. As much as it would be great to stay on in such lovely conditions I am heading a little further South today Nov 14th as there are more places to see and things to do!!. Today is my nine month anniversary since I left home😯 The year has flown and looking back it only feels like I left yesterday, but when I see how many kilometres I've travelled and look back on the many experiences I've had and friends I've made and fun, I can see where nine months has gone!!!
Just out of interest here is my "wikicamps" trip to date..86 campsites...I'm pretty slick at set up and pack up these days and getting ace at backing the van!!
I'll post the next blog in a couple of weeks. In the meantime I hope you continue to follow my journey and enjoy the ride with me🚘 It's lovely hearing your comments knowing that it brings back memories for some or encourages others to travel this wonderful country. I still can't respond individually from the blog site, which is frustrating me so apologies to all those who make comments.
Until next time
🥂Anne