Wild-Life & Swan Diving

The city of Geraldton was supposed to be our last stop before returning to Perth. A short distance from the coast are the Abrolhos Islands and the wreck site of the famous 'Batavia.' I say famous but like with most Australian history, it's all too recent for us to really give a damn. The reason why this drew my attention was that although 125 people survived the wreck, 124 of them were killed by a maniac among them. So, I figured this sounded like a lovely place to see off the end of our second road trip. The only problem was, that against popular opinion, Australia does experience some form of winter, and it had swept in while we were in the Tropics. It was now far too cold to think about getting into the water.

We had no real interest in anything else Geraldton had to offer so talked ourselves out of an arctic night in the tent and drove back to Perth to the warm hospitality and home of Mike & Sue. We still had a couple of pre-booked days with the hire car left so decided to take a little trip out to Caversham Wildlife Park in the Swan Valley region west of Perth. I know it's cheating really, but the majority of wildlife we'd seen were road kill - we'd personally taken out a Thorny Devil and were witness to a Brown Snake losing getting flattened. We'd also seen roadsides littered with kangaroos in various states of decay, and let me tell you, "Skippy" didn't have much of a spring in his step anymore.

Most of the animals here weren't moving around any faster but it was nice to see all body parts where they should be and I'm sure everyone would like to give a wombat a stroke every now and again.

After we took the hire car back, Mike and Sue kindly offered us the use of Mike's Holden V6 Ute for the weekend - now we felt like true Australians. For the last three weeks of our 2nd road trip, I had moments of thinking about the wreck diving I had missed out on in Dunsborough. My cold had disappeared within a week of the new road trip, so there should've been anything stopping me next time. However, as sod's law dictates, suggestions of a cold began again the moment we started heading south. It was as if my body didn't want me to dive, or maybe my apprehension manifested itself as a weakness in my immune system. Whatever the cause was, I was determined to not let it beat me again. On the morning of the dive, I was still sniffing, but I reasoned the fact that if I could sniff (however, restricted) with both nostrils, then I would be able to equalise. The dive would go ahead.

Right up to the point of a few metres below the surface, I was unsure if I could continue, but my stubbornness to go on, putting the danger of losing my money over my hearing, was the ruling judgment. I held my nose, blew until the noise squeezing through my ears signaled their equalisation and felt relief from both pressure and doubt.

Just like watching the whale shark appear from out of the blue, the outlines of the bow came into view, and then lines began to gradually complete it's huge frame. Images from film footage of the Titanic flooded my mind as I swan over the handrails and stood on the deck. Bizarre sensations of not actually being underwater were quashed with every school of fish that swam by.

Approximately 15ft off the starboard, lay a Wobergong Shark watching our every flipper stroke. This was his territory and we only had a temporary pass. Best behaviour would be maintained or appropriate action would be taken.

The first dive was an orientation dive where the group stayed with the instructor but I was qualified to go where my will desired on the 2nd dive. This was to go inside, to penetrate it's hull and see the rooms and corridors where 250 naval men once walked. Along with 3 others of the same disposition, I swan through a hole on the deck where a gun emplacement once sat, and flew along passageways & up stairs to see various rooms. Some were obvious as to their function, as apparatus such radar machines spoke of their history, whilst others were left to imagination. We finished our tour with a stop in the bridge, and thought about controlling this ocean giant.

The Swan was scuttled for tourism in these waters in 1997. It was rigorously prepared for this and no one died in the process of it's sinking. And yet, death seemed to cover every wall. Ironic considering that it is the life of ocean which now thrives on these walls and only dead metal was there before. The eeriness of seeing this, and being inside it, was both overwhelming and exciting. It is a new angle to my diving and has rejuvenated my interest to unimaginable levels. I can now let the cold do whatever it likes; I've 'Swan' dived.

When we arrived back at Mike & Sue's house, I thought about what we had already seen of Australia and how far we'd traveled. The total amount for all road-trips was over 7500km. In roughly 6 weeks of being in the country we had driven more than the distance from New York to Rome (or 5.5x the length of Britain). We'd seen all types of both land & marine wildlife, swam with a few of them, and eaten a few more (emu, crocodile, and kangaroo.)

Except for the wonderful interludes of staying with Mike & Sue, we'd stayed in our trusty tent the whole time. My brother asked me if we worried about all the dangerous animals that roam Australia. In truth, it does cross your mind when walking around at night only wearing sandals, and we were always careful to make sure the zip of the tent was done up so as not to return to any unwelcome guests. But apart from that, we just put those horrible thoughts out of mind or at least didn't worry. We adopted an attitude of not letting our fears stand in the way of something we wanted to do. And to be honest, living in a tent isn't all that bad - they're actually quite spacious.

Driving On Fumes To Canoe The Desert

Exmouth was the most northerly point that we would be going to in Western Australia. We'd originally intended to head up past Karratha & Port Headland to check out Broome, but decided it wasn't worth it for the distance and time we'd use. Plus, we need to save some things for the next trip down-under!


After leaving Exmouth, we briefly stopped and explored Shothole Canyon, before continuing the long way back to Perth. We'd deliberately left a couple of places out on the way up so at least we'd get to see some new things on the way back.

We arrived at Carnavon sometime in the afternoon and could see one of the attractions before the town was in view. Dominating the skyline is the huge OTC communications satellite dish that was opened in 1966 and participated in the space race to get man on the moon. It was also from here, that Australia received it's first satellite TV broadcast. The station closed after assisting track Halley's Comet in1987.


OK, not exactly the thrill of the century but there wasn't much else to see in the town, so we kind of had to make do. We briefly checked out the 'One Mile Jetty', and by brief, I mean, stopped the car, took a photo, and drove off again. The problem is we'd seen a longer one in Busselton and this one had nothing new to offer. Other attractions in this entertainment jewel were the banana plantations, but we were so exhausted by the excitement of the OTC Dish and big jetty that we decided to miss these and have an early night instead.

I mentioned before that the cost of fuel and supplies in between large towns is very expensive. Therefore, if you're watching your pennies, you try to make your fuel last the distance to get you that little bit further in order to reach a large town. For this journey, it was to get from Carnavon to Kalbarri without stopping. With 100km to go, the tank read just above the empty line. As we neared 60km, the light came on. It was over 30 degrees outside and would be impossible to push the car much of a distance through this hilly area. I drove with the clutch in on any downhill section and prayed whenever going uphill. As we reached the crest of the umpteenth hill on the never-ending road, we saw Kalbarri in the distance and a nice downhill stretch to lead us there. As a Mylo remix of The Killer's tune "Somebody Told Me" played on the stereo, we celebrated driving the last part of 60km while singing along and cruising at the pleasure of gravity up to speeds of 50km/hr. We'd obviously not found the limit to driving on low fuel and would have to push it further between petrol stops next time ;)

Our reason for returning to Kalbarri was to go on the Desert Canoeing excursion we'd missed out on last visit. As I said before, the fact that the organiser Frank was going to cut himself a road through the bush to use, as the other was impassable, was too good an introduction to a tour.

On the morning of the big day, Frank and his dog 'Boots were pleased to see us again and that we'd made the effort to come back - the tour would go ahead on our account despite only another three tourists going.

As I said before, this canoe trip has not been possible for about 150 years and may not be possible again for a very long time. There is usually no water in these parts at all. Not a drop. We would be canoeing through the desert, on the results of 7 (or 8) cyclones that had dumped their loads on Western Australia this year. It was never going to be an adrenaline-pumping day out, but a rare experience of Australia that allowed us to see something different.

We steered our Canadian-style canoes under branches, between gum-trees and over sandbanks. We had a lunch on an island, looked out for Monitor Lizards munching on desert frogs, and relaxed in watching Australia drift by or fly above. At the rate which the water level was dropping, Frank estimated that he'd only be able to take these tours out for another 3 days. We'd made it back just in time.

So, was it worth the trip back there? Absolutely. It was amazing to see how much water was traveling through a desert and also the high-water marks from when it was at it's peak. A tremendous amount of rain had fallen on Western Australia and provided us with a rare opportunity to do something very different. Gotta love those cyclones!

We're Gonna Need a Bigger Boat!

The size of the writing on the map is a gross misrepresentation of how big the town of Exmouth actually is. Although there was techincally a settlement here beforehand, it's main cause for development was the creation and occupation of an important American Naval base here. This has since been handed over to the Australians but is still a dominant blot on the Exmouth map.

Once again, a town simply means a main road with a few buildings along it. Importantly for us though, the attractions we sought were not part of the town's infrastructure. Exmouth marks the northernmost reaches of the Ningaloo Reef Marine Park. Approximately 8 nights after the full-moon in March & April, a monumental event of coral spawning occurs on the reef and the attending audience come from all over the world. As the coral releases millions of bright pink egg and sperm bundles, it signals the start of a chain of events that ends with the arrival of the biggest fish in the ocean.

There is comparatively very little known about the Whale Shark although they are said to grow up to 18m in length and believed to live for over 150 years. Although they have over 300 rows of teeth in each jaw, these giants of the ocean are not a threat to humans. They are filter feeders, filtering planktonic organisms such as krill and crab larvae from the water primarily near the surface. This makes them relatively easy for us to find and study. It also makes them an easy target for fisherman from countries in SE Asia, and their numbers are on the decrease as a result.

The viewing of these magnificent creatures is what pulls hundreds of thousands of people to Exmouth every year. The problem with an incredible experience such as this is the incredible price tag which accompanies it. In this case, the standard format is around $330 for the privilege. However, as there is no guarantee you will find one on your trip, the ticket comes with a no-sighting guarantee where the next available trip is free. There is still no guarantee you will see one on the 2nd trip.

We'd heard from companies in Coral Bay that it was only within the last few days that any Whale Sharks had actually been seen this season but no companies in Exmouth were obviously advertising this fact. One company caught our eye with an offer that seemed too good to be true - $170 for a trip. The catch? There was not a non-sighting policy. Do you feel lucky? Hell yeah.

There were only 2 spots left on the last day of this special offer period, and that was on our last intended day in Exmouth. We'd either see one or not - simple. That meant we had full two days to occupy our body and minds before the penultimate day arrived. On the first day we drove around the coast and down to view some gorges and check out some snorkeling spots. The starting point for this was Yardie Creek Gorge. We walked under the sun's oppressive gaze for a couple of hours, seeking shelter from the steep walls, skimming stones in the clear water and watching a couple of sharks patrol their territory.

By the time we returned to the car-park, we were anxious to shed our sweat sheens and headed to a beach to cool down. The dehydrating exertion of the first walk and rehabilitating relaxation of the beach swung heavy favour towards spending the rest of the day either in the sea or on the sand.

On our 2nd full day in Exmouth ('Whale' day in 24 hours and counting every second), we had intended to go fishing. Ideas of catching huge Blue Marlin and Mahi Mahi unfortunately never became a reality due to discovering that this had a name: 'Game Fishing' - and that had a high price. There was no point paying over $150 each for a 2nd best choice like reef fishing, so we opted to try our luck, hire a rod and go at it alone. Well, it worked for finding a turtle.

We had no luck on the beach in the morning so headed to the jetty in the afternoon. Within a short space of time, I caught our entrée for the evening - a rather meaty looking 'flathead'. We had no club to deliver to a death blow to it's skull, so I was forced to end it's life by stabbing it through the brain. A lot of things go through your mind when taking a life, but nothing compared to what went through the fish's - 6" of cold hard steel. I had caught, I had killed. Now, it was up to Lucie to gut the poor bastard. Our luck continued with hooking a red-nose next, and our first course was now decided. There would've been a main as well, but nothing else could be enticed that day.

On the morning of the trip, we were told that no companies in Exmouth had seen a single Whale Shark the day before and sightings had been sporadic and short on the previous days. We set off on the boat, trying to discourage any excitement or expectations.

The first stop for the morning was a short snorkelling excursion near the reef. We were advised this was more of a swimming test for everyone, but there were plenty of things to marvel at. I separated from the main group in search of greatness and swiftly found a Bull Ray, that was over a metre in width. With Lucie now swimming at my side we surveyed more of the area and found another one of similar size partially hidden in the sand nearby. We already felt satisfied with the money we had spent.

When everyone else was back on the boat, and only Lucie and I remained in the water, a small pod of dolphins was seen in the distance. The dive instructor jumped in immediately and motioned for us to follow and check them out. The dolphins were too fast, but the chase brought us right up to 3 Dugongs that we had no idea were there. I had never expected to see these extremely shy creatures so close and was even happier with our luck.

Before we were back on the boat, the call from the spotter plane had come through - a Whale Shark had been spotted! Time to grab a hold of something, put the boat into top speed and go find a big fish. Even though we all knew that whales sharks had been known to dive out of sight as soon as people jumped into the water, there was no chance of restraining our excitement. People either laughed, joked about our luck, or kept their voices to their mind, and watched the ocean ahead intently. When we were within sight, the dive instructor jumped into the water and swam to locate the whale shark's precise location while the boat attained a position ahead of the shark's course. When the timing was declared right, we jumped into the water in a controlled rush and swam towards the dive instructor's out-stretched arm. With my heartbeat filling my ears, and excitement in my stomach, I swam. When it first came into view, I was completely awe-struck. As it effortlessly glided towards us with a carriage of small fish taking shelter close by, it resembled a 'Star Wars' type mother ship, with smaller ships flying around it on a voyage through space. I repeatedly took new breaths, and dived underwater, to get what I deemed the best position for taking photos.

After 16 minutes, the whale shark decided it had seen enough, and dived beyond our reaches. We didn't care. We had seen one. We had swam with the biggest fish in the ocean & had only paid $170. And even if any of us had any sad feelings when we were getting out of the water, they were instantly put aside when it was announced that another one had already been spotted and was waiting for us.

In total, we saw three whale sharks on that day that ranged from 3.5 to 5 metres in length and swam a total of 25 minutes with them. I won't repeat my spoken sentiments of amazement when approaching the 5 metre one, but I'm sure they would be echoed by almost anyone that was in the same flippers. You are technically supposed to keep at least 3 metres way from the sharks at all times, but this is often impossible as it's own curiosity draws it towards you. Surprisingly, your only fear at this time, is that you're close proximity may cause the shark to dive and thus your experience to end.


To say we were satisfied with our decision to take a gamble is a contender for the understatement of infinity. Including our decision to independently look for turtles, we had now saved a total of nearly $700. I think that's cause for a celebratory drink….or 6.

Turtle Interference

In reaching 'Coral Bay', we had driven another 300 kilometres and crossed the Tropic of Capricorn. This tiny town is famous for being one of the most beautiful holiday destinations in Western Australia, and as the southern gateway to the Ningaloo Marine Park.

At 300km in length, the 'Ningaloo Reef' is the largest fringing coral reef in Australia and is the only large reef in the world that is found so close to continental land mass. At Coral Bay, the reef starts only a dozen flipper strokes away from the shore, and as a result, a tiny town 1100km north of Perth has become a Mecca for snorkelling addicts everywhere.

A few seemingly autonomous patches of coral quickly becomes a lush landscape of variety as you move further from the shore. Networks of a pastel-red branchlike coral cover 10m squared areas, and then stop to reveal bright coloured fan formations. As the type of coral diversifies, so does the variety of fish. What appears to be only coral at first glance reveals a busy maze of traffic swimming all around and in between each formation. Companies were charging unsuspecting tourists (& those that didn't want to get wet), over $150 for viewing tours, and all you had to do was swim fifty metres.

Other companies were capitalising on promises of seeing some of the wonderful wildlife in the bay. From Turtle tours at just under $200, to Whale Shark tours at $340, if there was an animal on the reef, there was an organised tour to try and find it. We had previously decided that we'd like to see turtles here, but $200 each, was a little hard to justify, so we put our masks and snorkels back on and searched the reef ourselves.

Within 5 minutes of our second snorkelling endeavour, we simultaneously spotted a turtle just a few metres away. It looked amazing. By simply doing what it does every minute of every day, it held our attention for as long as we had the energy to follow it. For the next hour, we swam alongside it around the bay, watching it's every graceful movement.

I have been fascinated by turtles ever since being a small boy. On one holiday, the island we were on had a turtle rookery on it. We'd missed the hatching, and saw no turtles, but from that moment on I wanted to see a turtle in the ocean. From the first second we saw the turtle in Coral Bay, I became that little kid again.

It seemed perfectly at ease with our company and was even so comfortable as to let me stroke it's head and feel the texture of it's shell. Of course, you're not supposed to get this close, and certainly not supposed to touch them, but the turtle didn't seem to mind, so what does it matter?

We'd just saved around $400 by ignoring the tours and finding one ourselves. From the markings on it's shell, I believe it was a Loggerhead Turtle, which is the most endangered species in Australia - not only had our luck found us a turtle, but it found a particularly rare one. We were now avid fans of Coral Bay.

The Not so Little Mermaid

Shark Bay is one of a handful of places across the globe that satisfy all four criteria for world heritage listing, having important evolutionary and biological histories, unique formations and natural habitats where threatened species survive. There is over 2000 km of coastline, white beaches, turquoise waters, and rust-red sand dunes. Within these crystal clear waters lives a massive variety of sea life from dolphins to dugongs, and from the 'Eagle Bluff' viewing point we immediately spotted one of the reasons why it is called 'Shark Bay'.

Denham is considered to be the main town of the area, although there is little more than a few shops and a couple of campsites. By the time you've questioned if you've seen the main town, you've driven through it. As we had all the supplies we needed, we opted to continue driving and try our luck at 'Monkey Mia' instead. There is only one resort here and considering the value of the name that this place holds, we expected to be conned out of an extortionate amount of money for our space of grass. We were pleasantly surprised. The resort had excellent facilities, & was located right on the beach that was the setting for the daily dolphin visits. Considering this was 'it'. This was where people go when they want to see the best of the ocean and get close to dolphins; I'm amazed it was so reasonable priced. We watched the sunset from the beach, cooked some grub, and slept under a sky of black velvet sprinkled with diamonds.


Soon after we had enjoyed our breakfast, we made way to the beach to watch the dolphins enjoy theirs. The study and interaction with dolphins has been going on here for over 25 years, and the feeding probably started at the same time. For this reason it is still allowed although there are current debates over its future continuance. Whether it was down to the food being offered or the history of these meetings, I'm not sure, but the dolphins here were far more comfortable with playing around and getting closer to everyone than at Bunbury.

After two successive appearances of up to 12 dolphins each time, we collected our snorkels and masks, and headed down the beach to see what we could find by ourselves. A turtle had been recently spotted near a black buoy so we headed there first. After about 25 minutes of no luck, I caught sight of a fin about 40m from where we were swimming. It was too quick to get a good idea of what type of animal it belonged to, but after seeing the shark from Eagle Bluff, I had to swallow my heart before I could speak. I began to think, "There is far too much food about to warrant an attack on a human. Stay calm; an excited heartbeat will sound like an animal in distress and would only attract a shark more." I grabbed Lucie's attention and suggested we should move slowly towards the shore. When we able to touch the bottom we saw a group of fins swing in an arch above the water in the distance and felt sure they were dolphins. And then, as our attention was looking straight ahead, two dolphins swam from the side & came within a couple of metres of us. We pulled our masks on and swam with them for a moment before their interest weaned and they swam faster than our ability. Now we could tick swimming with dolphins of the list and count $300 saved.

The next day we spent the morning snorkeling again, and in the afternoon jumped on board 'Shotover' - the 61' catamaran, originally built as an ocean racer that established itself as the fastest of it's kind on it's maiden voyage. The main draw for this trip was the variety of wildlife we would see, and in particular, the chance to see the (probable) source of the mermaid myth. Dugongs are aquatic mammals that cradle their young up right in the water. For me, this is where any similarity to a woman ends. The perpetuated image of beautiful women with flowing blonde hair must surely be indicative either of how lonely sailors once were, or the strength of the beer goggles they were using.

We were lucky enough to see a total of 4 different dugongs on the trip and just about managed to gain a couple of photos of them when they briefly broke the surface for air. These bizzare looking mammals spend most of their time eating and manage to consume over 70kg of seaweed a day. The problem with this much grazing is that they are very slow moving. Therefore, their defence against sharks needs to rely on something more than speed or agility. With no bone marrow, these creatures are extremely robust & heavy and use their bulk as a battering ram. On top of this, they can also tense their skin to such a degree that a shark's tooth can not penetrate it.

Our last stop before leaving the marine park was at Hamelin Pool where a great variety of stramatolites are found. The problem is that once you have seen one stramatolite, you've seen them all.

Grand Views & Gran Turismo

A general rule about Western Australia is the smaller the town, the more expensive everything is. This rule also applies the further you travel away from main cities like Perth. With this in mind, we made plans to pick up food and fuel in every major town we'd pass on each journey.



We hadn't planned to make any other stops on the way to Kalbarri, but a particularly pink lake outside Port Gregory grabbed our attention and signaled for a driving break. Port Gregory was originally heralded as the great 'port of the north', but that idea sank with the dozen ships wrecked off the coast here. Nowadays, the pink lake, which is used as a centre for beta-carotene production, seems to be the only appealing aspect of the area. Of course that only holds your attention for as long as it takes to stretch and a take a photo.

As the pink lake becomes a dot in the rear view mirror, the horizon to the west begins to flatten out and turn a deep blue. The first viewpoints we reached were fortunately the 'Natural Bridge' & 'Island Rock'. I say fortunate as these were known as the best of the area, and after the reception of flies we received there, we had no intention of stopping again until reaching town. As soon as we'd stepped from the air-conditioned safety of the Hyundai Accent, we were covered by a blanket of flies intent on investigating any exposed orifice. Words cannot even begin to describe just how annoying this is. I was a nuclear reactor of rage, wishing that any fly that had the audacity to land on my skin would be incinerated instantly. Thoughts of somehow inducing spontaneous combustion to eradicate a few of these things filled my mind. The relentless resilience of their assault is enough to nearly cause tears, and certainly ruin the appreciation of a view. We now had an immediate purpose in Kalbarri - to buy a head-net as soon as possible.

That evening I was further welcomed to the area by a particularly vicious insect. I didn't get a good enough look at him to formally identify the suspect, but from the blurred view I had, I would say it was flying ant. Despite only being about an inch long, this little bastard gave me the most painful sting I've ever suffered. The uncertainly of what I had seen, and the increasing discomfort in such pleasures of nausea, dizziness, and my finger swelling up like a balloon, made for a restless night wondering if it was something more fatal.

As I was still breathing the next morning, and the remaining digits on my left hand were functioning as normal (I now had little feeling in the finger that was bitten), we left camp and made our way to the National Park. Unfortunately for the suspension on our hire car, over 60 km of the journey today was on an unsealed road - or a rally track as it came to be treated.

With my appreciation for life, and reckless abandonment for caring about a hire car, I put the pedal to the metal and raced my way to Grin-town. Every time we either gained a few centimetres of air or skidded to one side, thoughts of the $1000 excess swept through my mind. However, my reasoning that a rally driving experience in England would probably cost a similar price, was enough to keep the revs screaming higher than a helium-inflated choirboy.

Driving skills that have been precision honed with hours of time on the rally circuits of 'Gran Turismo', were coming back to me with every bump & skid. I pulled into the car park and gave a victorious hand-brake-turn salute to all the 4x4s sitting so proudly. Driving has never been so much fun.

My elation turned to a desire for elevation as the rocky landscape surrounding the 'Nature's Window' provided a perfect playground for more foolhardy exercises of adrenalin.

The window itself was pretty impressive but the flies prevented any lasting enjoyment without the head-net, and who wants to look at the world for long, from behind a green mesh? The massive amount of water sweeping through the gorge had meant we were unable to trek 'The Loop', so we played around on the cliff edges and then moved on to the next site.

At the end of the day, we stopped off to talk to a company about some quad biking tours that we'd heard about. He advised us that he wasn't running them at the moment, in favour of a desert canoe trip instead. Due to the incredible number of cyclones (7 or 8 depending who you talk to) that have ravaged West Australia this year, there is a river in the desert that hasn't existed for 150 years. This was an opportunity to canoe a journey that would probably not be possible again in my lifetime, or many people's to come.

On the morning of the big day, we were picked up along with 6 other experience seekers soon after sunrise, and headed out in a huge mining truck with our leader, Frank, at the wheel, and his dog 'Boots' sitting close by. Roughly 100 km into our 200 km trip into the desert, we encountered bad news. The floodwaters had increased even further and a vital road was now impassable. Frank was even more upset than us at this setback and apologised profusely. He even drove us down a single lane, sand and rock strewn road, to see a little known spot where you can see the start of the Murchison River gorge. Not many locals know where this is. Only a handful of tourists have been here. Virtually no one has seen it with this amount of water passing through.

When we got back to Kalbarri, Frank assured us that the trip would be possible when we would be heading back through the area - he had a plan. He would take a chainsaw, his dog and gun, and go clear an old disused road he knew about, shooting his grub and sleeping under the stars. That kind of introduction to a tour was not something we would ignore. We would definitely be back.

In the afternoon, we checked out a few other viewpoints over the ocean, and then made our way to Rainbow Jungle - a world leader in the breeding of endangered species of parrots, cockatoos, and exotic birds. Nothing too exciting, but a relaxing option for an afternoon and I think I'll always find the phrases and characteristics displayed by these creatures amusing. Plus, I don't care how old I am - teaching a parrot to swear is piss funny.

Tree Huggers & Desert Revelations

From Lancelin, we backtracked to Yanchep to spend a couple of nights. I was still waiting on a delivery in Perth, so wanted to stay within driving distance. However, as Sod's Law dictates, the waiting wasn't quite enough for the postman to even knock once, and we later moved on North regardless.

Yanchep National Park is one of Perth's weekend getaway locations. There are numerous walks, a boating lake, caves to investigate and a koala sanctuary. We were simply looking for a relaxing place to spend a day, & kill some time.

Now fully relaxed, we accepted the delivery wouldn't arrive in time, and pushed on North to Cervantes. Our first stop here was to see a piece of earth's history at Lake Thetis.

Lake Thetis is one of the few sites in the world where living stromatolites are found. Occurring as domes of limestone around the edge of the lake, stromaltolites are formed by the activity of microbial communities trapping and binding sediment and precipitating calcium carbonate from the water. OK? The interesting thing is that the ones here are over 1200 years old, and are the closest living organisms to the earliest life on Earth. It is believed that microbes similar to this, living over 3500 million years ago, are responsible for giving us an atmosphere. Good work, fellas.

The 'Pinnacles' are the poster pin-ups for WA tourism. They are easily accessible on a day trip from Perth and thus a viable option for those with just a short time in WA. The best time to view this rock forest is said to be around sunrise or sunset - we arrived about an hour before sunset.

The columns were formed thousands of years ago when ancient plant roots formed a weak cementation of calcite within the dunes. After that, it was just a question of time before shifting sands and the wind exposed them to tourists. To me, the area had an otherworldly feel to it, which would be perfectly apt for a Pink Floyd video. In a momentary lapse of reason, I jumped up on the pillars of rock, and let my air guitar sing 'Wish you were here', until I felt comfortably numb.

Judgement Day & Playing on the Sand-Piste

A late start, an argument with an hire car firm about what constitutes an excessive amount of insects on a windscreen (???), 2 hours of driving, and we arrived at Yanchep in search of a campsite. Yanchep proved to be a little reluctant in providing adequate information as to where such ground may exist, so we carried on towards the coast and then turned North.

Near the town of Two Rocks, we saw the first signs of armageddon looming on the horizon. We watched the skies turn to blood, and waited for the seas to boil, and the dead to rise from the grave. This spectacular sunset temporarily eradicated any plans of finding somewhere to sleep, and drew our gaze until it's last flick of paint had fallen beyond view and only darkness prevailed.

It was clear from my mood that hunger had begun to take control and an irrational anger for the world was rising to the surface. The Dr. would need to be fed soon before Mr. Hyde gained complete control.

We arrived at a campiste in Guilderton to grab the last unpowered site and swiftly realised that the start of our trip coincided with a national holiday period; the camp was infested with screaming, relentless, untiring, unremorseful, children. I needed food quickly or a child was likely to suffer a horendous misfortune of being pinned to a tree by a hundred tent pegs. I prayed for peace and quiet ... and food.

The town of Guilderton turned out to be a campsite, a section of coast, a general store, and a tourist information centre / caravan, that were all connected by a car park. The definition of town in Australia desperately needs to be reviewed.

Further north of this is the town of Lancelin (a real town this time). There were 2 supermarkets, a surf shop, pub, bottle shop (off-licence), and two campsite, so we decided to pitch up and stay a few days. Lancelin is famous for the mountains of sand upon which it reclines as it dips it's toes into the sea.

These huge white dunes are a playground for local off-road driving nuts on bikes, quads, and jeeps, and for travellers with snowboarding withdrawal seeking any similar substitute. It was obviously no comparison to the real thing, but was a brilliant laugh and something a bit different. Just wish they'd build some lifts.

After that, our cravings took us to the surf shop to hire the necessaries before heading to the beach & attending another board-meeting. Although Lucie had never tried surfing before, I felt my recent (last March) introductory lessons would be sufficient to tell her everything.

As time went on, the wind began to blow the waves into a terrible mess, and the 'rip' drained any remainnig energy from us. We both progressed over the next few occasions and then hung our wet-suits up, satisfied that we'd lived what Lancelin had to offer.