Perth, Fremantle, Bunbury - 20-25th Sept 2010

(24th Sept 2010) Louise at a lookout over Bunbury (west coast  of   W.A)

(20th Sept) Louise at the bell tower in the Perth CBD 

(23rd Sept) Matt at the Perth Mint trying to lift a replica of the worlds largest gold nugget ever found called 'The Welcome Stranger'

(22nd Sept) Inside the now defunct Fremantle maximum security jail, which was still operating up until 1991.

This is where you spent your whole day with 150 other inmates, rain,hail or shine, unless you had a job in the jail working in the gardens, Kitchen, Boiler room or the like;  Grim eh?

One of the wings inside the jail which had three floors to each wing , the jail held a total of  1000 inmates.

Your cell please sir, which includes a slop bucket for you know what! Not a bad room to spend a sentence for life...
The temperatures inside the cells during the day could reach between 40-50C depending what floor you were stuck on.

The Gallows room - where 44 inmates were hung, the last one being in 1968, it was quite an eerie place, some people could not walk inside to have a look

Outside the Gaol before entering at my own risk!

(25th Sept) Louise at the Wellington dam catchment, which was situated 20km inland from Bunbury WA

Hi All,

It's Matt here putting in another blog for your perusal, on making this blog I said to Louise, "we only took a couple of photos of Perth" which you have seen above.  My excuse is, we really enjoyed Perth and got caught up in the moment and basically had our heads up our bottoms! My sincere apologies for not taking many lovely photos of Perth.  Its a great place...

Having now conquered all the capital cities and territories of Australia, it was probably the best of the lot, and I must say, even without still seeing the whole state yet,  WA is probably the most diverse, after all why wouldn't it be, it stretches the whole length of the country giving it everything from Deserts, Coral reefs with pure white sandy beaches and crystal clear water to snorkel in and to whales and dolphins watch, to lush green forests and pasture with sheep and cattle grazing in the sundrenched climate.   I Love it...

We are off to Margaret River tomorrow, which is the wine capital of W.A and a few cellar doors will be open for our enjoyment;  we are thinking of doing a tour around the vineyards but as its Sunday tomorrow that may not be on;  we shall see;  they also have a few micro breweries as well as wine.  

We are currently parked up in the harbour at Bunbury,  we spent last night here on the west side and as it has a large car park, several of the locals decided to come and do burn outs at 3am;   Louise slept through the whole thing of course, so we have  come to the other side that has one skinny road and water  on both sides;  as its Sat night we are hoping this will not be the road the local rev heads want to use..,

we went for a lovely run on the beach here early (7am) this morning, and got chatting to a lady who is a local environment teacher and she was able to explain what all these balls of blond hair the size of golf balls were on the beach;  turned out they are a type of hairy seaweed that gets tossed around by the water and dumped on the beach;  So glad we found someone who knew all about it...   We also found a dead water rat that was washed up,  it was the size of a Yorkshire terrier -  I kid you not...   ya never know what will wash up...

Anyways I shall close now...  We love to read yr comments, so please leave some - we welcome any feedback...

kind regards to all....

Louise and Matt  xxx

corrigan, wave rock; lake grace ; W.A.

hello pals;  see text below....  

Louise (above) at the Dog Cemetery, Corrigan W.A. on sat. 18.9.10; it was very moving, some people  had gone to such a lot of trouble with the headstones etc.

dear friends

louise here, just quickly getting some pics and news out to y'all;  hope all our readers are well and keeping abreast of our adventures.

Our first stop out east of Perth was at Corrigan, where they have this dog cemetery,  some of the gravestones were really impressive and I have to admit a tear in my eyes, reading some  of the headstones...  anyone in the country here can pay $300 and the Council of Corrigan will let you put your dog in the cemetery!  One grave even had a solar power set of fairy lights around it;  the dog was named Mandy I think...

Matt walked away saying 'Man's best friend...'  when I said 'Diamonds are a girls best friend, so I guess we have more brains...?'   He was somehow not amused....

Our next stop was a great free camp area called Gorge Rock which has a 1950s concrete pool ensconsed inside a huge rock escarpment...  not in use now, but it was big in the 60s when there was a bit of a town nearby...  Next day we ploughed on to Hyden and a look at long last to Wave Rock.   Which was amazing;  not only could you stand and make out to surf (see photos) but you can walk over the top of it, and its a series of stone hills that cover a big area;   Down the road about 1.5km north is the Hippo Yawn rock, which you can see also below.   Wave Rock was formed about 2m yrs ago or so and has been shaped that way purely by erosion.   Wow!

We are currently (mon 20.9.10) 4pm - in a dot of a place called Kokerbin Rock,  about 300km east of Perth WA;  we stayed last  night at the Lookout at Lake Grace town and this morning we went to look at the huge salt lake (lake grace) at the south of town;  very spooky looking it was too;  We then drove about 150km north to Bruce Rock to have lunch,  another dot of a place that was about 2 streets and a pub;  the countryside here is very like England, believe it or not,  green fields of wheat, lupin and barley.   And for those of you reading from o/s  I heard a stat the other day that you may like;  the State of Western Australia is the same size as Europe, but with only 3M people!  Crazy eh?   We have left behind the hot end of the state and it was 23c today but our spring is upon us now and we hope by going south to gradually get the summer weather;  mind you its single digits at night and all praise the feather doona we had the brains to  bring along...

So please keep reading,  and we  are heading back to Perth tomorrow for a day or two, may need to get the van serviced, we have done 20,000km so far.  We probably be in WA for a few more weeks yet, there is so much to see, its a joke.   Going south soon and I will endeavour to keep you all informed of our adventures...

ciao  Louise and Matt  XXXX

Matt (above) at Wave rock, Hyden, WA, doing his best surfing impression...  19.9.10

matt -above - at Hippos Yawn which is also at the Wave Rock Nature park;  19.9.10

Louise with Lake Grace in the background  - a huge 26km salt/gypsum lake;  mon 20.09.10

The Pinnacles, The Gravity Centre, Perth and Fremantle WA

(17th Sept) Louise in Fremantle posing to get her sculpture, still needs the botox louise LOL... 

(17th Sept) Matt doing the same only he needs liposuction AND botox...

(17th Sept) Louise in Fremantle.

(15th Sept) A rocket taking off for the school children at the gravity wave centre. Gin Gin WA

A piece of meteorite that feel to the earth weighing 300kg! SOLID IRON!

The Gravity Wave Centre in Gin Gin just outside of Perth about 100km north.

(13th Sept) What a big pinnacle that is...

Louise at the pinnacles too, it was a very surreal place to walk around on your own

This picture does not really do it any any justice, there are sooo many of them.

Louise at the Pinancles

We had a look at Fremantle today and really loved the place, it too has a laid back lifestlye with a trendy and hip feel to it with many of its trendy cafes, pubs, eateries and boutiques.

If Maggie Island ends up being too humid for us (WA has a dry heat) we would seriously come to think about moving over here. You can can pick up a 3 bedroom house near the beach for around $500,000 and the beaches run about 22km along the Perth coastline. Perth basically has the same temperature in the winter (cool at night but pleasantly warm in the day, around 25C) as Nth Qld.

We are off to Wave Rock tomorrow which is about 350km east of Perth and driving around the surrounding countryside for 3 days then heading back to Perth to walk around the city and have another look at Fremantle for a few days.

If you thought the ferry prices to Magnetic Island were expensive, we went to catch a ferry to Rottnest Island today and the price for a return trip was $48.00 each plus a $15.00 govt tax each, plus $24.00 each to hire a bike out for the day given there no cars on the Island and you have to cycle around or you can your own bike and get charged $14.00... AND we had to pay $1.00 an hour for parking our van on the mainland.

We decided that because we are are going to be living on an island in the near future what was the point!

All up it would have cost us $200 without having to buy lunch... sorry they can keep it...

We went to the gravity centre in Gingin which was amazing... they are trying to find the waves as predicted by Einstein and they think they may find them in the next 5 years or so.  

The Pinnacles were also amazing,  a landscape like no other, 2 m yrs ago, trees were covered by dunes, then by lava then uncovered to be like they are now;  very spooky.

Hope all our readers are well; we are, and having a great time...  

catch ya;  matt and louise

Carnarvon, Denham, Monkey Mia, Kilbarry, Geraldton

(8th Sep) Louise at shell beach on the way into Monkey Mia, there were literally billions and billions of shells on the beach.

(9th Sep) Monkey Mia.

(9th sep)  Monkey Mia with the dolphins.

(Wed 8th Sep) Both of us on the lookout of Ealge Bluff, can you see how clear the water was below, we are about  two to three hundred metres above the ocean there. Not a breath of wind.

(Wed 8th Sep) Matt at the Red Bluff lookout! it was absolutely mind blowing, we stayed there for nearly an hour just staring out to sea spotting schools of fish being chased by sharks.

( 7th-10th Sep) Our campsite in the distance about 50km from Monkey Mia at a place called 'Whalebone Bay' there were only around 3-5 other people camping there!

(Fri 10th Sep) Louise at a look out over the Murchison river in the Kilbarri national park.

(Fri 10th Sep) Matt at a lookout over the Indian Ocean outside of Kilbarri

(11th sept 10) This is where we arrived today at a lovely seaside free camp spot, 100km south of Geraldton.

(10th Sept) Louise and I at a lookout just outside of Kilbarri W.A, we could see whales and a pod of dolphins swimming just below us, it was mind blowing stuff!

(10th Sept) From one of the lookouts outside Kilbarri Nat Park where we could spot whales and dolphins, there were about half a dozen of these lookouts stretched across 20km. The views were amazing with the sheer size of these cliffs, it really makes your own life look insignificant.

Well hello again happy campers,  Matt here;

We have been blessed by the internet gods of a good reception over the past few days, mainly due to the fact we are only now 350km north of Perth, perched up for a bit in a lovely free camp spot by the Indian Ocean (see pic).

After arriving in Carnarvon, it was a quite a disappointing place; it was like a ghost town and the only person I spoke to was a drunk Aboringinal man, because he was standing on the corner of the street looking lost and he eyeballed me, so I just said to him "Hello" and he replied "you know what, people are really nice these days" and I replied back "well with a lovely day like this, it is a great reason to be nice".  And that was that, we stayed in Carnarvon at a boat ramp (because it was free) for the night and rose very early the next day to 'get the hell outta here' as Louise put it, she hated it and actually got her bum outta bed before me for a change (6am) to quickly make our brekky and leave!

Our next place of call was Denham and Monkey Mia, where we found a great free campsite by the sea (see pic) and stayed there for 2 nights, where we made trips into Denham and Monkey Mia.  Denham was a nice seaside town, but like most seaside towns we have seen on the coast of W.A., it has been built out and has become quite commercial e.g. (a 3 bedroom house $500,000+). We found out also Monkey Mia was not a town, but a national park where you had to pay $8.00 each to get into see the dolphins, but it was worth it!  Especially as the kind lady on the gate said 'please us the facilities at the resort'. Now I took this quite literally and espying a chalet type room, with the door open and the occupants now gone, and the key on the bench, I decided to (with Louise watching the door) to have a HOT shower (our onboard bathroom only has a cold one at the mo - long story - its complicated) and the idea of a hot one was just too appealing.  So in record time and using the free shampoo & conditioner, I had the fastest shower in the west - west Australia that is!

The dolphins came in at 8am for the first of 3 feeds (all in their own time, because they are wild) with the last one ending at around 10am.  The last feed was the best because there were hardly any tourists around, they all arrived there for the first feed.  (Including us; and trust me it was cold (10C ) but it warmed up later. )  After this we found the resorts camping ground with shower blocks and Louise (who decided I had gone nuts using the shower above) snuck in with her stuff and used that one; H&C showers have it all over the cold kind;  even when the weather is  warm...

While in the Denham area we went to a lookout called Eagle Buff (see pic), and let me tell you, it was the most amazing view I have seen yet on this trip, the weather was so good, the water looked like cling wrap it was so still,  and you could see schools of fish swimming around with sharks chasing them for a feed.  We also saw and heard loads of birds breeding on a nearby island which gave the lookout a bit of character, and we could also see for miles the crystal clear ocean with not a breeze to be felt, it was truly an amazing experience to be in natures arms.

Next we moved onto Kilbarri, another coastal town similar to Denham that has been overrun with grey nomads, before entering the town we passed through the Kilbarri national park, and went to some lookouts of the Murchison River where the mouth of it ends in Kilbarri.  It was worth the look and set us up for the costal lookouts of Kilbarri Nat Park, (probably the second best lookouts to Eagle Bluff). We saw a pod of 20 or so dolphins swimming past and a few large humpback whales flapping their dorsal fins at one another showing off to us mere travellers taking photos of them. The views were spectacular and the colours of the ocean are mesmerisingly beautiful.

Today we landed our spaceship/van in Geraldton WA, the place is quite big and very nice, it has a large port facility that loads all the grain from nearby wheat farms onto ships for export to other parts of the world -  (Asia I presume).  After living on 2 minute noodles, baked beans and rice for the past few days, we decided to splash out and have lunch at McDonalds, but, after a few hours and having not eaten that kind of food for quite a while I had a sudden rush to the mens toilet and it all disappeared very quickly!  LOL...

We decided to drive 100km south of Geraldton and stay at this lovely seaside free camp spot (see pic) for a couple of nights until the rain settles down in Perth, then take a slow couple of days and hit the light fantastic big city of Perth (capital of West Australia for those of you reading this overseas...)

Hope you are all going well and will keep you posted as much as possible.

Hope you are enjoying our blog.

Matt and Louise xoxoxox    P.s.  we have more photos and will add these the next few days for this part of the blog...slow connection at moment.

Dampier, Karatha, Onslow, Exmouth and Coral Bay

(4th Sept)  Louise at Touquise Bay (Exmouth), the water was crystal clear where the visibility underwater was as far as you could see, with loads of fish and colourful reefs.

(4th Sept) Louise at the Oyster stacks (Exmouth)

(3rd Sept) On top of the lookout at Exmouth, we watched the sunset over the ocean while loads of humpback whales were  frolicking in the bay behind us. As it became darker you could also see the gas platforms out at sea with their gas plumes burning away illuminating the nights sky over the horizon.

(3rd Sept) Matt at the Yardi Gorge a 2km ridge walk, you could see people kyaking down below in the water (Exmouth)

(1st Sept) Louise at the Charlse Knife gorge (Exmouth)

(30 Aug) Louise sitting outside our camping spot, where we stayed for the week when were in Exmouth.
We named the beach, Byron Beach. During the sunset dolphins would swim by looking for a feed, it was breath taking.

(29th Aug) We had to get a photo taken of the termite mound city, just outside of Onslow, there were thousands of them...

(28th Aug) This place was in the middle of nowhere near Karatha, it was so quiet, you could only hear yourself breathing, and the stars at night just lit up the sky, it was actually quite eerie... 

(29th Aug) This was our resting place for the night at Onslow.

(24th Aug) We could not get on a tour at the Mt Newman mine, the worlds biggest open cut mine (the weather was too wet), so Matt settled for a photo in front of one of their old trucks instead.

(25th Aug) Louise on the Tom Price mine tour, everything in mining is just 'BIG'.

(25th Aug) Matt standing at the Tom Price mine tour lookout, in the background is where most of the "Tonka" trucks would dump the iron ore.

(5th Sept) This photo was taken today at Coral Bay's boat jetty from where I wrote this blog, people were coming off fishing boat charters with fish they caught - no smaller than the length of your whole arm (mainly red emperor for all you keen fishing buffs)...

Hello there dear followers,

Since our last post, we have moved on from the Pilbara region of WA to the Coral Coast where it is just absolutely magnificent.  After going on a mine tour of Tom Price (owned by Rio Tinto) we moved onto Karatha and Dampier (run by Rio Tinto), which are big mining towns which is very similar to Port Headland (run by BHP).

Karratha is basically a town booming with new real estate (average price for a new 3 bedroom house $800K) where all the workers and their families live, and the ships get loaded with Iron Ore from Dampier (where all the workers travel to each day to work, about 15Km form Karratha).

One ship can hold up to 160,000 tonnes of iron ore and up to 6 ships are being loaded at any time 24/7 -  (it takes around 24 - 36 hours to load a ship).

We decided the next port of call was Onslow, a small fishing town on the coast which also had a very big salt mine, where the majority of it is shipped off to Asia, the ships dock up to a long jetty and the salt is carried out via 3km of conveyer belt from the mine (we only stayed there for a night).

Next we moved down the coast a little further to Exmouth, this is where we found our Utopia, after being on the road for the past 3 months and nearly 16,000km and not really having stayed at anyone place for more than a day or two (because of the lack of things to do and see), this was the place we were looking for to have a break - and we stayed for a week.

The drivable coastline of Exmouth travels for around 100km where around the other side of the Exmouth cape is a national park and marine park, there were gorges to explore, beaches to snorkel and camping spots to be hunted out (as you can see in the pics).  In one morning while having breakfast, humpback whales swam past and on the same day we saw a huge monitor lizard cross the road in front of us, wild horses were roaming in the national park, wild emus and kangaroos were just casually chomping on the side of the road.

I must say Exmouth is probably the best place we have visited so far (everything about it reminds me of what the vibe was like on Magnetic Island say, 15 years ago) minus the emus, dolphins, whales, horses and kangaroos.

Today, we just arrived at Coral Bay W.A.  - Its just 150km down the road from Exmouth, where I am writing this blog from the boat ramp car park (see pic) it is a beautiful place were it is on the edge of the Ningaloo reef, the same as Exmouth.  We had a snorkel over the reef, but there is not as many fish as Exmouth, and it was quite windy.  The place is littered with "NO CAMPING" signs everywhere you turn, but, given we are now veterans of finding the elusive legal camping spots (we do not want to waste $30 a night to stay in a caravan site, when we paid so much money to live in a campervan, it just doesn't make sense to us)  - we have found a good spot behind the local supermarket and will doss up there for the night and will be heading off to Canarvon tomorrow - early!

We hope you are all well and are enjoying our blog and photos we have taken.

We will try to keep you posted as much as possible but as already explained in our previous blogs, Telstra coverage is "CRAP".

Bye for now.

Matt and Louise xoxoxoxo

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