Exmouth to Coral Bay to Carnavon

The most boring travel stories are those that say, "The weather is great, the water is perfect and we are having a great time." Much more interesting are those stories that set out the disasters that people have encountered - a good cyclone or flood is excellent story fodder.  Alas, Exmouth continued to be fantastic - we visited the turtles 4 times and Turquoise Bay 3 times.  One visit to the turtles by Mum and Dad was at night - when we learned that they do exactly the same things at night as during the day (basically, getting jiggy) - and we also saw 50 kangaroos during the 30 minute car drive.  One kangaroo was just standing in the middle of the road, looking at us, wondering when we was going to become road kill (pretty soon I reckon). 

We told the kids not to worry about
that bin as the emu probably got the
good stuff out of that one

On the last night in Exmouth, we went to a very nice restaurant (Whalers). Anouk wanted to know why there was no number on the table.  Gives you an idea of the type of high class "restaurant" we have been going to.

Anouk made another comment as she saw (speedo clad) Pa walk down the beach - she could see where he was becuause he was the one "wearing his undies".  Unlike the bloke at Cable Beach I guess.

After Exmouth we headed to Coral Bay which is basically made up of two caravan parks and not much else.  After thinking that Turquoise Bay was the best beach in the world, we found that Coral Bay may have been even better!  (sorry, this is one of those boring travel stories).  Again, reefs to swim at, turquoise water, even whiter sand but no waves and some great shallow parts for the kids to play in - even Yvette crawling out in the water.  Pretty close to perfect - although it was a little bit cloudy on one of the five days that we were there.

We went out on a boat to look at the Ningaloo Reef and to do some snorkelling - and Anouk learned to snorkel.

It was during this period that we learned that the kids were having morning meetings to work out whose turn it was to be a complete pain.  Typically Isaac volunteered for the role but certainly not his sole domain.  For example, Mum and Dad had their seventh wedding anniversary in Coral Bay and it was Isaac's turn in the afternoon and Yvette's turn at night.  But we could not really complain about an anniversary in such a glorious location (even if our anniversary dinner was at a pizza place with three kids and two grandparents).

Talking of Yvette, she has now lost the fear she previously had of the water, sand and dirt (not that dirt ever really worried her). She now loves nothing better than crawling over dirt and sand and sitting in the middle of the road or into the water at the beach.  Keeps life interesting.

Isaac, as discussed, is being a complete pain in the arse.  Typically, a conversation with him goes along the following lines:

Dad (as Isaac hits either or both of Anouk and/or Yvette) - Stop hitting your sister
Isaac - I don't want to stop hitting her
- If you don't stop hitting her then I will smack your bottom
- I don't want you to smack my bottom
- Fine, then don't hit her sister
- But I want to (very whiny voice)
etc etc. Then often finishes with dad hitting Isaac as a means of teaching him not to hit people.  It works as well as anything else (which is to say it does not work).

We have about 5 of those conversations each day.  He is toilet training too.  That is great fun as any parent will tell you.

And why wouldn't Alex have fallen in love
with her?

Anouk fell in love in Coral Bay with a boy from Traralgon named Alex - which is same name of one of hest (female) friends in Melbourne.  Dad was a bit concerned that they were "playing" honeymoons.  He had to ask her to stop kissing him - initially seemed to have no problem but we suspect that Alex's 9 year old brother might have thought it far too good ammunition to let it go by.

As discussed, Anouk is otherwise doing very well.  She is making lots of friends wherever we go and has learned to snorkel.  She is not perfect by any means and still has the occasional melt down.  She has also developed a very serious case of the "go slows".  If you did not see it, it would be hard to beelived that it could take 10 minutes to get out of a car or an hour to eat some Rice Bubbles.

Mum and Nana have also loved the fact that this part of the world has allowed them to catch up on the important events of the world. The quality of crap magazines that get left behind at the laundries around here is much higher than on the east coast.  Even Dad know that Angelina is too skinny and Jen's new boyfriend is not happy wtih what Brad had to say about Jen.   We only deal wtih the important stuff when we travel.

Dad knows some bigger blow hards
than here.

But back to the travels.  We are now in Carnavon which is a bit of a stop off point.  Today, we travelled to the "blow holes" where the waves come in and shoot up water.  The sign at the entrance says - very unsubtly - "KING WAVES KILL".  It wsa quite impressive as was the beach we went to.  Guess what?    Reefs for snorkelling at, white sands etc etc . Its not actually Ningaloo Reef but the snorkelling was probably better than anything else we have seen.

Tomorrow we are on to Shark Bay and Monkey Mia. May get to see some dolphin feeding on Isaac's birthday on 27 October.  We are banking on Isaac's "terrible two's" ending on his third birthday.  Maybe we will suffer some massive problem that will make the blog more interesting.

Port Hedland to Point Samson to Onslow to Exmouth

We have determined that, while caravanning around Australia, one sees the best of Australia and the worst of it.  Both in terms of the geography and the demographics.  The last week or so has demonstrated this proposition well. 

However, first we have to mention to a special little aspect of our WA adventure that we have not mentioned to date.  The wind.  It was present a little in Broome but once we left there it has been blowing a gale.  In 80 Mile Beach and everywhere since.  So as I tell the stories below of having some of the greatest experiences of our lives (you can skip to the bit on Exmouth if you want to just read about that), remember that it was quite windy.  So feel sorry for us please.  But while I am mentioning weather, I should mention that we have had one rainy day - Coolum - and have not seen a drop of rain for 10 weeks.  They do not call it the dry season for nothing.

For a boy who want to drive diggers
when he grows up, Wickham was
the surprising choice of his best place
so far.

Anyway,Mum did well to find to even find Point Samson.  It a bit of a gem near a whole lot of dud places -  Karratha, Dampier - which are great places if you want to dig stuff up and ship it off to another country but not, shall we say, "tourist focused" .  At Point Samson there was a lovely little beach  near our immaculate caravan park but when you call yourself Honeymoon Cove you are ensuring that no-one will come there for their honeymoon.  Which is a good thing (who wants to see all those PDA's?) so perhaps the good burghers of Point Samson knew that they were on to.

While on Honeymoon Cove, Dad and Anouk shared a special moment.  They were walking along the beach and looking at the some of the pink (and other coloured - but pink was out favourite) rocks.
Dad: "Anouk, isn't this amazing to be here and seeing these things."
Anouk : "Mmm.  Yes Dad."
Dad: "I mean, its just so fantastic"
Anouk; "Dad?"
Dad: "Yes Nouky" (Its fair to say that Dad was expecting something quite profound - or at least affectionate - at that point).
Anouk "Dad, I need to do a poo.  And I am busting."

And that, in a nutshell, is what its like travelling wtih kids.  (We got there, just in time, in case you are wondering).

The team - minus the ugly bloke - at
Honeymoon Cove at Point Samson.

While in Point Samson we went to Church at the big smoke - Wickham.  I was sitting there thinking how depressing it would to be the member of a parish where my family made up about a fifth of the congregation.  However, at the end of mass, they all went in for coffee and to catch up.  I made up excuses on the basis that the kids had been very well behaved for an hour but I could not really expect more from them.  As I was buckling them into their car seats, one of the ladies came up laden with cake to give to us!  Its clearly not the size of a parish that gives it life - its the people in it.

Contast that with the conversation Mum and Dad overheard on our last night in Point Samson.  A couple of grey nomads were on the site behind us and were talking very loudly.  The conversation started, as all such conversations do, along the following lines:

Doreen:  I live in Melbourne and its very multicultural and I do not consider myself racist  (editors' note - using this reasoning, you cannot be from Melbourne and be a racist.  Doreen, let me tell you you - you can and you are) but what is it with the Aborigines around here?

Well, that was the floodgates wasn't it?  Out they spewed wtih their ignorant, small minded crap.   One of them was even mouting a passionate defence of Andrew Bolt who, apparently, was "convicted" ( she used the word about 10 times) of racism.  Actually, no he wasn't and the problem was not the he had a racist point of view - his problem was that his racist point of view was based on a number of factual inaccuraries that even he admits he made.   Dad wound down the window in the caravan and let fly wtih, "Shut your stupid racist pie-holes because we are trying to sleep and you are making me angry." Well, actually, he did not.  Mum would not let him unless he came up wtih something more witty and amusing but he was so angry he could not.

The least used pin board in WA. 

We moved on from Point Samson and went to Onslow, not really knowing what to expect.  Its about 80 kms off the main highway but its a long way to go from Point Samson all the way to Exmouth.  We had to stop somewhere and this looked like it might be okay.  It was not.  It was about the most dire place we have been to.  The caravan park was a mine site.  It was disgusting and dirty - and VERY windy.  We got out of there earlier than we have got out of anywhere.   Let us not speak of it again.

Turquoise Bay - the water really is that colour and so is the sand.

Anyway, its always darkest before the dawn and after we went to - that place about which we will not speak - we arrived in Exmouth.  Its hard to explain how good Exmouth has been.   First, we went over to Cape Range National Park where we went to Turquoise Bay.  Now, you are setting yourself up for a fall when a beach calls itself "Turquiose" but this bay delivers.  Not only its the sand so white you cannot look at it, the water is tourquoise and there is a reef just off the beach which makes for amazming snorkelling.  Mum originally put it in her top 5 beaches she had ever been to.  Dad challenged here to name ANY beach that was better.  She could not.  Not even the Maldives.  Perhaps, the closest is Whitehaven Beach in the Whisundays but you need a boat to get to that.  Even Nana and Pa would not think of a better beach they had been to than Turquoise Bay.  It was spectacular. 

But I should say that Isaac was being a total t*rd the whole time.  So, again, that is what its like travelling with kids.

On the way back we stopped at the lighthouse lookout and saw whales making their way along the coast.  Isaac refused to get out of the car.  He truly is a t*rd at times.

The best day.

However, just when we thought we had had the best day of holiday so far, a fellow camper (there are some good ones and Marty was a great bloke) told us about a beach wtih hundreds of turtles on it.  We were a little sceptical - all of the tourist brochures claim that turtles nest in their area.  Even at 80 Mile Beach we saw turtle flipper marks but we never saw a turtle.  However, as we made our way down this unmarked track and then walked over the sand dunes (following Marty's directions) we came to the beach and saw literally hundreds of turtles bobbing up and down in the shallows, no more than 20 metres from shore and some on the shore.  You could practically have walked across the water it was that thick wtih them.  It was truly amazing.  We went back later in the day to see if there was more on-shore at low tide  - and there was. 

As we were leaving we then saw an emu taking her eight chicks for a walk. And one of the just had to walk on the road the whole time. Mum and Dad felt a lot of empathy for that mother emu.

It ranked amongst the most amazing experiences any of us had had.  The adults because of the turtles, and the kids because they were allowed to eat a whole packet of chips.

I am not kidding - the water is thick wtih (very randy) turtles. 
The black dots in the water are turtles..

Broome to 80 Mile Beach to Port Hedland

Not a dinosaur footprint to be seen...

How people without a 4WD
perve at the nudists on Cable
Beach.

We returned to Broome and carried on sitting on the beach.  We also saw the grand final (well, Dad and Pa did - the rest of the team committed the ultimate sacrilege by going to the beach) at the Cable Beach pub and went to see some dinosaur footprints. It was pretty amusing - about 100 people walking over rocks asking each other, "Which of these  holes is supposedly a dinosaur footprint?"  I can tell you that a the holes all look them same.  Mind you, while looking for dinosaur footprints we discovered two things.  First, if Pa whacks his shin and bleeds, his whole foot swells up.  Second, if a parent - lets say Dad - is carrying their child - lets say Isaac - over slippery rocks and slips then the said parent does not herocially fall to the ground and prevent injury to said child. Rather, he drops the child on the rocks.  For the benefit of the DHS, I am not saying it happened but we learned that is what would happen.

No breaking the eighth commandment
fella's.

On then to 80 Mile Beach that is half way between Broome and Port Hedland.  The only thing there is a caravan park and Coastwatch - ie boat people spotters.  The caravan park is nice enough but it really is mega bogan heaven - every person who has ever owned a quad bike seems to camp here and they all own Australian flags.  Its also the only caravan park wtih a shrine to fallen soldiers that we have seen.  Not that there is anything wrong wtih that but when you put it together wtih quad bikes and Coastwatch you get the idea of the people there.  I should mention however, that in an area of the world where eveything is expensive, they do sell ice creams for $2 each.  They are the best bargain in WA.

Issac and Yvette washing the sand off from 80 mile beach.
What Isaac does not know is that Yvette has been without a
nappy for about 4 hours now.  He is about to find out in
the worst possible way....

Again, this was a beach holiday - I mean, its not like there was a lot else to do there.  The beach is nice but not safe for swimming - if the rips do not get you, then the brown jelly fish (of which there are heaps here and at Broome) will sting you. 

We then dragged ourselves down to Port Hedland - which, as the guide books will tell you - is the busiest port in Australia by tonnage.  It all about the mines - BHP in particular seems to own the town although Rio Tinto is also very much present.  The whole place is covered in red dust that makes everything red and dirty.  If you lived here it would drive you mad.

We had Pa's birthday here - happy birthday Pa - and watched some massive ships come into port.  Again, not sure its the reason you would move here. Anyway, onward to more beach sitting at Port Samson tomorrow.

Cape Leveque

Good news is that the
tyre is not flat.  Bad news
is that the clutch is about to
get fried...

Deciding to take another holiday from our holiday, we headed over to Cape Leveque which is at the top of the Dampier Peninsula - Broome is at the bottom of it.  Its about 220 kms from Broome to Cape Leveque and about 100 kms of that is unsealed.  One would assume that it would be the last 100 kms but one would be wrong.  You travel over a very unsealed road for about 100 kms and then come on to a sealed road to travel the final 120kms.  Have to say that I was glad to see that bitumen but still cannot work out fot the life of me why they have a full bitumen highway that can only be reached by 4WD after driving 100 kms on an unsealed road unless it is to link the aboriginal communities that are up there.

219.99 kms of the dirt road was successfully managed.  We did come a cropper un the last120 metres when we got bogged outside out "luxury safari tent".  Lets just say that the clutch got a serious workout and we can still smell if if we use the air conditioner in the car. 

Proof for Fr Martin that we did go
to church while on this holiday...

Cape Leveque is a lovely place - basically it was a beach holiday with lots of frogs.  Apparently, given the last wet season was so wet, the frogs like it.  Mum is still not a fan of the frogs.  Especially the pesky one that croaked very loudly but we could not find him for the whole time we were there (2 nights). 

We were there during very serious tides so at high tide you had to get off the beach and at low tide you could not swim because the rocks in the water made it impossible.  Otherwise, it was a lovely part of the world.  Some of the team claimed to see whales - others believed them to be reefer whales.

An interesting part of it is that you cannot go into a number of the aboriginal communities without a permit.  Somehow (personally, I blame Pa, who is getting much more adventurous as the holiday wears on), we still ended up at One Arm Point where we saw the local indigenous fisherfolk had hunted (if that be the right word - I doubt they are all that hard to catch) a large turtle. But it has to be said that these communities seem to have it much more together than some others so hats off to them.

Finally, a photo of the whole team.  Sunsets are important
in this part of the world.