Walpole Tree Top Walk, Greens Pool, Denmark 05 November 2013

Definitely heading homeward now as we speed towards Denmark. On the way we did the tree top walk just outside of Walpole (Valley of the Giants) which was pretty cool. They have built a suspended walkway up to 50 metres high which takes you through the upper levels of a Red Tingle tree forest. While they may not grow as tall as a Karri tree, these things are still huge.

Note the strange flowers on the trunk :)

Awe Pretty

Then it was on to Greens Pool and Elephant Rocks which were very picturesque before finishing the day in Denmark.

Can you spot the Elephants?

 Now Denmark is one of the towns I have been hanging out to get to as they had the world's biggest barometer there which was more than 12 metres tall (yep, it's strange what some people find interesting I know). Note the past tense there. Apparently about 18 months ago the Visitor Information Centre (where the barometer was installed in a specially built tower) and it's board couldn't come to grips with the fact that the barometer could not be turned into a profit turning attraction as one of the conditions under which the maker in the Netherlands insisted on was that no admission charges could ever be levied for viewing it. After much to-ing and fro-ing, the maker took it back and expressed his dismay and disgust with the town of Denmark and in particular the lack of vision shown by the Visitor Centre board. Of course not a word of this is mentioned in the Visitor Centre. There is just this weird tower in the middle of the building with a staircase to nowhere running up the inside wall.

What it used to look like

Woke up next morning and it was raining! Everything was sodden and getting soggier by the minute. This was not part of the plan! We were supposed to chase the sun for four months and completely skip winter. Oh well, it had to happen sooner or later.

Cape Leeuwin and Pemberton 03 - 04 November 2013

Stopped off at Cape Leeuwin, which is the most south westerly point of mainland Australia, to see the lighthouse. This is the tallest lighthouse in WA, but only about the sixth tallest in Oz. Still the Wait Awhileians do like to brag about it ;-) It's not really trying to imitate the Tower of Pisa either - I just didn't hold the camera/phone straight when I took the photo (so hard to get good help these days!). Cape Leeuwin is also where the Indian and Southern Oceans meet and prior to the lighthouse being built there were many shipwrecks in the area. None since though, so it must be working.







While constructing the lighthouse, the builders needed a constant supply of water and this was pumped to the site by a waterwheel which is still there on the beach today. It is now encased in lime from the spring water which drove it and is virtually fossilized.



 

Well, after all that touristy excitement, there was nothing left but to push on for Pemberton. We camped in the national park at a spot called Big Brook Arboretum. Back in the 1930's they planted a bunch of different trees here from around the world in the middle of the forrest. We saw American Sequoias, pine trees from Mexico, trees from Cyprus, and even some from NSW and Victoria. No idea why - maybe they were looking for a replacement for all the Karri trees they were cutting down. Anyway, they are an interesting site to see, but I think that if you wanted to have a look yourself you need to hurry as many of them had ominous white rings painted round their trunks and I'm betting that they are now deemed surplus to requirements.
The campsite came complete with fire pits and this was the first time so far where it has been both cool enough and permissable to light a camp fire. It was great to cook on a hot plate again and sit up and stare into the flames. Definitely brought back memories of the Murray.

Also reminicent of the Murray was the fact that there was a family of Kookaburras in residence, and they were more than prepared to elbow their way into anyone's dinner. They knocked off sausages and chops from right under the noses of other campers. Luckily, we were running a little late and didn't eat until after the birds had gone to bed for the evening.



While we were in town we went searching for the Gloucester Ridge winery. This was owned by Don Hancock, the brother of one of the guys (Paul) I did System 12 (an old type of telephone exchange if you don't know) training with in Sydney years ago and last time we were here Don and his wife were very nice to us and invited us back to their home after closing to help drink the left overs from the day's tastings and eat kilo after kilo of maron and smoked trout their son had caught - yum. Sadly, the winery is no more and the vineyard had been plowed under in preparation for subdivision. Oh well, it has been twenty odd years since we were in town... We also had a look at the Dave Evans Bicentennial Tree and the Gloucester Tree which are both ex fire watcher trees. Basically a really brave and foolhardy ranger climbed these trees using spiked boots until they were 60 to 70 meters off the ground and then they proceeded to cut the top 10 metres out of the trees with an axe, so that a fire watching platform could be built there. They then put steel pegs in a spiral from the ground to the platform to make a staircase for the fire watchers to climb up and down. Amazing what some people will do when it needs to be done.

Bicentennial Tree

Gloucester Tree

Upland 31 October - 02 November

We are now firmly in Upland. Yep, not Finland, not Greenland, not Iceland, but Upland. Every second place, town, road, path and creek south of Perth seems to end in 'up' e.g. Wilyabrup, Nowergup, Joondalup, Neerabup, Cowaramup and Yallingup which is where we headed after Perth (decided to skip Bunbury and Busselton as we had had enough of city life for a while).

Just one of the many "Ups"

 Yellingup is a very nice little seaside spot with not much more than a museum a cafe and a surf shop, oh and a beach :-) All very nice and the campground had the best BBQ set up we have seen so far. Ocean views, tables and chairs and four huge barbies. It seemed like half the camp was there enjoying the sunset while cooking dinner and quaffing the liquid refreshment of their choice. We had a great evening chatting to a couple in their seventies who had just completed a crossing of the Anne Beadell Highway - 1,340km of corrugations from Coober Pedy SA to Laverton in WA! Certainly hope to be as active and determined as they are in 20 years time. From Yallingup it was a short backtrack to Cape Naturaliste where we walked along the cliff tops and actually spotted some humpback whales jumping out of the water. You will need to use a little imagination as the telephoto capabilities of the Samsung Galaxy S4 were not really up to the task but they were terrific to see.

Where's whaley????

That white bit in the middle is the splash after the whale crashed back down.

Not a whale...

Then it was off to Canal Rocks to see the effects of ocean waves on fault lines in the rocks which has carved out virtually dead straight channels in a criss cross pattern in the rocks and you can walk overhead on a boarwalk as the waves surge in and out beneath your feet. Well at least that is what the brochures say - the boardwalk is currently closed due to storm damage, so some rock climbing was in order to see the full picture.

The Boardwalk

The very broken Boardwalk

View from the top

And looking the other way

And finally on to Margaret River. Funnily enough, for the premium wine area in Australia (yes, Margaret River wines internationally outsell and out price everything from the barossa, clare, and every other wine region in Oz every year!), there are bugger all wineries in or next to Margaret River itself. You have to travel whole kilometers to get to them! The effort is worth it though! We now have several new favorite wines :)

Well really, where did you honestly think we'd wind up while in Margaret River?

New Norcia, Perth, Fremantle 29 - 31 October 2013

After the excitement of the Pinnacles, it was onwards towards Perth with a stopover in New Norcia. New Norcia is a monastic community which was established by the Benedictine order of monks in 1847 and has a strong Spanish influence. The monks still run things today, producing and selling bakery products, herbal infusions, wine and religious paraphernalia etc

Well, Geraldton may have been a bit of a practice run, but Perth really is the big smoke! Nearly as many cars on the road as Cranbourne, with five zillion traffic lights. This was always going to be a service stop for the truck, but we also had to organize a replacement shock for the camper :-( The seal had gone on one of our big red Pedders. Unfortunately we could only get this done on our second day in town, so we had to set up for the first night only to pack it all away again and take everything to the Pedders shop the next morning. Both Pedders and Aussie Swag were great help with organizing this, but Murphy had his part to play as well when the replacement shocker missed the delivery truck from the warehouse and had to be sent over in a second run, which added another wasted hour to our day.
Drove out to Freo to see the sights. I really wanted to have a look at the Duyfken which is a reproduction of a 16th century Dutch ship of exploration. It was built in Fremantle and is reputably the most accurate reproduction of one of these ships anywhere in the world. The thing is tiny when you think that the original sailed around the world. It is only 24 metres long. Glad I'm not a 16th century sailor!!!

Typically, we arrived at 3:30 and the tours stopped at 3:00. Happily however, the ship is moored right next to the Little Creatures brewery. Guess where the rest of the afternoon and evening was spent :)

Next day it was service time for the Patrol. I had arranged for this to be done as close to the city as possible and we dropped the truck in and walked into town for some serious retail therapy. I managed to find Perth Hobbies and invested in some new plastic, while Hazel picked up some clothes and a manicure. All very civilized. After a full day walking the streets and malls of the CBD in the 36 degree heat we had just about made it back to the mechanics when my mobile rang. It seemed that Murphy had come to town with us as the hoist which our truck was on was refusing to come down! We were leaving the next morning, so this was problematic to say the least. Anyway, the manager was very good at customer service, and offered us the use of a loan car straight away, and informed us that a hoist technician was on his way and that they hoped to have everything fixed by morning. Biggest problem was that all our booze was stuck inside the fridge in the back of the Patrol and we couldn't get the back doors open wide enough to extract any of it while it was up in the air.





Anyway, almost as soon as had we made it back to camp, we received a call to say that the hoist was fixed and we could collect the Patrol, so back into town again..... I had a look at the hoist in question when I got there and it is rated at 2.5 tonne. The Patrol weighs 2.4t empty!
Wonder why it had problems????

Found another candidate for the coolest rig comp. It may be slightly smaller than the Pilbra Princess, but it's way cool:

Cevantes 27 - 28 October 2013

After a refreshingly urban coffee along the Geraldton foreshore we skipped town and headed further down the coast to Cervantes. We have definitely left the Red Centre behind at last with the landscape dominated y whiter than white lime-sand dunes.

It's so white, you would almost swear it was snow.

Stopped off at Central Greenough which was set up in the 1800s as an administration center for the agricultural area but was virtually abandoned as transport improvements made it largely redundant. Luckily the National Trust and WA Heritage have stepped in and are preserving the old buildings to provide a rather unique window on life back then.

From there it was full steam ahead for Cervantes which is a nice little sleepy coastal place. Very nice indeed, but the main attraction for those with limited time is the Pinnacles. These are a fairly amazing set of stone pillars which look a lot like the termite mounds you see in NT (not the dumpy ones typical of WA) which have been revealed by the erosion of overlying softer material and then shaped by the winds which never seem to stop blowing along this coast. Once again Ranger Bob (Jill in this case but they're all Bob to me) said we couldn't take the camper trailer an the Pinnacle viewing loop road, but before we (I) could crack it again, she told us that there was a walking trail, so we opted for this. The trail is 1.6km long, but to be honest we couldn't see the point in completing it once we had got to the first pinnacles. Amazing geology, yes. Capable of providing 1.6km of entertainment, no. Also, we couldn't see any reason why they wouldn't let us tow the Aussie Swag through either. The road was winding and narrow, but not so much that we would have had problems. I dunno, give a person a uniform and they want to control all the fun!

Geraldton 26 October 2013

Wow, we are definitely back in civilization! This is the biggest town we have been in since Darwin, and the CBD is probably bigger here. Geraldton is a city undergoing quite a lot of urban renewal and is turning into another Fremantle like seaside resort town. Very pretty along the foreshore and quite a lot of touristy type attractions. There is the old hospital/gaol/Information Center, a branch of the WA Museum with Batavia shipwreck stuff and the RSL Museum, but the only thing we really had time to visit was the HMAS Sydney Memorial. To be honest, the loss of the Sydney is done to death between Coral Bay and Geraldton, with memorial plaques seemingly around every second corner. This however is different. It is a truly poignant, inspiring, thought provoking and beautifully symbolic memorial to 645 Australian Navy Seamen who were lost when their ship sank after it's encounter with the Kormoran. The original memorial was built before the Sydney was rediscovered over 200km off the coast of Steep Point (the most westerly point on the Australian mainland). Since then a final section has been added to the memorial which shows the WA coast in marble surrounded by 644 seagulls (which traditionally represent the lost souls of sailors who die at sea) with the 645th seagull's wingtip embedded in the ocean at the point of the wreck site. So glad we came here.

Oh, almost forgot. On the way to Geraldton, we saw the pink lake at Port Gregory (it looked a lot pinker in real life than in the photos I took with my phone - yep, the marks on the lens of the camera are terminal and we will be buying a new one in Perth) and stopped off for a gander at the Lynton/Port Gregory Convict Hiring Station which is slowly being restored. This place was a major project in the 1850s but only lasted for six years before it was abandoned. Interestingly (well we thought it was interesting), Anna Leonowens who was the 'I' of the book/play/movie "The King and I" was the wife of the storekeeper here before she achieved/invented notoriety as the governess of the King of Siam's children.

Some serious zooming may be required...

Accommodation for up to 80 Ticket of Leave convicts awaiting hire

If you have convicts, you've got to have a gaol.

It really was pik.

Anna's story

Little shack built by the Governor of the Hiring Station (seems he left under a cloud of financial suspicion - go figure)

It really was pink...