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Day 56

We were going to head down to Albany and then spend a couple of days going across to Esperance but we really want to get away from the heat so we make a beeline direct for Esperance. This means a 6hr drive and the thought of having to set-up camp after a long day in the car isn’t very appealing so I suggest we book I to some accommodation for the first night, but then we figure, well once we’re in we want to get settled so we end up having another four nights in an Airbnb!!

Day 55

Sorry grandma but we’re going to share our business around town and have breakfast at settlers house today before heading to the lama farm only to learn that it recently closed as the owners are retiring. So instead we farewell our friends back to Perth and head to the local artisan markets.

Day 54

We had tinkered with the idea of going to a miniature pet farm or one of the other towns nearby but it’s simply too hot and we are paying for the air con so we figure we best make the most of it and have a lazy day indoors (chasing each other through the house and catching our daughter out by making using of the double entrances to double back causing no end of giggles!!).

Later we meet our friends in town for lunch- back at Grandmas kitchen (turns out scones, team, jam and tea count as lunch as well as breakfast! This time though I order two from the get go!!).

We all head back to the house where we get the slow cooker going with some lamb we picked up from the butcher!! Whilst we wait for it to cook we head to Mount Brown lookout where little miss gets into rock climbing!

Day 53

We head to Grandmas Kitchen for a delicious brekkie (if a scone with cream, jam and tea counts as breakfast??). The scone was soo good I ended up going back for a second one! Having made the most of Grandma’s homemade scones we head to the local sweet shop (naturally) which happens to be right next door to the dentist (now that’s good business planning!). We then visit the sock factory – the only place making socks in WA (after all, who wears socks in WA!!). It because we live in Melbourne, where we most definitely do need to wear socks! We not only buy some, but despite it being 42 degrees I pick up some Ugg boots too! By now it’s starting to get really hot but before we head back to the air con we check out York’s motor museum, which was originally founded as a way to attract visitors to York, making it a Mecca for motorists and leading to annual car festivals etc.

Day 52

We have a fairly long drive ahead of us today to get to York, the other side of Perth where we have arranged another Airbnb (as its still in the high thirties/low forties), as an added bonus our friends will be joining us over the weekend.

We’d been going for about an hr when hubby commented that the car in front, towing a boat should only be doing 100km. I look at our speed and reply, well so should we (because in WA any car towing is limited to 100km – so, up until now that’s what we’ve been doing – well, maybe 105……). Anyhow, hubby responds that he’d looked into further and it’s actually only of you are over 10 tonne and towing. Hmmm me thinks that doesn’t sound right, the sign when we entered WA clearly said towing vehicle’s restricted to 100km….. no no, hubby insists we mis-read the sign, he’s since read up about it and because we are less than 10 tonne we can do 110km……. well fast forward an hr and we are being pulled over by the cops – why? Because in WA any vehicle towing is limited to 100k’s and we were doing 110! Whilst hubby apologies and explains he thought that was for over 10 tonne I have the harder job of biting my tongue and holding back the ‘I told you so!’ (at least until after the policeman is out of earshot!). Fortunately, after checking over the trailer and discussing the fuel economy of the Ram he lets us of with a warning (and the advice that we can go up to 105 and they’ll ‘probably’ leave us alone but at 110 they will intervene).

After our brush with the law, we arrive in the afternoon and spend the first hour or so getting our heads around the layout! It’s a historical Georgian cottage that has been added to and there are various rooms that have double entrances and about 5 doors to the outside! The door handles are the perfect height for a toddler so needless to say our little one has much fun opening and closing doors and running in and out of rooms, going round in circles (and occasionally kissing the floor!!).

It’s been a long day so we decide to go to the local pub for dinner, we take the boy with us which means we have to sit outside and just reconfirms the need to be Airbnb’ing it at the moment! When we get back though, we realise that of all the doors and multiple locks on some of those doors we put the latch across the wrong one and have locked ourselves out 🙄 we contact the hosts who live in Perth and don’t have a spare key anywhere in York 😮 so with their permission we remove some bricks and a fly screen and guess which one of us gets to climb through window….?? 😆

Day 51

Another day relaxing inside with the air con and regular applications of dermeeze –I am on a mission to have this eczema gone by the time we leave!

That afternoon we head into Geraldton to visit target as someone has had a couple of growth spurts in quick succession and outgrown most of their clothes!! Whilst we’re in the area we may as well go back to Jaffle Shack and enjoy another iced chai latte!

Day 50

Having had a week of 40+ degrees and with another week of hot hot days forecast we decide to give the camping a miss for a while and book into an Airbnb where we can access air con and get our daughters eczema’s under control (which has flared up again due to the heat and all the suncream).

Because of this, we only go about an hr down the road, staying in White Peak which is about 15mins from Geraldton.

We spend a very relaxing afternoon and evening chilling on the couch and watching TV for the first time since…… hmm, I was about to say since we left but we did watch a bit of TV in Perth!

Days 48-49

We head to Kalbarri via Hutt Lagoon to take in the pink lake and then enjoy an early lunch in Kalbarri itself before heading to the national park. We take in Meanarea Hill Lookout and Nature’s Window – I complete the loop trail with our daughter in the BabyBjorn while the hubby stays at the rim and throws the drone up. The trail walk is just over 1km so not far at all, I’m not sure why they say to allow an hr and take plenty of water. I get to natures window pretty quickly. Whilst I knew we were (aka I was) walking downhill, I hadn’t appreciated the gradient…..needless to say it took a lot longer to walk back! Oh, and did I mention it’s about 40degrees today???

After rehydrating (having drunk all my water on the walk back!) we head to the Z bend. The plan is that I will do the walk solo, however according to the info board this is a 1.2km walk to the lookout where you get to look down on the valley. Great I think, this will be pretty flat and the path looks pram friendly , this time I check out the path first and it looks pram friendly so we sunscreen up (again), put on our hats and head off with bubs in the pram. Everything has going well when we come across a few wide, low steps. Not to worry, the pram can handle this, so we keep going, that is until we turn a corner and suddenly the steps are closer together and not as low. Hubby decides to head back with the pram and I keep going. Turns out this was a very wise choice as they make you go down just to come back up again! After the Z bend we decide it’s just too hot to do any other walks so we make our way back to Elbenjo.

Once again, after the kids go to bed I grab out the laptop to finish off my assignment. Once again the wind picks up, only much worse. I’m sitting under the stars with 50km winds triggering my hay fever whilst being eaten alive but I know I have to keep going though because it’s due 5pm tomorrow and I know I won’t have anytime during the day to work on it. I get to bed around 4am and am up again by 6am – the joys of camping with a toddler! Not to worry though, today we are taking the train to feed the animals!! She has a great time, she feeds the kangaroos herself, helps me feed the birds and even holds a baby chick. We also learn that the ostrich egg hatched that morning!!

As today is another hot day we hang out in the camp kitchen/lounge where it is shaded.

I don’t need to study tonight – yey!! So we celebrate by walking up the hill to watch the sunset – such an amazing view!

Day 47

For the next few days we are camping at Elbenjo, an eco sustainable bushcamp and wildlife sanctuary set on 10,000 acres. The hosts, Benny and Jock look after rescued and injured wildlife such as emus, lamas, ostriches, kangaroos and even a pig. There are parrots, chickens and ducks to. All the money from the campsite goes towards the care of the animals and Jock built everything himself. These guys have a real passion for what they do. On arrival we meet a baby Joey that is only a few months old and still living their house, they also have an ostrich egg that is showing signs of starting to crack, which is exciting as it will be their third baby ostrich this year! We arrange for them to look after J the next day so we can go to Kalbarri National Park and we book ourselves into the animal tour and feeding for the following day. We then set about setting up camp for the next few nights.

I have an assignment due soon so I’ve earmarked the next couple of nights to work on it. Once the kids are in bed I set myself up with the laptop and work away until midnight, I still have plenty of work to do and it is due 5pm day after next so I already know that tomorrow night is going to be an all nighter but the wind has picked up and my feet are dumb (despite wearing woolly socks!) I call it night and head to bed.

Day 46

We use the J free time to take a scenic flight and stock up on supplies as we will be bush camping for the next few days.

The afternoon is spent gradually packing up as much as we can ahead of our departure tomorrow. This is a bigger job than normal as, turns out that whilst I made a point of ensuring we had our max tracks to hand prior to entering the national park, I didn’t consider what else we had in the back – like the tub of J’s dry food that got jostled and shaken so much the lid came off…… on the upside, we finally found the handle for the jockey wheel!!!

Day 45

We start the morning off again with the dolphins and enjoy a swim in one of the pools before heading back to the national park to have lunch at the big lagoon.

As we leave the park and have signal again we check-in with the dog sitter and it turns out Jasper is having soo much fun with his new friends (I think he has missed the company of other dogs!). That we decide to let him have another day of his own little holiday.

Day 44

We drop J off in town and head out to the national park. The first few kms to the homestead is 2WD but from there it is 4WD only and we have to let our tyres down. This time I have made sure that our max tracks are within easy reach – just in case!!!

We don’t get far before we hit upon a traffic jam as a group of overseas tourists in an all wheel drive have, predictably gotten themselves bogged. We get out to see if they need any more assistance only to find that the family we met in coral bay have already got their max tracks out to assist. We gently explain to them the difference between a 4WD and an AWD and once freed they turnaround and head back to the homestead. Everyone else heads back into their cars and we are off again, until of course the next overseas tourist that has well and truly bogged themselves. By the time we arrive on scene, not only are the coral bay max tracks out again but there is some serious digging of sand going on, we are starting to think that more extreme measures may be needed….. but fortunately the max tracks work a treat and having been issued some guidance on how to manoeuvre through the soft sand they are able to continue with their way. It is at this point that we decide to let our tyres a bit more. The coral bay guys do the same, having gotten themselves bogged in the process of helping the tourists. Reducing the tyre pressure isn’t enough though and they have to use their max tracks for a third time!

Finally we are on our way again and we make it to point cape without anyone else getting bogged. I grab out the BabyBjorn and we complete half the trail walk to skipjack point before jumping back in the car and driving to it!! The views from here are amazing, we see sharks, mantra rays, sting rays and turtles in the water below. If it wasn’t for the strength of the sun I could spend hours here just taking in the views and looking at the ocean wildlife.

Having driven to the furthest point in the park, we make our way back out, stopping to take various side tracks to look in on other beaches and views. We realise we won’t have enough time to the last one – the big lagoon (where we previously camped) so we decide to come back tomorrow.

After pumping the tyres back up and refuelling we are ready to pick J up from the dog sitter. J however, is having far too much fun at the beach with the other dogs 😀 so we go ahead and enjoy our BBQ dinner at little lagoon without him. Before we head back I call the dog sitter to let them know we are on our way and is ok if they have him again tomorrow and in the end we agree it’s easiest if he just stays the night (he can’t have slept at all during the day because if they knew how loudly he snores they wouldn’t have offered to have sleep over!).

Day 43

Tomorrow we’ve arranged for J to be looked after by a couple in town (Denham) who have 3 dogs of their own whilst we explore the national park, so after seeing the dolphins we set about doing all the dog friendly activities today. We head to the ocean aquarium and arrive just in time to order lunch at the attached café where we bump into the family room coral bay who have just been to the aquarium and our now having lunch!

All the animals in the aquarium have been rescued from the local area, and many are released again once well enough. Turns out J isn’t a big fan of things that move in water, so despite being one of the few things we can include him in here, he doesn’t enjoy it ☹️ we stay long enough to watch the shark feeding, during which our tour guide got caught off guard resulting in her screaming when the fish she had hung out at the end of a rod got eaten – much to her embarrassment 🤣

Day 42

We are in no in rush this morning as Monkey Mia is only a couple of hours down the road. We pack up at a leisurely pace and drive the 20kms to Gladstone station to see the jetty that we didn’t camp at last night.

After a walk on the salt, sorry, the ‘beach’ goat spotting and a short flight with the drone we are back in the car.

We have actually been to Monkey Mia before, on our honeymoon. We camped at Francis Perron National Park and did a day trio to Monkey Mia. We knew it would have changed in the last 13 years but wow! Whereas before there was a car park, some sun loungers on the beach and a hut where you could hire kayaks, now there is a massive resort offering the full range of accomodation from backpacker to cabins to camping. There are 3 swimming pools, a bar, a restaurant, a jetty, a kids playground and more! The facilities are the best we have seen (granted they are practically brand new) but the design and thought that has gone into them is obvious. There are several high chairs in each camp kitchen and the parents room even has a bath!

It is however, dry hot and the reflection off the white gravel that has been used everywhere makes it very bright – definitely need your sunnies and sunscreen here – the UV just bounces off everything!

As we set-up camp for the next 5 nights J introduces himself to the dog next door (by drinking all of her water – despite having his own….??).

Day 41

We are up and off to Gladstone jetty for tonight’s stop over before continuing on to Monkey Mia tomorrow. Only we make a last minute decision to go back to Wooramel Station/Riverside retreat instead! It’s about 20kms before Gladstone and being a bit more inland we figure we’ll be better protected from the wind – plus last time hubby didn’t get to use the hot tub as he had to stay back to look after the kids. We arrive for our second stay and camp in almost exactly the same spot!

The kids have a great time running around, both being familiar with the place and thus having a little more confidence to go further a field – though usually in complexity different directions 🤣.

As agreed, tonight is hubby’s turn to float in the hot tub under the stars. Knowing as I do how incredibly hard it is to get out once you are in, I settle down to get ahead on my studies as somehow I doubt I’ll find much time when we are in Monkey Mia…….

Day 40

So hubby has his quad bike safari this evening, unfortunately there isn’t enough people for the snorkelling boat tour so I have a girls morning instead and head off on the glass bottom boat instead. We then swap parental responsibilities so I can snorkel off the beach before swapping again for the quad bike tour.

I manage a bit of snorkelling but I’m having trouble with the mask and even though it’s very close to the beach it drops deep very quickly so I decide to get out and walk along to the shark nursery. I’m told that it doesn’t matter what time of day you go, you will see baby sharks…….I however manage only to see a couple of stingrays! It’s a little disappointing but the stingrays were orange and blue which was pretty cool!

Later that evening, whilst hubby is driving over sand dunes etc our daughter makes friends with the toddler camping behind us and once the kids are in bed (and hubby is back at camp) the two sets of parents crack open the wine, cheese and biscuits and enjoy a casual chat under the star

Day 39

Today we are heading an hr and a half down the road to Coral Bay where hubby hopes to do a quad bike safari (subject to getting the minimum numbers required) and I hope to do some more snorkelling…….

In the evening I set myself up to complete one of my timed online assignments which is due soon – got to keep on track with the studies!!

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