Mawle Family

Woke up to a beautiful day; blue sky and a gentle breeze.  Ems and Ollie wasted no time getting up and dressed, and had their breakfast in double quick time, they even did the washing up without being asked!  After the shock had worn off, Charlotte and I realised that they had an agenda; get to Tulki Beach ASAP and see the Kellam team.

Oscar, the Kellam Team bus.

The drive to Tulki was uneventful, apart from the large Emu that wandered nonchalantly across our path, and we arrived at Oscar, the Kellam team bus,  in time for coffee.  The Kellams were in good form and were game for a trip to Turquoise Bay.

Before we could get into the water a distressed Frenchman asked if we could help look for his friend who had gone missing whilst snorkelling.  Whilst Charlotte used the emergency phone to ring the Ranger I grabbed the Binoculars from the car and started to scan the sea.  Eventually we spotted a lonely figure making slow progress back across the Bay.  He was a long way out so his friend swam out to see if he was OK.  He was but he looked very tired and was shivering a lot.  Although Charlotte had updated the Ranger, he arrived shortly afterwards with a boat to check that all was well.

It’s always exciting to snorkel on the Ningaloo reef, there’s so much to see, and occasionally some of the larger wildlife comes close to take a look at the weird beings bobbing on the surface with their coloured flippers, one big eye and a tube for a mouth.  Today’s highlights were a large Stingray and a Black Tipped Shark (open with Windows Media Player):

Stingray

Black Tipped Shark

Later we jumped in the cars and followed the Kellams back to Oscar for Afternoon Tea (very civilised).  The drive was enlivened by a Kangaroo that decided to cross the road just as the Kellams were passing by.  It bounded straight out of the Bush towards the side of the car.  Then, just as it was about hit the car (and had presumably identified the folly of its decision) it leapt high into the air in an attempt to go over the car.  Now, the kangaroo’s plan might have worked if the Kellams were driving a Ferrari, but they were in a Suzuki 4WD.  So we watched the scene with baited breath – the Kangaroo flying through the air (altitude: about 1.2 metres) straight towards the side window of the car (height: about 1.8 metres).

Whilst I was still processing the altitude/height conundrum, the Kangaroo had already considered the bigger picture and had included velocity – its own and the car’s.  As the car moved forward I’m sure I saw the Kangaroo widen its ears to arrest its speed.  It worked because, rather than hit the car,  the Kangaroo slid across the rear window (narrowly missing the spare wheel), landed on all fours, shook its head, and bounded off into the Bush.  Perhaps some Kangaroos deserve more credit than they are given – particularly in the field of aerodynamics.

Whilst we were having Tea there was more drama.  A distressed woman arrived at the site looking for the Ranger, she had a tiny hairless Joey tucked under her jacket.  She had found it further up the road trying to get into its dead mother’s pouch – the mother had been hit by a car.  The children were able to see the Joey before the Ranger took it to be looked after at one of the Rescue Centres.

The Kellam and Mawle Children

Later we said our Goodbyes and the children gave each other lots of hugs.  It had been another excellent, fun-filled day with the Kellams.  We even saw another Echidna on the way back to Exmouth!

Spent the day at Sandy Bay, another of our favourite beaches here.  Didn’t do any snorkelling , just played games on the beach.  Ollie and I have invented a new one called “Rocketbase” which is a bit like Tennis but without a ball… we use a Rocket instead!  We held a tournament and Ollie was crowned first Rocketbase Champion.

Oliver wins the first Rocketbase championship.

On our way back we saw a large bus appear on the horizon and come thundering down the road towards us.  As it drew nearer we realised it was the Kellam team (who we met in Coral Bay) on their way to Tulki Beach which is a free campsite within the Cape Range National Park.  We will try and hook up with them tomorrow, the weather is supposed to be sunny so we’ll probably head back to Turquoise Bay.

It was windy again last night but it quietened down after midnight, this morning was clear and pleasant so we decided to drive to Turquoise Bay which is one of our favourite beaches in the Cape Range National Park.  The snorkelling here is excellent and it didn’t disappoint this time.  We walked south along the beach, swam out to the coral then allowed the current to take us back to our starting point.   We saw lots of colourful fish and coral and I managed to video this Moray eel.

MorayEel

We had lunch on the beach, skimmed a few flat shells (“Daddy I got six bounces!”) then headed back along the road to Exmouth.  The drive is always interesting  – particularly at dusk when the Kangaroos and Emus wander onto the road, the Kangaroos always seem to face west to watch the sunset and seem very reluctant to move even when you approach them in a car.

Today’s drive was another good one.  We saw lots of Kangaroos, a couple of Emus, and several large Eagles (Wedge Tailed Eagles I think) feasting on the Road-kill.  Oh yes, there’s plenty of Road-kill in Western Australia – particularly Kangaroos.  They don’t just get hit by vehicles, they have been known to actually run (hop) into the side of moving vehicles.  On a previous trip I asked a local chap why Kangaroos don’t move when approached by cars.  He took his hat off, scratched his head and thought for a while then grinned at me and said; “Well it’s like this mate, cars have been here for less than two hundred years.  The Roos have been here for thousands of years but they’re real-slow learners”.

Today the drive highlight was seeing an Echidna wandering alongside the road.  We stopped so the children could get a close look and took some photos.  Further up the road we saw another two Echidnas.  It’s like waiting for a bus; you don’t see one for ages then three turn up at the same time!

Echidnas look a bit like a porcupine but they have some interesting traits.  They are monotremes (mammals that lay eggs).  At the beginning of the mating season (July to August) the female echidna develops a pouch and, a few weeks after mating, she digs a burrow and lays one egg into her pouch.  Ten days later a blind, hairless baby echidna (a puggle) hatches and attaches itself to a teat inside the pouch.  The puggle remains inside the pouch until it develops spines (the mother must be quite uncomfortable!)  then the puggle leaves the pouch (the mother must be relieved!) but it still stays in the burrow for the next 6 months and continues to suckle.  Weird or what?

We’re now in Exmouth on the Western Cape.  It’s a great place from which to access the Cape Range National Park and Ningaloo Marine Park.  The Ningaloo Reef is 260 kilometres long, it is Australia’s longest fringing reef and is the closest reef to land in the world (in some places it is only 500 metres from the shore).  The big ticket activities here are swimming with Whale Sharks (highly recommended – we’ve done this a few times before), swimming with Manta Rays, and whale watching.  But even without those, the Cape Range and Ningaloo are pretty special.  There’s just so much wildlife in and out of the water.

Last night was very windy.  The wind gusts rocked the trailer quite a bit – I was awakened a few times.  Apparently we’re on the edge of a large High pressure system that is dumping rain further north (where we’re heading in a week).

We spent the morning in the “classroom” with Ems and Ollie.  They both spent time writing their journals and updating their Blogs.  Then it was Maths for Ollie and violin for Emily.

After lunch we drove to Jurabi Turtle Centre at one of the beaches where turtles nest each year.  Although it’s not the nesting season the children found some old nests (some with old eggshells in them) and we did see a couple of turtles watching us from the sea.  The Turtle Centre is simple but informative and it was nice to see the children take such a keen interest.

On Saturday, May 25th we drove from Denham to Coral Bay (about 570 kilometres) stopping briefly at Carnarvon for fuel and supplies.  This is our first time in Coral Bay and we really like it.  The campsite is near the beach, has plenty of shade and the facilities are very good.

The beach is perfect for snorkelling – there’s a sand bar which drops off straight onto the coral reef where there’s plenty of wildlife, we’ve seen Coral Cod, Blue Spotted Rays and a couple of Octopus.  The children are getting more confident and Emily has been doing some quite long dives down to get a better look at the fish.  I’m playing with the Go Pro video camera and have some quite good footage, I’ll post some soon.  This is a great place for a family holiday – we’ll definitely come back.

Apart from snorkelling we’ve not done much else other than school work under the shade of a Tamarisk tree- the children are actually pretty good at settling down and concentrating even though there’s lots going on around the campsite.  Oliver’s handwriting and reading are improving.  They’re both almost up to date with their journals so we’ll post those soon.

Wednesday 29th: Did a drift snorkel from the “5 Knots” sign (just south of Coral Bay) back into Coral Bay.  The children had made friends with the Kellam children earlier in the week.  The Kellam family are from Melbourne and are also travelling around Australia in a coach which has been kitted out with everything including a washing machine!  They tow a 4WD which they use as a run-about and to go on off-road adventures.

Later on we watched the fish being fed in the shallows over the sand bar.  The girl feeding the fish (Spangled Emperors I think) gave the children a handful of food and they had great fun watching (and feeling) the fish swim around their legs.  I used the Go Pro to take the video and some free editors to cut and compress it.  Click the link below; it works with Windows Media Player and Quicktime Player:

FishFeeding

Thursday 30th:  Packed up the trailer and parked it in the public car park.  Then we headed off with the Kellam family to Oyster Bridge which is about 10 kilometres off-road from Coral Bay.  I had been told the previous day that it was a good place to snorkel and that occasionally there were big fish and turtles just inside the reef.

The drive to Oyster Bridge took us into the sand dunes so we had to reduce the tyre pressures and use low range on a couple of the steeper dunes (great fun!).

The Oyster Bridge reef is about 50 metres offshore and runs parallel to the beach.  The sea outside the reef was quite rough, the waves were breaking over it and creating quite a swell inside the lagoon.  Rod Kellam and I climbed a large sand dune, watched the water for a while and agreed that it was safe for the kids to snorkel as long as we stayed inside the and didn’t get too close – it was covered in sharp Oyster shells (Aahh so that’s why it’s called…).

We swam out to the reef but the visibility was poor; each time a wave crashed over the reef we were surrounded by bubbles.  Also, the current that ran parallel to the beach was stronger than we had anticipated so we found it difficult to make any progress along the reef.  After half an hour or so we called it a day and had lunch on one of the big sand dunes – it was a great spot, the view along the coast was spectacular.  All in all it was a fun-packed morning and it was nice to share the experience with the Kellams.  But we needed head for Exmouth so we said our goodbyes, made our way back to Coral Bay to hook up the trailer, and were on the road by 2PM for the 150 kilometre journey.