Tour Australia

We drove into Carnarvon in the morning and visited the local supermarket and fueled up then drove out to the big jetty on the coast. We didn’t walk to the end of the jetty but admired it from the shore. We also visited the heritage precinct adjacent to the jetty which was quite interesting. It showcased some of the old shearing stories, transport and life in the area. There is also a water tank which is now a lookout which is worth going up and looking out to the jetty.

We left Carnarvon and headed for the Shark Bay area. We arrived in the afternoon and booked in to the Nanga Bay Resort. There weren’t many people staying there but it is not a bad caravan park. They have an artesian hot spa that is very nice for a dip in the cooler weather, it is right on the bay and they have a bar/bistro area.

The next morning we left early in hope of making it to Monkey Mia by 8am for the first of the dolphin experiences. Unfortuntely it took longer than we thought to get there and we arrived at 8:30am just as they were finishing feeding the first of the dolphins. As they say they do up to 3 dolphin experiences between 7:45am and 12 midday we decided to hang around.

We could see the dolphins off in the distance playing around in the water but they did not come in close to the shore. We hung around for a few hours, as it was approaching 12 we decided to leave but finally a young dolphin came in and swam around the shore catching fish and showing off to the crowd of people. It was great to see the dolphin and watch it in its natural habitat.

 

We were happy we finally saw one and left after it swam away. We headed into Denham and had a BBQ lunch in the park. The facilities were super clean and nice. After lunch we headed up north to Francois Peron National Park.

Firstly we went to the Peron Heritage Precinct which gives some good information about the National Park and early life. They also have an artesian hot spa but we resisted and headed on up north.

As instructed, we aired down to 20PSI and headed up north. The track was fairly sandy but not too bad. We drove all the way up to Skipjack Point. Closer to the top, it was very sandy and soft. We did a short walk to the coast which has some great lookouts. We stayed there and observed for quite a while. We were lucky enough to see a couple of turtles, a dolphin and its calf and a few small sharks. The coast was very pretty along here as well.

  

We then drove around to Cape Peron and walked down to the beach. The coastline was similar and pretty. The red sand meets the white sand which gives it an amazing contrast.

We headed south and drove out to Gregories. We walked down to the beach to have a look at the snorkeling area and walk around on the rocks. The reef looks to be quite large here but it was too cold for us to go in. We were lucky enough to see another few dolphins in the bay swimming around catching fish!

We drove back down to the Peron Heritage Precinct and aired up at the air stations provided. We then went for a dip in the artesian hot spa. There were some locals aready in there and we joined them. The water was very warm and we enjoyed relaxing for a short while before we headed back to the caravan.

 

The next day we packed up and left the caravan park. We headed north a short distance up to Shell Beach. The walk down to Shell Beach is short but has some great signage with lots of informtion about the formation of the beach and the geological features around the area. The beach was very firm under foot and was covered in tiny little shells. It was quite amazing and we’d seen nothing like it before. There appeared to be no sand just shells! The beach was very beautiful.

We headed back down south and went to Hamelin Pool. Nearby to the pool is an old quarry where they mine blocks made of tiny shells compressed and seemingly glued together.

A short distance away is Hamelin Pool where there are some amazing marine Stromatolites. There are only two other locations in the world where these occur. They were quite abundant and amazing.

We headed towards Kalbarri National Park and stayed a short distance from it.