This is Australia - As a Grey Nomand: Part 11 Carnavon,Denham, Kalbarri and Geraldton Western Australia

Red Bluff Panorama where red dirt meets sea

We loved WA it is really a beautiful place,  and they  cater so well to the tourist, everything is well sign posted, tourist offices provide heaps of good information on things to do in the various local areas, and no matter where you go here there is a fantastic view, beautiful scenery, incredible drives that take you to spectacular coast lines or incredible mountain ranges plus this part of the drive had prolific wild flowers, this is where you see them everywhere you look.  I have to move this journey along a bit so will put a few places in together.

Murchison River Panorama

From Coral Bay we headed to Carnarvon,  and once again there were fantastic day drives (some however were quite long on sandy tracks, but they provided some great experiences, including blow holes (only a few kilometres from the town center), to Red Bluff – quite a drive but worth it.  This is the Gasgoyne region and Murchison River a major food bowl for WA and crops abundant so a very pretty landscape oh and I cannot forget the space station – a lovely exhibition here.  

Panorama of Denham foreshore 

 Denham, was our next stop and a lovely seaside town, again there is heaps to do here (but this is where we first hit rain), we had been lucky to date that everywhere was dry.  Again a lot of great day drives coming into Denham – all with lovely walks and exciting things to see – it is a place that you could spend a significant time at. 

Shell Beach

From the stromatolites (the oldest living thing on earth), to shell beaches (that are so white, and the shells go forever),  fantastic broadwalks that show you the beauty of this World Heritage listed area, the aquarium  and of course wild flowers everywhere, there is just so much beauty in this area.  The only thing I will say that disappointed us was Monkey Mia – you see this place all the time on TV etc and it was a real let down for us – would recommend if you want to spend time with dolphins, you go to either Tangalooma (in Queensland) or I was told Bunbury was better for this activity.

  

I think this is what we loved about WA is the coastal views coupled with the inland views all magnificent.

Panorama of Natures Window Kalbarri

Lets talk about Kalbarri – such a beautiful place again many days were spent here on this water front town,with again spectacular inland and coast drives, viewing platforms, walks and we finally saw our first whales frolicking off the coast line, bird sanctuary, but the walk to natures window in the national park was probably the best for us, just beautiful.  The national park has several great walking trails, viewing platforms etc, but again the coast road does as well, you can either walk the entire coast or drive to the various smaller walks dotted along the coast.

Unfortunately for us, the rains where now beginning to set in, so off we had to go, camping is fun, but not when it is pouring – we headed for Geraldton  to get the car serviced and ready for the drive across the Nullarbor – more on that in the next blog.  It was pouring in Geraldton as well so cabins it was – this is quite a big town center and one that is good for a general stock up.  Generally though this whole part of the trip was full of the beautiful wild flowers , and coming into Geraldton you got the back drop of the canola fields as well providing the most incredible yellow and green background.

We have been travelling now for 9 weeks and while some people say WOW you did that quickly, we felt we stayed in most places long enough to see and do everything in the area, there were definitely times however in this drive where there was nothing along the way other than a petrol station, and given we didn’t want to do the free camping sometimes you just had to suck it in and do the 800k days from one place to the next.  Also the beauty of a camper trailer is you can go the speed limits so you just get places faster than those in a van.

More of Dereks finds - he has been having a great time with his metal detecting.

I suppose the only regret I have is not doing Karijni National Park – we were told it was 4wd only access, but after having long past it, many others in 2wd said we would have made it.