Christmas spirit in Perth

Christmas is fast approaching and it is a very different experience to be far away from "home" at this time of the year. It is also the time of year when I miss Sweden as it is a very special time there. To make up for it we went to IKEA and bought gingerbread and ¨glögg. This was on the 13th Dec (Lucia in Sweden).

The same evening we went to Carols by Candlelight by the river in Perth City. It was a great night with the Christmas message played out in music and action. They had Scottish pipe band, choirs and even three live camels for the wise men. We went together with two girls from Holland, Paulien and Sjaane. We got to know them travelling the Top End and it was nice to catch up again and compare notes.

Time is running out so we are getting ready to leave Perth and go onto Margaret River which is our next stop.

Perth - a livable city and some great news re our stolen house

Perth is beautifully situated around Swan river and has a population of 1.6 million people in the metropolitan area. The Swan River is Perth's natural heartbeat - the city's location right on the river banks makes the capital very beautiful. The view of the river and city from Kings Park is among Western Australia's most scenic. City sky scrapers shining against a brilliant blue sky, green parklands and the shimmering blue river combine to create a stunning view which we enjoyed as we spent a big part of Saturday in the park.

Being Swedish I had to take Graeme to Miss Maud's which is a hotel, restaurant and coffee shop with a Swedish flair. They have 17 outlets in and around Perth, a popular and well known cafe in this part of Australia. We planned to stay one night in their hotel but they were fully booked during our entire stay here.

We visited Penguin Island by sea kayak with a guide and another couple and had a fantastic day there. We spotted sea lions and a pelican colony on another island as we paddled across.
Penguin Island had an abundance of bird life, tern colonies, penguins, ospreys and many more.

Very unusual bird on the right, Buff Banded Rail , it cannot fly and we were told it only exists on this Island but that appears incorrect.


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Osprey enjoying his catch.

Our guide took us round the island and we did some snorkeling as well. This was a very different experience compared to Exmounth with colder water and less fish but still very enjoyable.

We are still staying in Fremantle, and like it. It has loads of character and nice restaurants. 
I fell in love with the looks of this B&B in Essex St (who wouldn't). However that will be for another visit.  Reminds me of Tuscany.

We had dinner last night with Graeme Richards, his wife Merryn and 4 children and had a great time. We met Graeme and his son in Adelaide River (NT) as we were traveling and then we caught up and had dinner in Katherine  together. We are forming new friendships with people as we travel and are really enjoying this aspect of our journey.

Foot Note: Graeme Richards is on his way around Australia again !!! and is due at our B&B in June 2011

The Richards clan

The bike was serviced by Fraser's, the Harley dealer in Perth, and got new tyres as well. The back tyres were dangerously bald when we got here, but we were unable to find a place to get new ones fitted since we left Darwin.
We have cracks in the tow bar fitting that needs to be welded before we take off. Graeme blames me as he think I am carrying too many shoes!!


We continue to explore Churches as we go and this Sunday we visited C3 Fremantle, which is a City Church and they made us feel really welcome - a "home away from home". 

We have moved between two locations of Bed and Breakfast with the same owner. We are currently in this one.

Advent is here and this beautiful ornament on a Fremantle building reminded us about Christmas, which will be here before we know it.


Last but not least IMPORTANT NEWS
The police raided a property about 10 km away from our block of land. They found our portable home and most of our outdoor furniture and equipment.  This is not short of a miracle as months have passed, and is an answer to our prayers. The person/s had a lot of other stolen goods including a Harley, another caravan worth $100,000 and a car on the property as well and will finally be brought to justice. GREAT! (Marie-Louise will be in court to make sure).


We are still missing all of our personal things, like Graeme's much loved Harley vest, all our jewellery, passports, original documents, photos journals and more. However we are very grateful for what they did find. Justice must now run it's course and it will take months until we can retrieve our found possessions.

Foot note: we have had one day in court along with 7 other victims and the case has been adjourned till July 2011 .I had to hold onto Marie-Louise she wanted to take the scum bag out.

Dongara-Port Denison onto Perth

We are almost in Perth, we bypassed Geraldton preferring to stop in the quaint little seaside town of Dongara.
This town is about 360 km north of Perth, which is one of our major mile stones; it is getting real close. It is cooler now, but our trip from Monkey Mia was a real challenge with temperatures in the 40s and we were back to our strong winds. Poor Marie-Louise felt her brain was frying but the trooper she is did not tell me until we stopped for the night in Dongara.
Dongara is called the rock lobster capital of Australia and has a population of around 3500 people and is situated at the mouth of the Irwin river.

We stayed in the nice Sea-spray caravan park where we were greeted by this friendly dark skinned fella  (above)  who wanted to take Marie-Louise away with him.

The local owners of a new Cafe just in front of the caravan park made us most welcome with new drinks they had concocted and we enjoyed our dinner there later.
Sunday saw us at the local Church and Sunday night we had a baked lamb dinner cooked  on the veranda of our cabin.
Monday morning we had a ride along the new coast road to Perth close to 500 km and it was one of the best roads we have been on. I really enjoyed having corners again !! and having a nice sea breeze escort us most of the way.

We arrived at our Bed and Breakfast in Mouat St (which used to be the French Embassy)  in the centre of  Fremantle  just before 1PM, where we are staying for the next 8 days. It is a time to catch up with friends we have made along the way, service the bike, eat something more than a pub meal, do some shopping, receive mail and go to the markets.
We slept in a huge bed in a room where the walls don't move and flap all night. There is even a spa bath which we used last night.
Pete Donovan the owner, has made us very welcome and we will have some much needed rest here before we move on to the next leg of our journey.

Foot note, this is where we decided to buy a B&B. 

Monkey Mia-the home of Dolphins and Dugongs

Monkey Mia is a seaside resort that you reach by leaving Hwy 1 and driving 130 km down a road that is dry, straight and boring.
 After enduring 1.5 hours of heat and sweat, you finally reach the coast and Denham and then there is another 20 km to go before reaching the beautiful Monkey Mia resort. The place was buzzing with backpackers, campers and holiday stayers of all kinds.

Unbelievable colours of the sea

We went on a cruise and were introduced to the pearl industry and this was totally fascinating.  

We now fully understand why good quality pearls cost what they do after our visit to the pearl farm. 

The same tour took us our to areas where the dugongs roam around. They are a funny type of sea creatures and they are related to the elephants and hippos. 12 000 of them live in the huge bay. However, 50% of the new born calves are taken by the tiger sharks each year. 

The bay is also home to more than 2000 bottle nose dolphins and a small group of them come ashore every day to meet the tourists and get a couple of small fish. They only feed 3 of them so habit more than the food must be the reason for the daily visits. 

Dugong mother and calf

We had a great stay, enjoyed all the wildlife, good food and caught up with some travelers we knew from previous places.

The only challenge was the wind, we didn't get too much sleep the first night as if sounded like a full on storm in the tent. We did some readjustments the following night, tying down as much as possible and taking away anything that could flap and we slept much better the second night. 

Graeme got a curious visitor whilst packing up

This emu family crossed our path as we left the resort 7AM in the morning.

We clocked over 15000 km today on our way to Monkey Mia 25/11/2010

This is a rough map of our journey so far, and we have done and seen so much.Today, a year ago, Graeme was undergoing surgery and very close to death. He says never in his wildest imagination could he have imagined that he would be given a second chance for a new chapter in life with so much happiness after all the hardship he endured over the past few years.


We thank God everyday for an opportunity like this to travel, discover and enjoy this beautiful country. We are also learning so much about ourselves and each other in the process as well as meeting and sharing experiences with fellow travelers along the way.

Carnarvon the bread basket of West Australia

          Not much happens in Carnavon

                               

  More great coast line   

The town of Carnarvon, the hub of the Gascoyne, is located 904 km north of Perth following the Brand and North West Coastal Highways. Carnarvon’s unique location, warm sunny winter and mild summer makes the town a wonderful place for a truly memorable holiday. Carnarvon is an ideal location for travellers to restock supplies, sample locally grown produce, fish and explore outlying areas which provide a diverse range of natural attractions. Dominating the Carnarvon skyline is a huge communication satellite dish, which was opened in 1966. Although no longer used the dish still stands as a reminder of days gone by when Carnarvon participated in the space race to put a man on the moon.

 But it does have an awesome blow hole 70 km north of the town                                                       

                                                         

But while you may see the crops being irrigated from the river, you may well not see any water in the Gascoyne River. The mighty Gascoyne River runs only for about 120 days a year and the rest of the time it runs underground.

                                                 A River that does not run

             Of course Mangoes

                                                  A sexy Husband to be

         An old light house

                                                                Great sun sets

                                                            

All in all it was a great little town, very friendly and a very nice camp ground 700 mts from the centre.
 We relaxed, held each other tight, had romantic dinners on the sea shore and our love for each other grows stronger each day.

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Turtles and snorkeling in Exmouth- and Kangaroos

 

Emu's were part of the permanent residents of the park

Our next stop was Exmouth (population 2400) and we found an excellent Big4 camp ground there. We have  been on the road for a long time and met different people as we stay in different camping grounds. Some are heading down the same route as we are, as the choice of roads are limited!! Now we start to run into people we have gotten to know along the way and it really nice to see some familiar faces and share our experiences.

Wild horses in The Cape Range National Park

We are discovering so much about Australia and its hidden treasures everywhere. Exmouth exceeded our expectations in many ways. Nigaloo Marine Park is snorkelers and divers paradise with 260 km of coastline with the reef often being only meters from the shore. It has 500 recorded species of tropical fish. The Cape Range National Park outside Exmouth took us to the reef. We spent two days going out snorkeling and it was an experience never to be forgotten. 

Turquoise Bay with the reef

Turtles 

This is the time of the year when big turtles come ashore and lay their eggs at night. This was something we really wanted to see. One of our newfound friends lent us her Land Cruiser one night so we could drive out safely to the Turtle Viewing Centre. We spent a few hours enjoying the moon light and each other, but not one turtle in sight.

The following day we asked around and got advised about some other spots where others had seen turtles and we stopped by there during the afternoon and saw several turtles sticking their heads up and swimming around waiting for the dark. We returned that night on our Harley and it was challenging to drive along the road in the dark as there were plenty of kangaroos around. 

We came a bit late, one big turtle was already returning to the sea after having done her business. Another one, was digging her hole and sand was flying everywhere.  We sat down a few meters away and started watching her. Little did we know that we had come upon the most stubborn turtle on the entire beach. If a turtle doesn't like the structure of the sand etc in the hole she is digging, she moves on and starts a new one. This is very demanding as they are big and heavy and it is very cumbersome for them to move ashore and dig their nest.  This turtle was exhausted and on her sixth attempted nest when we left at 1.30 AM.

Turtle footprints as they are moving up from the sea.

"Our" stubborn female, digging away being watched by another stubborn female

We walked along the beach and watched other turtles in the process of doing the same thing, some returning to the sea and others just coming up. They are guided by  moon light and come up when the tide is high as they have less distance to cover on the beach that way.


It was a very romantic night with close to full moon and very special. Graeme even saw a Meteorite.


We  attempted to sleep on the beach but were not prepared and it got too damp and uncomfortable so we decided to drive back to the camping ground which was about 50 km's away. 


We now know without a doubt that kangaroos are nocturnal. We passed more than 100 kangaroos on the way back, driving very slowly and carefully. We hit one, and it was a miracle we didn't run into more. The kangaroo "shoo roo" gadgets you can buy in auto shops are useless we discovered. There were kangaroos all the way right up to the camp ground. It is very dry out here in WA and you wonder how they survive.


Next stop is Carnavon via Coral Bay and this will take us out of the "heat zone" of the Top End.

 This short billed Corella fell in love with Marie-Louise (who doesn't)  in the camp kitchen.
 He then  followed her to our camp site and would not leave.