Archive for the ‘Australia’ Category
We had another early start. We had to get up and be ready by 7.30 to be picked up for a whale shark trip. As there was no jetty we had to board a small boat that took us to the main sightseeing boat. Once all 20 of us were on board we left the “harbor” we anchored down so we could get in the water for a 30 minute snorkel. This was nothing spectacular although we saw a lot of small colored fish and some coral. We then cruised further along the Cape Range coast southwards seeing humpback whales.
At 10 o”clock the spotter planes take to the skies to radio in the location of the whale sharks and the boat then heads that way. Once the destination is reached a group of 10 people get in the water right in the path of the shark. Once it gets closer the group splits to the right and left to let the shark pass and the continues to swim alongside. These are magnificent creatures and the ones we saw today were 6-7 meters long.
As the whale shark is an endangered species, it”s illegal to harm them in any way and we had to stay 3 meters away from it’s body and 4 meters from it’s tail (seems logical as the tail of a full grown whale shark can weigh 1 ton).
After we had 4 opportunities to swim with these sharks it was time to return. On the way back we had some bottlenose dolphins swim in the bowwave and a few humpbacks were seen breaching out of the water.
We had to get up early as we had a 733 Km drive ahead of us and we wanted to be in Exmouth before dark. Traffic on the highway was light and we made good time so we stopped for a few geocaches along the way. We passed a few road trains and got the opportunity to see a couple up close at the roadhouses. We noticed that it’s best not to wait to long to fill up on petrol (gas). We had lunch and filled up at Carnarvon and found the next available petrol station to be 140 Km away with the next another 223 Km further north.
Along this highway it’s clear that driving in the dark has some drawbacks, we must have passed over 100 dead kangaroos and goats next to the road.
After dinner in Exmouth, driving 5 Km back to the hotel,we had to stop for 2 smaller kangaroos that crossed the road. At highway speeds there would have no way to avoid them.
As the distance from Perth to Exmouth is more than we cared to do on one day we picked The Riverside Sanctuary as a stopover. It was still a 530 Km drive and we planned our route so we would arrive at the Sanctuary by sunset.
We left Perth via the highway until we got to Jurian Bay from where we took the scenic route along the coast. 15 Km south of Geralton we stopped at Greenough where many of the trees are growing near horizontal because of the winds blowing in from the sea.
When we arrived at our cottage for one night we were just in time to see the final daylight that colored the western sky. There was nothing more to do than have dinner and preparing for tomorrow.
It was a short night but we were on our way to the rentalcar company by 10:30. We were given a 3.6 V6 cylinder Holden with 9000 Km on the clock. Not bad 
After stopping at a nearby shoppingcenter to get some food and drink and a prepaid phonecard we set off to the center of Perth. We first went to the Bell Tower at the waterfront, thee spot where wee found our first Ozzie geocache. We strolled along one of the main streets to the Perth Mint where gold coins are made (no free samples though).
We continued to the Belgian Beer Cafe and then back to the car. All is set to drive north and “really” begin our tour of this part of Western Australia.
There will be no internet access tomorrow as we’ll be in the middle of nowhere, at least 20 Km from the nearest “town”.
We left home at 17:00 on Sunday to take our first flight from Brussels to Frankfurt. The flight left right on time and 40 minutes later we touched down. We changed terminals and boarded QF6, the Qantas flight to Singapore, for a 12 hour flight east. Still spot on time we again changed planes once again for the final leg of our trip, a 5 hour flight south to Perth. 100% to schedule we touched down on Ozzie soil at 30 minutes past midnight. A quick stroll through immigration and customs and a 15 minute drive in the hotel courtesy bus and we could get to sleep around 2 in the morning.