From the 21st of June to the 12th of July 2009, Rita and I travelled to the north West of WA. I had never been past Kalbarri before, despite having visited most places on the East Coast of Australia. We went up the coast from Perth to Shark Bay to Exmouth to Karratha/Dampier, then cut inland to the Millstream and Karajini national parks, before coming home on the inland road via Newman. Check this out on the map.

Perth to Karratha

We were accompanied by ‘diddums’, a furry stuffed Kiwi which I got at the 2008 ascilite conference. The idea was to take him on your travels, and report back through a Flickr site prior to the 2009 conference in Orcland.

Rita took lots of photos, especially of the many plants and birds. The Gallery at the bottom of this post has tons of photos, but they aren’t in chronological order.

Here is the chronology of the nicest photos.

21 June, First overnight stop, 100 kms out of Perth at Oliver Bridge, then up the coast via Greenhead, Greenough and Geraldton.

Oliver Bridge on Brand Hwy

Crayfishing village of Greenhead

23-24 June. Time spent at Denham and Monkey Mia on Shark Bay. Early morning rainbow over the bay at Denham. Sand formations near Monkey Mia. Rita and diddums at the camp in Denham, and the landscape around Shark Bay.

Rainbow over Denham

Sand formations just inland from Monkey Mia

Camping at Denham

Eagle Bluff on Shark Bay

Our van at Goulet Bluff, Shark Bay

Moving further North. Sunset near Minilya Roadhouse and on the beach at Coral Bay with diddums.

Sunset from Minilya Roadhouse

At Coral Bay with diddums

29-30 June. Ningaloo (Cape Range) National Park. Relaxing at Mandu Mandu Gorge and at the camp at Yardie Homestead. Yardie Creek Gorge is pretty impressive. There is fossilised coral right next to the ferry.

Outside Mandu Mandu Gorge

Campsite at Yardie Homestead

Yardie Gorge. Figs. Airroots reach to just above the highwater mark, they don't like salt water.

Petrified Coral at Yardie Gorge

1 July. Still at Yardie Station. Rita got up early to go to the loo, and caught this sunrise, both direct, and through the window of the shearing shed.

Sunrise in the shearing shed window

Sunrise at Yardie Homestead

2 July. On the way North from Exmouth/Ningaloo we had a problem with the front suspension. Rita was still photographing flowers, and we passed some large rivers, including the Ashburton and Fortescue.

Troubles with the steering

More flowers!

Ashburton River at Nanutarra RH

Sturt Desert Pea

3 July. Karratha/Dampier. We visited the rock carvings the Burrup Peninsula – who knows what else has been lost under the huge processing plants being built. We met a friendly echidna, and then we visited my nephew Shaun in Dampier, and got the suspension problem fixed.

Echidna

4 July. We set off inland, first to Millstream National Park. Millstream is an area of permanent natural springs, with some great riverside camping spots, except you had to drive through the river to get to them.

Deflating the tyres from 46psi to 26, to better cope with the rough roads ahead, into the Millstream National Park.

Millstream near the Homestead

Crossing the Fortescue River

Reflections

Not one ripple!

Crossing the Fortescue

6 July. Tom Price and Karajini. After leaving Millstream, we had a choice. We could retrn to the coast and follow the bitumen roads for 600 kms to Port Headland and then back South towards Karajini – towards Newman. Or, we could follow the Rio Tinto railway line straight inland over 120kms of dirt road to Mt Tom Price and then Karajini National Park. We had different reports from people about how tough this was going to be. We decided to take the inland route, and the first three quarters were fine. We could drive at 60-80 kms/hr. However, when we got to the hillier areas, the road corrugations increased, and we had to drive slower and slower in our old Toyota – 20-30 kms/hr. Nevertheless, we got to Tom Price much quicker, and used less fuel, than if we’d gone the long way.

Three engines to help it up the hills

View of Mount Tom Price Opencut Mine from the top of Mount Nameless.

7-8 July. We drove from Tom Price to Karajine Natnal Park. We had to queue to secure a camping spot, but this was OK. We were to meet our friends Amanda and Rob, who were coming up from Newman to spend a day with us. The gorges were spectacular, but the dirt roads weren’t, with all the yuppie 4WDs hooning along and digging up corrugations. A dingo came visiting. Enjoy these photos!

Weano Gorge, Dingo walking along road.

Circular Pool, Dales Gorge

Dales Gorge, bird watching

The will to live. Dales Gorge

Near Fortescue Falls in Dales Gorge

Fern Pool

Fern Pool

Here is a gallery of the good photos from this trip.

Photo Gallery

Pete’s wedding

Our son, Pete, was married on Sunday Jan 11, 2009 to Cara Sutcliffe.

Pete and Cara are both a little ‘alternative’, and chose to have their wedding with a pirate theme, at Bunker Bay, at the tip of Cape Naturaliste, 250kms South of Perth. The wedding was on Sunday, but the celebrations started on Friday night and went all weekend. Many of Pete and Cara’s friends stayed at a caravan park, together with us, Rita’s dad Peter and her sister Pauline.

On Friday, Peter was taken out by the groomsmen and had various challenges to overcome, including a dive from the Busselton jetty and trying to replace a car tire while wearing a miniskirt!

Various activities on Saturday culminated in a concert on Saturday night, performed entirely by wedding guests.

Ceremony

The wedding was held on Sunday morning at Bunker Bay, a beautifully picturesque secluded bay. Just about everyone, especially the wedding party, wore pirate costume, and the wedding was against the background of the Indian Ocean. Here are some of the photos. [See the full photo gallery below]

Reception

The reception was held at the Dunsborough Hall, which was decorated as a pirate’s den by the people from Esther House, the Christian charitable refuge for troubled young girls that Cara and Peter are both involved with. The Esther House people also prepared all the catering, and worked all hours to do this. It was yummy!
Here are the photos from the reception.

Off to China!

Our newlyweds then spent two nights at a local Dunsborough resort, and spent the next two days frantically sorting out everything before leaving Oz for a week’s honeymoon in Bali, and then on to Hong Kong and China for an extended period of backpacking and film-making and hopefully working.

Photo Gallery

Here is a collection of the nicest photos from Pete and Cara’s wedding. Thanks to Natalie, Russell and ? for the digital photos! A couple were even taken by us, but the camera was playing up.