The McCookie Travels: June 2014

Hi All

Well we’ve had a gorgeous few weeks seeing the gorges (forgive the pun…!!) in Kalbarri National Park and the breathtaking scenery along this WA coastline.

Our journey from Perth took us to Yanchep National Park which is a stunning park, pretty close to Perth and with the mandatory wildlife and scenery. It was a great first base out of the City.

From there we headed up the coast and stopped to walk round the strange rock formations, The Pinnacles, which go on for as far as the eye can see. They are formed by soil erosion over many years and are very odd looking rocks! Whilst on our way north, we also went to Stockyard Gully Caves, which is a 300m tunnel (which is actually a sinkhole). As expected, inside, it was pitch black and eerie but luckily, we saw no bats !! It really is in the middle of nowhere and we were surprised to see another family there, and even more surprised when we found out the wife works with Sarah Collier in Frenchs Forest!! Small world hey?!!

Anyway, we then headed to the lovely town of Geraldton for a few days, using it as a base to explore the area and catch up on caravan tinkering and schoolwork! A highlight of our stay there was our first ever Rodeo, 100km east in Mulwerra. It really is a different way of life which was brought home to me when there were various contests, including bull-riding, for the "junior" category. I could tell I was a Sydney softy as all I could think of was “they will hurt themselves” and “why aren’t they wearing helmets!”. Clearly, they are bred to be tough out here!! Anyway, after the excitement of the Rodeo, we continued north to the beautiful Kalbarri National Park. We camped on the banks of the Murchison River on a Goat Station of some 350,000 acres! That in itself was lovely. Campfires at night and walking in the national park during the day made for a great time. We’ve met some lovely people on the way and the kids just love it when we meet other kids….doesn’t matter if they are different ages ….just having kids around is the greatest excitement for them….throw in a campfire with marshmallows on sticks and they really are happy little campers!

From Kalbarri we continued our journey to Monkey Mia, and had an amazing day, just watching the dolphins and playing in the swimming pool (the girls that is….still WAY too cold for us grown ups!). Meggie wasn’t keen, but Rosie was SO excited to be picked to feed the dolphins….afterwards, she told me that she’d put on her lucky pants that morning, hoping she’d be picked!!! How funny….that was the first I knew she has lucky pants! Must try that myself with Lotto. Anyway, the dolphins came in so close to shore that it felt like they’d beach themselves but they are so agile they just dart away. Just by staying around the beach for the day we saw them come in and go out….it was a really magical day.

We are now staying at a lovely spot at Shark Bay (more schoolwork to catch up on!!) and will head to Carnarvon in the next few days to restock supplies and then upto Ningaloo Reef where we’ll camp in Cape Range National Park and hopefully enjoy a bit of snorkelling.

Well, hope you are all keeping well and will be in touch again after Ningaloo and Exmouth.

Take care

Xxx

PS The photo of Steve is just to show its not all “rainbows and lollipops”!! Once a mechanic always a mechanic!