South West Friends

The last part of our journey in the South West of Western Australia was spent reacquainting ourselves with friends from Marty’s Army days.  I guess it proves that you can take the bloke out of the Army but the Army out of the bloke.

The first stop was at Albany where we stayed with Charles Reynolds and his lovely wife Lee and equally lovely daughter Julia.  We had last seen the Reynolds family in Canberra around 2001 and so it was great to catch up.  We pitched the camper in Charles’ lilium farm at Cuthbert just west of Albany.  Charles’ company ‘Floresence’ has just been judged to be the best regional business in WA which is a great fillip for Albany as well as the company.  It was not hard to see why the company won the award as Charles applies his military training and lots of hard work and dedication to make the business the success it is.  We (hopefully) helped Charles by working on the farm on one day.  We picked and bunched liliiums for 5-6 hours.  Marty was the buncher and I was the fat controller putting the bunches into cellophane.  It was good fun but we would not like to do it for a living. 

We also got to experience the surround sound theatre that is part of the Reynolds home and an amateur stage production (“A Family Christmas Concert”) in the Albany Entertainment Centre where Charles was the stage manager.

Albany was probably the most surprising town we visited in regards to how different it was from our expectations.  We had expected a working port but we got much more.  The town has lovely beaches and views and is surrounded by national parks with scenery equal to anything we have seen on the trip.  We were especially fascinated by the wind farms which supplies a large amount of Albany’s power.

Albany Wind farm 12 giant turbines 100m high

Princess Royal Harbour on The Edge Of King George Sound

We spent a nice day in Frenchman’s National Park where we visited the Gap and Natural Bridge, both natural rock features on the Albany coastline.  We had a picnic at Natural Bridge and Marty dangled his legs over the edge.  Boy that was tempting.

Torndirrup National Park – more rugged coastal scenery

Torndirrup National Park – arch.

Torndirrup National Park – Natural Bridge.

Torndirrup National Park – more rugged coastal scenery, - the Gap, a chasm witha 24 meter drop to the sea

We also visited Stony Hill in the park which also had great views.  We persuaded Charles to have his first day off for some time and the three of us went to the Porongurup National Park and walked the 3kms to Castle Rock.  What a sensational view, right back to Albany.  We also found geocaches at both places.

Porongurup National Park Castle Rock

Porongurup National Park Balancing Rock

The weather had improved significantly so we walked along the beaches at Emu Point, Mutton Bird Beach and Middleton Beach and walked the boardwalk along the cliff face between Middleton and Albany.  In the town of Albany we went to the ANZAC Day memorial with its great views and attended an antique auction.  Unfortunately I didn’t get any offers for Marty.

Mounted Corps Memorial, a recast of the original statue erected at Suez in 1932

Torndirrup National Park – more rugged coastal scenery, - the Gap, a chasm with arch.

After saying goodbye and thanks to Charles and family, we left Albany for Esperance via a stop at Munglinup Beach, another lovely beach in this part of the world.

Fortunately we were not beached out as Esperance is well known for its beautiful beaches and white sand.  We did the Great Ocean Drive which highlights Esperance’s beaches and as the weather was pretty hot we stopped for a swim at Twilight Beach.  It looked lovely but was a little treacherous as Marty found out.  Fortunately (Perhaps) I came to the rescue with my pink noodle and dragged him back to shore.

Great Ocean Drive 38 km drive explores the coast of Esperance . 

 Esperance .

In Esperance we caught up with another Army colleague of Marty’s, the quiet and retiring Annie Smith (Timmsy) and met her husband Al and daughter Darby.  We had a ripper meal with them and then went to Cape le Grand some 50 odd kms from Esperance.  Whilst at the Cape we parked on the sand at Lucky Beach, scrambled around the rocks (including seeing a plaque that commemorates the visit of Mathew Flinders) and had a barbie.  But then the highlight.  Marty caught his very first fish and what a ripper it was.  It was a salmon that fed four people that night (after Al filleted it).  After a 50 odd kms drive there I drove 23 back along the beach.  I had received instructions in beach driving from our friend Terry earlier in the trip and put it to good use.

We were sorry to leave Esperance and said sad farewells to Timmsy, Al and Darby.  We also farewelled our new best friends Grant and Donna (Chippie and Kebab).  We have now shared eight caravan parks with them.

The South West

After leaving Mandurah we headed south to Margaret River, one of WA’s best known towns which is synonymous with wine.  We visited and supped wine at a number of wineries including Voyager Estate and St Laurance which seemed to be in competition for the most magnificent grounds as roses and water features abounded.  The wines were OK too.  We also visited a meadery and sampled honey wines.  So that we could both drink and not worry about driving we went a on a wine tour which was great fun.  We tasted at four wineries, a brewery, chocolate factory and a cheese factory and had a big bush tucker lunch including native berries, a Kakadu plum, kangaroo meat and wild turkey.

Winery & Brewery Tour - Lunch with all the trimmings, kangaroo and  witchety grub

I loved this sign that said I'm in the vineyard ring the bell, we had to rign it a few time before anyone responded

The Garden of Eden

Margarer River

We used Margaret River as a base to explore other areas of interest in the region.  Firstly we went north to Busselton where we caught the train down the jetty to the underwater observatory where we saw lots of marine life including a few catfish.  Whilst north of Margaret River we also went to Cape Naturaliste where we went whale spotting and visited the lighthouse.  We saw lots of seals frolicking in the ocean but were not prepared to believe that the water spouts in the ocean were whales as technically we only saw waterspouts and not the whales themselves.  Ever body claimed them as whales except us.

Busselton Jetty

Busselton Jetty

Under the Jetty  

Dunsborough -Cape Naturaliste Lighthouse

South from Margaret River we went to Augusta and Cape Leeuwin on the south west tip of WA.  Cape Leeuwin is a signpost between two oceans; the Southern Ocean and the Indian Ocean.  We climbed the 176 steps up the lighthouse for a spectacular view including the precise point where the two oceans intersect.

Cape Leeuwin Lighthouse

View form the lighthouse

round the twist

The Southern or is it the Indian ocean?

From Margaret River we went to the little timber town of Pemberton.  The town is surrounded by some of the largest trees in the world.  We went on a tram ride through the Warren National Park and saw beautiful karri and jarrah trees.  The most well known tree is the Gloucester tree which is a 61m high fire lookout. The climb of the tree consists of a series of stakes hammered into the tree and winding their way upward.

Pemberton

Pemberton sits in a quite valley surrounded by some of the tallest trees in the world

The GloucesternTree

Another feature of the area is the Beedelup National Park which has a karri tree big enough for people to comfortably walk through.

The walk through tree Beedelup National park

 The Beedelup Falls are 106m high, are rocky cascades with walking trails and a suspension bridge.

From Pemberton we travelled east to the little town of Walpole. Nearby in the Nornalup National Park is the Valley of the Giants Tree top walk.  This consists of steel walkways suspended 38m high in the tree tops.  It was pretty windy when we were there so the walkways swayed a far bit but the view was superb and gave us a greater understanding of the giant tingle trees in the park.  The Ancient Empire interpretative boardwalk allowed us to walk at ground level amongst these great trees.

The Ancient Empire interpretive boardwalk weaves its way through the veteran tingle trees.

  Giant Red Tingle a 25m circumference defines this tree as one of the 10 largest living things 

 On leaving Walpole heading for Albany we stopped at Denmark and sampled more local produce at a ciderey and toffee factory. 

At Denmark itself we sampled a pie for lunch from the local bakery that had won a lot of prizes from the Perth Show.  Our last stop before reaching our destination for the day was a place called Green Pools a natural rock pool and the nearby Elephant Rocks which were really beautiful.

Green’s Pool Denmark Elephant Rock – massive rounded boulders resembling elephants.

Elephant rock

Unfortunately the weather in the south west was consistently horrible but it did not stop us gaining a really positive impression of the diversity of the area.    A little bit for every taste we reckon.