So Tuesday came which was DAY 1 of our Roadtrip, we cycled/ran (with only 1 bike) to the station to go into Perth to pick up our camper. We hired a Lucky campervan (the Ryan Air of campervans, as all their vehicles are bought second hand of Juicy Rentals) a 1997 classic Toyota in the shape of a ford Galaxy. The front to seats are normal, but the back seats had been removed into a limo type format, with seats along the windows facing each other, these both had storage units underneath. There was also a wash basin and a gas cooker and also all windows could be covered with curtains. It was an automatic car, which neither of us had driven before so I allowed Nath to drive back to the house. We then stocked up with our clothes and a few bits of food before heading to the supermarket on route. By then it was lunch so we treated ourselves to a Grill'd (healthy burger house, we have wanted to try ever since arriving in Perth).
Finally around lunchtime, we went on our way officially. We drove for around 5 and a half hours, switching driver every 2 hours. Our plan initially was to stop in Geraldton overnight, which is the only major town between Perth and Broome, which says a lot about Western Australia and how huge it is but how small the population is. However when the sun went down it got very dark, which you will think is normal right? But in WA street lights are pretty much only in Perth and the surrounding suburbs, as soon as you head north you drive on one road in the middle of absolutely no where, all there is to see is outback. You can look 360 degrees around and not see one human, building or sign of life, unless you count a few cows, sheep, goats or emu. You can also drive for hours and not see anything and be on the same road, so we had to make sure we had plenty of water, fuel and provisions.
Anyway back to DAY 1, we finally saw a sign for a town called Eneabba, however you definitely couldn't call it a town. We pulled over opposite a fuel station in a caravan park spot with actual toilets yay! We cooked pasta with ham and cheese sauce with salad for dinner before going to bed around 8pm!
DAY 2 started early at 7am, and we had a breakfast bar and a banana before heading on our way. I drove for another 2 and a bit hours (yep on the same road) before finally getting to Geraldton, where we stopped for the toilet and to have sandwiches and a bit of a leg stretch. We also stocked up on fuel and water (as water becomes a shortage the further north you get).
We then had another 9 hours to go before getting to Coral Bay, still all on the same road. However because of a huge amount of rainfall the road we needed to go on to get to Coral Bay and then Exmouth was closed off due to flooding. So we had a decision to make and at this point it was quickly getting dark. We could either drive at night and get to Exmouth in over 3 hours or stay the night and hopefully the road would reopen in the morning. We took the latter option and it seemed like quite a few others had decided to do it too, as there was a campsite just before the said road with toilets. So we pitched up and made a tomato pasta with salad and had a few glasses of Sauv Blanc whilst getting eaten alive by mozzies.
As soon as we went to bed, the rain came and I don't think it stopped all night. I kept dreaming that our camper would get washed away with us in it or we'd wake up in a river.
Thankfully when we woke up at 7am on DAY 3 we were fine but there were a few tents pitched up in the middle of a newly created lake. We really felt for them. After having a breakfast of croissants and marmalade, we waited until some of the professional campers left (who we knew were also heading in the same direction as us) and followed them. The road didn't reopen, as you can probably guess it was still flooded. So we had to go the alternative route and we arrived in Exmouth late morning.
We went straight to the information centre to find out what we could do. We found that you couldn't camp anywhere for free, we had to stay in a campsite. So we booked in Ningaloo Lighthouse campsite. We also booked to go on Ningaloo Whale Shark and Dive tour, which cost a small fortune, but it was definitely one of those once in a lifetime opportunities.
We couldn't check in until two so we headed to a beach near the campsite called Mauritius Beach which we didn't realise was a nudist beach. We had sandwiches for lunch and were the only people there for a while before another couple arrived and they got straight down to business, removing all items of clothing. Nathan and I didn't know where to look but then we thought, 'when in Rome' and copied them. Thankfully they left soon after and we were the only ones there and were miles less embarrassed.
Soon it was time for us to check in to our campsite, we we headed there and gave the camper a good clean and finally we had our first shower in what seemed like forever. I've never felt so clean!
We then had an early dinner of pasta with sausage, zucchini, celery, red onion and white cheese sauce and a salad. We also had a lovely bottle of pink Moscato! Yum! After a few games of rummy we headed to bed with our roof window open so we could see plenty of stars.
DAY 4 was an early start for our Whale Shark tour but I've decided to dedicate an entire post to this. But here is my sunrise picture.
That evening we walked up to the lighthouse in time for sunset and took what seemed like a zillion pictures, plus we saw an emu.
After a dinner of cup a soup and bread we played Casino to which I won!! Then time for bed.
DAY 5, we had a slight lie in (7.30am) before buying some postcards, fueling up and heading south to Coral Bay.
Coral Bay was exactly what it said in the name and probably exactly what you are picturing.
We checked into another campsite which is really frustrating when you are trying to travel cheaply but you have to. However this been the town's main source of income you can't get that annoyed. Plus we got full use of the camp kitchen and showers.
As soon as we had parked up, we booked onto a snorkelling trip with a glass bottomed boat. It was awesome. And because Nath and I have recently purchased a GoPro, it meant we got to do lots of underwater filming. Hopefully I'll be able to post a film at some point when we have the right software. We saw loads of different fish, including some sort of Ray and some people saw a turtle, which we unfortunately didn't.
After a long session of snorkelling, we headed back to the beach where we just chilled for a while. For dinner we cooked a veggie curry (meat is too expensive on our traveller budget so it's veggie all the way) with potato instead of rice with a couple of ciders before heading to bed.
DAY 6, we decided to make use of the eggs we bought ages ago along with the toaster which was onsite and had egg and salami on toast. It was delicious!
We had a long day of driving ahead of us to get to Monkey Mia, our next destination. We were desperately hoping that the road that was previously closed due to flooding would have reopened by now as otherwise it was add a lot of extra time onto of journey. But it would appear that luck was not on our side, as the road was still closed. We drove for the majority of the day and managed to get a picture at the Tropic of Capricorn.
We finally arrived in Monkey Mia around 5.30pm. We failed to find a free rest stop, which meant we had to pay to stay in Monkey Mia's only resort and thank goodness we did because it was beautiful and we arrived just in time to see an incredible sunset (they don't call Western Australia sunset coast for nothing).
We cooked pasta for dinner in the camp kitchen then had another early night.
We woke up to lovely sunrise on DAY 7, we had a quick bowl of Weetabix with UHT milk, which is gross and I'm not having anymore this trip. Cheap is not always best.
Our main reason for coming to Monkey Mia was to see Dolphins (not quite sure why it's got monkey in its name). It is world renowned as a special place where people can experience and enjoy close encounters with dolphins. Certain wild female dolphins are offered small amounts of fish up to three times during the morning and they are only fed under the supervision of Departmeng of Parks and Wildlife officers with feed amounts small so that the dolphins continue to behave and hunt naturally and teach their young to hunt.
It was an incredible experience, having never seen dolphins in the wild before. Unfortunately I didn't manage to get any pictures on my phone. We left soon after to drive to Kalbarri. But we stopped along the way at a lookout point.
We also stopped at Shell Beach, which was insanely amazing. Tons and tons of tiny shells instead of sand.
We arrived in Kalbarri around lunchtime. This is a national park area and is beautiful. We decided not to pay to go fully inside as we plan to visit the Pinnacles another national park in a few days, plus these costs add up. However we did get to drive through bits of it. We stopped by the sea for lunch. Before heading on our way. There were loads of different viewpoints Mushroom Rock, Rainbow Bay and we stopped at one to get pictures of the incredible view. Again I didn't take any pictures on my phone, sorry.
We didn't want to pay for another campsite, so we needed to be somewhere between towns. We drove through Port Gregory, which is definitely the smallest town ever and then through Northampton which is very western like and quite creepy, before stopping on the side of the road just before Geraldton. It was a pretty good stop and we stopped just as the sun was setting. We had veggie burritos for dinner and a glass of Cabernet Merlot.
DAY 8, we woke up before 7am because I was worried where we were parking was illegal and we got another amazing sunrise (I could get used to these). We then drove on to Geraldton which we stocked up on a few bits and went for a lovely walk along the sea front and to the Marina and saw some aboriginal art.
We had half a melon for breakfast before heading on the road again, with our final destination for the day being Jurien Bay.
We got there late morning and pretty much spent the rest of the day walking up and down the beach and me doing a few lunges, squats and sit ups!
Our original plan was to drive to a free rest area, but we ended up staying in the campsite and had a great dinner of spicy sausage pasta.
DAY 9 we woke up early and had a breakfast treat of pancakes with banana (they were on offer). I had a terrible time with making mine, luckily I had Nathan on hand as an expert pancake maker and flipper.
With our bellies nice and full, we headed on our final stretch of our roadtrip. Next stop the Pinnacles in the Nambung National Park.
It was a short drive and we arrived there around 10am. The Pinnacles are basically naturally set in a desert within the national park and there are some theories as to how they got there but there is no definite explanation. Anyway they are pretty awesome.
We walked the 1.5km route around the Pinnacles and then did the 5km drive and by this time Nathan was ready for food.
We drove further North, stopping in Lancelin (a water sports area) for lunch before making an executive decision to head back to Judi and Arthur's instead of staying in the side of the road for the final night, as it was only an hour and a half on.
We had a fantastic trip and managed to do so much more than planned and it gave us a real insight into travelling Australia and some tips for driving the East Coast.
Xoxo
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