Esperance to Lucky Bay

Sunday, January 31, 2010

Eventually sleep came, after much stargazing in which I saw 9 shooting stars, (I still haven’t used up all of those wishes) and I awoke to the sun heating up the tent. Breakfast, great, I am never one who likes to join in with the general public in a lot of things, I disagree with such things as eating cereal in the morning. So naturally it was cereal in the morning, of course it was that’s normal right. I opted for some toast, cooked upon some weird little grill that you put over a flame to heat the toast. I figured out how it worked eventually, and I have used one before, but was too overheated to even question, being in Litchfield.

We said goodbye to Mary and off we went! To Esperance, we were hot whilst driving, but when we got off the bus… I was glad I visited the northern parts of Australia early, as there is no way I would be coping up there when it was too hot for me on the south coast. Most people seemed happy about the ‘good weather’ but I tend to feel that if it burns you, its too hot. It burned, a fair bit, I wasn’t really sunburned as my skin is Afghan, still doesn’t mean I could breathe though. As soon as the bus doors opened everyone spilled out and fled in different directions, suddenly I was alone “What time are we supposed to be where? Oh…” right then, time to do something. I wandered around, got some snacks from the supermarket, some film for my underwater camera and then walked along the beach, using the trees for shade but still sweating like a much larger man. I did find them, right down the other end, where were supposed to meet Lachie they told me, ‘oh good then at least I can find my way accidentally.’

There was a Sea lion. Just lying there. I walked straight past it and didn’t even notice, then after I had my swim in the gloriously cold water the girls asked me if I had seen it “What, there’s a Sea lion, here? Where?” “Over there.” and so there was, lounging around under the jetty, a big blob of a Sea beast chilling in the shade. It looked pretty damn content and I felt a tiny bit guilty about disturbing its sleep when I started taking pictures, but hey when else was I going to get to pose with a Sea lion. “Don’t go near it!” Dammit Lachie could you not have waited 5 seconds to say that! So maybe I wasn’t going to pose with a Sea lion.

We left there and headed to another beach, this one had a billion flies, sorry that’s an understatement. But then at least it wasn’t worse than Uluru, which if anyone cares to visit, take a compact fly killer with you, they may be illegal in Oz but its worth the risk! The beach itself was very pretty, Lucky Bay it was named, after someone who got lucky there, no not in that way, he was fleeing a storm at sea, and was happy to see white sand with blue/green water. Arguably the sand was kind of weird and pretty disgusting, all mushy and soggy in places but beautiful from afar, at least it made good pictures. The water was freezing, I think it must be due to having no landmass between Australia’s south coast and Antarctica as Esperance had cold water too, and so it seems does everywhere along the south coast. But it did the job and refreshment was mine!

Nullarbor!

Thursday, January 28, 2010

So I pretty much got off one bus and onto another. Our tour with the Nullarbor Traveller started early, meaning I had to wake up early, grr, something I have never been a fan of so I was still half asleep when we began our epic journey to Adelaide. When I had finally shuffled my stuff around and got myself onboard we headed off and soon after one of the girls announced that I was pretty lucky being the only guy on board among 9 girls, I must have been tired as I hadn’t noticed. I wasn’t the only guy though; our tour guide Lachie made us 2 vs. 9.

We spent much of the first day driving, stopping at York to eat a quick breakfast then heading to the Wave Rock! Now the Wave Rock is really just another rock, however it just so happens that it formed in the shape of a giant wave. We took a wander in the blistering heat that we had been following east and climbed as far up the wave as we could manage to take pictures. One among our number, Angelica vanished and we wandered over to the bus wondering whether she would make it or perhaps perish in the heat, then thoughts of food and shade took over. She did turn up in the end.

That first night was spent at Mary’s house, a charming lady who cooked us a delightful, meal of pasta with veg. Then off to bed, or rather to the tents, I shared with Nicola, soon to become my new best friend, as my tent had a few issues. She didn’t seem to mind, in fact she recently told me she was really happy I moved in, as she wasn’t keen on being left alone with any spiders, I’m sure the tiger snakes that came out at night weren’t much of a confidence booster either. We talked a fair bit through the night, everyone obviously being able to hear our conversation as we were in tents, and Nic didn’t get the best first impression of me when I told her about my dads family history, which in a nutshell is: banditry, smuggling, a lot of siblings, murders, not so many siblings and then lots of mental illness. Please do note, that is a rough outline of a very complicated family history, not my dad’s personal history, which is very different and only includes the many siblings.

Check out the itinerary Samson followed at Nullarbor Traveller

Cold cold morning

Tuesday, January 26, 2010

Upon waking the cottage was bloody freezing, the last thing I wanted to do was get out from under the lovely warm covers, with the lovely warm Nadege and venture out into the unthawed early world. But I forced myself to move, shivering as I searched for clothes and cringing when I put the icy garments on. I crammed all my stuff into my bags and got ready to leave while Nadege got dressed herself and put the kettle on, I told her she didn’t have to get up for me and she should stay in bed but she told me “No it’s ok, I’m not, I want to see Helen.” All ready, we sat outside with a cup of tea in the fresh morning air while waiting for the bus to turn up and drag me away from the scene. Which it promptly did. Helen and Nadege hugged each other and spoke for a second whilst I dumped my stuff in the trailer and then I had my turn for a goodbye, which I never like doing. We hugged, kissed, said goodbye, and I got on the bus feeling a little embarrassed as they clearly all had a good view and I’m not a fan of having spectators during intimate moments. I don’t mind writing about it.

The last day of the Southern Curl tour was another one full of fun, we went to the valley of the giants, where they have yet more Karri trees to walk among and a skinny little walkway up at the top of the trees which swayed with each step so that it felt like being on a ship, not that many ships ever end up that high above ground. There were trees big enough to stand inside, some big enough for several of us to stand inside, ones you could walk straight through a hole in one side and out a hole in the other, tall trees, skinny trees, fat trees or just plain burnt, there was a lot.

After the trees it was time to hit the beach, we went to one that apparently the tour hadn’t been before, just to check it out. That’s another thing about the Easy Rider, they are perfectly happy to change around the schedule and find a different beach or winery or whatever, unless of course it’s day 1 and you’re a grumpy old man that looks like Benny Hill with a recently broken back and don’t like walking or swimming or caves or anything else that people come to Australia for, and the rest of the group does like it. That’s just being difficult. So anyway we hit the beach and apart from the stupendous amount of flies it was great, nice view and lovely cool water. We spent a while mucking around with the Christmas hat, ate lunch and then took a swim before dribbling back to the bus everyone according to their own schedule.

After that was another tasting at a toffee and ice cream shop, this place had a hay bale with half a cyclist sticking out, sheer genius if you ask me. John the Irishman in our group, who was also extremely loud, always drunk, very sunburned, tubby and talked far too much and in far too much detail about his sexual encounters with what I assume to be chickens but he called ‘birds’; proceeded to pig out and clear out the tasting trays. Amusingly they had a picture of a pig with a red cross through it above the trays, which prompted the statement “Clearly they don’t want you here John" repeatedly by several people. Then we played ring toss outside, a game which I usually suck at yet somehow managed a 3 in a row at which point I declared myself Champion.

The last stop was at another little bit of coast, with more flies, this time of the stinging variety. But it was beautiful so it made up for it, and there were rocks to climb! Climb we did, Burt and myself swimming round one of the rocks and climbing to the top, we weren’t sure whether it was deep enough so I jumped in to test it out, then we jumped off repeatedly, and even managed to convince Fiona and a couple others to jump off too. The end of that day was spent in Albany, where I headed to the YHA there run by a very sweet couple, I don’t actually know if they were a couple but both were very sweet all the same. Here I met Clair again, it really is a small world, and what were the odds of me moving backpackers and finding her there!

Nadege and a giant tree

Sunday, January 24, 2010

The goodbye as usual came with plenty of hugs and the usual feeling of pessimism at leaving behind a new friend or 5, and excitement at the new journey about to unfold. Speaking of which Nadege had given her no to Helen to pass on to me, which made me kinda happy, she had previously not given me her no saying we should just leave it and let fate decide, it seems fate had decided, only I wouldn’t get to see her for long, she had rented a cottage for a few days and I would be sleeping in the same town but only for one night as I had to rush back to Perth for another tour I had booked. Still at least I would get to see her again, which is more than expected when backpacking.

The plan was to head to Pemberton, and take in a few sights along the way. Again we went through the Karri forest and I got another look at the giants, then we headed south and along the coast to view a lighthouse just off the far south west corner. Then it was a lot of driving. I sort of conked out for a bit, got comfy, typed, read, showed off pictures etc. as we cruised along to visit Pemberton and the great Gloucester Tree. The tree is ancient just like the forest surrounding it, and it’s a 60 metre climb which when you reach the top means you can see the forest for miles around, and that just so happens to be the purpose of the platform at the top, used a fireman’s lookout to spot forest fires in the distance.

After hopping up the tree and hopping back down, we went back to the little town and off to the backpackers. We all piled out of the bus and into the office, which I had presumed was the same backpackers that Nadege was staying at, no cigar, the had never heard of her, then it transpired there was another backpackers that also dealt in cottages and it was in the town we just came from. Fiona our guide dropped me back at the other hostel and I found the cottage after much confusion and finally was let in by Nadege. I think what I was feeling was nervous, having only met the girl once before and about to spend the night at her cottage, it was at least a new experience. I said as much to her and she confessed to feeling a little the same, I then announced I was hungry, as I often do when I can think of nothing else to say, in any case it is almost always true.

Nadege didn’t have a lot of food but there was enough to make some pasta sauce, if only we had the pasta. Time for a pasta hunt, surely even in a town this small we can find some pasta, the shops were shut, and there were no small shops. Right then, no pasta, hmm. On the way we talked, about her life and mine, about our plans for the near future and the subject of dance came up, as did past men, for her not me. On the way back to the cottage we went past a café, at which point I figured they gotta have some pasta, it may be an odd request, excuse me can I have some raw pasta, but they gotta have it. Surely! So we went in and asked, “excuse me, do you have any raw pasta?” after an odd look and a moments contemplation, who knows what was going through her head at the time, I’m assuming something to do with madness, she went out the back and got us a packet of raw pasta, success! She charged us exactly what it cost her, wouldn’t hear of it being any more and sent us on our way with loads of pasta and an amused smile.

I learned a fair amount about Nadege, and I guess now I should include a rough description: she is blond, a head shorter than me, wears glasses, was a nurse back home and was taking time off to explore some of the more remote parts of Australia, I love her French accent, and she kissed like a demon, a very sexy demon that is. I wont give you all the details of the evening, my sisters are reading this blog, and so is my mother, however I will say that I cooked up some lovely pasta whilst Nadege looked through my photos, and then we went to bed and watched a film about Monsters and Aliens having a random war, with Reese Witherspoon playing the lead monster.

Margaret River

I wasn’t the only guy who didn’t get much sleep, and that was mostly due to the snorer so I’m pretty blessed having at least a nice reason for being tired. We did a quick pack then headed away to a chocolate factory and a cheese tasting before getting into the town of Margaret River again, this time I got off the bus, along with Helen, Melissa and Burt, leaving only 3 people on the bus. We all stayed until the next Easy Rider tour went by which was in 4 days time, Burt just wanted to surf and avoid the snoring, Helen wanted to check out the town, and Melissa I don’t know, but we was all there, except for me who went just out of town to stay at The Lodge YHA.

My hostel was full of Japanese people, loads of them. When I arrived I met so many I got very confused and forget their names. There was also a mixture of others from France, Italy, Ireland, generally all over the place. I met 2 lovely French girls that remembered me from Perth who I chatted with whilst at the hostel who complimented my cooking, J they were looking for work, which seems to be big in the Margaret River and were staying around there hoping to find something or waiting for the next thing to arrive.

The first day I didn’t do much, went back into town and met up with the others, found out their plans etc. then I think I might have played chess with Helen, at which I lost terribly. The next day I went for a walk down the river with Helen (she’s nice to hang out with), and I talked, a lot. I think I was pretty annoying, although Helen was nice and didn’t hit me over the head with a branch to shut me up. I nattered away like crazy about all my problems and everything else I could think of, not quite sure why today had me feeling so talkative, or perhaps whiney depending on how you look at it, but either way I just couldn’t stop. Helens response was to kindly point out that I was being a bit of a nob, and to tell me to stop worrying and just let it work itself out. I stopped talking for perhaps 3 seconds before carrying on with my tirade. Eventually I shut up, which I’m sure brought Helen much relief, and I went back home to chill out.

At one point when I had no food, Yu (numerous name jokes were made) a Japanese surfer offered to cook for me, he was cooking a curry for a few people and included me in the delectable meal, then afterwards our Italian friend got out the profiteroles! This encounter led me to be involved with a little trip that headed down south. A group of awesome people and myself got in a 4x4 and drove. We headed south and meandered a little, taking smaller more scenic roads, this taking us through the Karri forests, which once entered confused the senses somewhat, I literally thought we had entered a giants world. We had to stop and get out just to wonder at the tall trees, this also led to a stinging fly getting in the car, which resulted in much flailing and attempted fly murder. Moving further into the mighty forest we took a dirt track and went down even more surreal tracks like tunnels through the trees, one of them leading to an off road event, true off-roading.

The road wasn’t even worth calling a road, I’m sure most cliffs are more stable to drive across however the car was a really good one, and it went straight over the boulders with ease, the track leading us to a sandy path. We got out and not expecting much trudged down the path to find the most beautiful scene I have seen in a while, and considering where I’ve been recently that’s saying something. The day was cloudy, and quite dark, yet the water was a striking blue green against the white sand, with not another person in sight and we ran down the little path taking photos and sliding down the sand to reach the beach. If it had been a hotter day we might have swum but as it was we were all wearing 2 layers against the cold and didn’t much fancy hypothermia. However it wasn’t necessary as we were content just to be there and see it. If asked to pinpoint exactly what made it so beautiful I couldn’t say, but we all agreed it was breathtaking and an amazing spot.

We all felt pretty elevated after this and next we headed just down the coast to Hamelin Bay, where there was other people. And apparently stingrays, which we didn’t really expect to see, so were naturally pretty surprised when we noticed a metre wide stingray floating past 2 feet from us. At this astounding sight we all got rather excited and began splashing about looking for more of them, we even touched them, being incredibly docile, to the point where I wouldn’t be surprised if someone had put something in the water. We could actually just stand there as they drifted over to us and glided over our feet. Then a quick climb up the rocks to take in the sun as it went down before heading back to the car and with a feeling like floating we drove back home.

Easy Rider Southern Curl

Friday, January 22, 2010

I hopped on the Easy rider bus to see whom, but Helen looking at me with an amused grin. Hi Helen, don’t mind me I’m just stalking you. We set off and headed south, stopping almost immediately when one of our group got off to stay at the first town we reached. The Easy Rider being a JOJO (Jump on Jump off) tour this was normal but unexpected so soon after getting on the bus.

It wasn’t all fun and games, I had a little argument with one of the other passengers almost right away. I was talking to Helen and we got onto the subject of Heath Care which I knew little about in other countries, however I did know that in England it is abysmal, our government preferring to spend its money on paying an army to kill civilians in other countries than on proper pay for doctors that are overworked and without the needed resources. Anyhow once I announced my views to Helen the man seated in front of me turned around and began to shout, at first I was simply surprised, having no idea why someone was shouting at me. Then when I figured out what he was saying “you have no idea, your not doing anything about it, I’ve been through the war etc.” I slightly switched off realizing he was just a bitter old man wanting to blame someone else’s inactivity for all the suffering he went through. It was almost too much when he said, “have you ever killed anyone?” Strangely no, I haven’t killed anyone yet, its on my to do before 30 list but just haven’t got round to it yet. Perhaps when I do I’ll understand better how the health system and politics work?

After stopping for breakfast we stopped at Busselton to see the famous jetty, which has half fallen down so you cant actually do the mile walk to the end but is still quite impressive, we walked up and then back down and just happened to be standing in the right place to watch the Iron Man competition as it ran by. They looked shattered which doesn’t really surprise me as they had just done something very stupid yet extremely impressive.

Back on the bus and this time off to a beautiful little beach surrounded by trees and a large rock in the distance, we ate lunch, which in my case was a yummy gourmet sandwich and then on with the boardies for a swim, that was when I realized there was a big rock and picture opportunities. I didn’t quite get that far, I started running down the path and noticed that not only was it scorching hot in the sun, but it was also mostly sharp rocks. So slowly burned and quickly hurt. Great I thought and pressed on thinking ‘it cant be that far’ always an obvious sign that it will be a long way when you think that.

Eventually I decided I couldn’t walk back, it being too torturous for my precious feet, the only problem was I had a camera with me, which wouldn’t take too kindly to me swimming. The problem was solved swiftly by Helen appearing on the track headed back towards the picnic area, ‘take this’ I said handing the camera to her as I continued my odd hopping form of travel past and on to the rock. I made it but I didn’t have my camera. So it was time to swim back, having wasted my time getting here I resolved to at least enjoy the swim. Into the cold water I waded and my god it was gorgeous, the day was ridiculously hot and finally I was cooling down in clear, cold, wonderful water! The swim took a little while but eventually I made it back to the group, dripping and feeling rather exhilarated.

Our next stop was the Ngilgi caves where we stumbled about in the dark and at one point I got to crawl through an odd little claustrophobia-inducing tunnel. It was filled with odd sediments that shined funny colours when you put a torch to them, stalactites and stalagmites which I still get confused about, and some little caves inside the bigger caves, apparently some Englishman spent 3 days exploring them soon after the British occupation. Now you can do some of the tougher explorations in a day, all of it spent crawling.

Probably the most scenic part of the day was the next place we visited, a natural rock formation that created a channel for the tide. It was awesome to see the waves come in and I was quite tempted to jump in the water, only the roughness of it and my tendency to enjoy danger a little too much stopped me. We clambered over some boulders to reach an ideal viewing spot, then sat down and watched the waves roll in. After this we went to a winery.

Our final stop was the end of the Margaret river, divided from the sea by about 2 meters of sand. Where a dog was having fun running headlong into waves, it seemed that he was trying to rescue surfers or something, and some dude was doing pushups on the rocks, then switching to a different rock and repeating. The weird things you see.

After our fun packed and entertaining day we headed back up to dunsborough for the night, our backpackers was the YHA there, right on the beach which being a bay had almost completely still water, wrong direction for sunset though. It turned out they were doing a Barbie, of which I believe I had 2 steaks, 2 sausages and 2 burgers amongst a bit of potato salad and pasta etc. so I certainly got my moneys worth, well I say my money, I had to borrow it off Helen so really it was her money. Either way the food was great and I chatted away to my new group and met a friend of Helen, a Swiss lady like Helen, called Nadege, although she spoke French and Helen spoke German, or rather the Swiss variety.

Everyone went to bed but I just wasn’t feeling tired, and I really felt like a cup of fruity tea, naturally I didn’t have any, but I saw Nadege was up as well so figured I’d go talk to her. She then got up and made tea, fruit tea, I love moments like that; when you want something and you randomly get it in a way you weren’t expecting. We sat on the sofa and talked away about jobs and such like, and eventually started kissing. In a backpackers you don’t get much privacy, there was a football game going on in the next room with ‘intellectual men’ yelling at the TV. We stayed there for long enough to decide that we weren’t going to get any privacy, and then I went to bed. I lay down and decided I wasn’t tired. I got up again. Nadege was outside listening to her iPod, so I snuck up sat behind her and hugged her, figured it was nicer than shouting boo. We sat there for a while, listening to her music, and then we got up and danced. I attempted to remember and teach her how to tango, not very successful but it was fun all the same, and I bet we looked very odd to whoever was watching that couldn’t hear the music. Eventually I did go to bed and I tried to fall asleep despite the old guy who I argued with who was still snoring at a rather antisocial level, really you should get your own room if your going to stop other people from sleeping.

Back to base

Tuesday, January 19, 2010

Starting the journey back to Perth at 3 was tough, and what was worse I didn’t manage to sleep until over half way there. I was slightly annoyed that I couldn’t go any higher seeing as I would be missing lots but then you never get to see everything eh. So off I headed on a painful journey, which was made much nicer by the fact that Clair and Helen got on when we went past Kalbarri.

Back in Perth I made a new friend, apart from a French girl who worked there and a Dutch girl I talked with once at lunch, I had spoken little with the other inhabitants in Perth City YHA. Coming back I met Natacha, a pretty French lady (I hope you have noticed a pattern arising here, how most of the people I meet seem to be pretty women… I only notice when I write about it after, seems normal to me at the time.) who I hung out with during my brief rest back in Perth before the next leg. We ate together, watched films together, went for walks together and got lost and pissed off in the heat together. Whilst searching for wildlife on Heirrison Island we walked left thinking it looked more promising. Well we kept looking on the left side for quite a while, but guess what, we found only ducks. It was hot so our search was slightly more difficult than one might imagine, and eventually I did figure out that we simply on the wrong side of the island.

Whilst we wandered over the over side I discovered that Natacha was ticklish, and she discovered my age, we both asked each other and then both said guess. So she guessed all the usuals, 24? No. 25? No. 26?! “I’m 20.” “No… your not 20, you cant be!” Why exactly I couldn’t be 20 I wasn’t quite sure, then of course it was my turn, 26? No. 27? No. 28? No. “alright then 38?” “NO!” complete with slap. “I’m 29.” Then I noticed a gate, looking remarkably like that of an enclosure for animals maybe. “That’s it!” I announced and steered us towards it. Inside we did indeed meet some kangaroos, and cleverly I had not taken a camera with me, otherwise I would upload some amusing pictures of me shaking hands with a Roo.

Shark Bay

Thursday, January 14, 2010

I said my goodbyes and Anna dropped me off at the bus stop to wait for my journey up to Monkey Mia which would only be for one day, crazy aren’t I. Turns out the bus only went to Monkey Mia 2 times a week, so I had to book it on the one which just so happened to be at 3 in the morning leaving the next day, so it meant I had one full day to enjoy the place, what else d’ya need.

I got to Monkey Mia pretty late, it was about 10 and when I got there I found a room with no free beds, however I had been left with a key and the office was shut due to the time, eventually I figured out that there was a free bed it just didn’t have any clean linen, great! Judging by most males I didn’t relish the thought of someone else’s leftovers. Eventually I found a staff member at the bar who got me some sheets and apologised etc. sheets are all I needed but thank you for the concern. So I headed back to make my bed. I entered my room to find a girl sitting on the bed below mine, hmm have they put me in the wrong room? Looking at the girl with her dishevelled hair and cute smile I figured it was a pretty lucky mistake if they had.

She introduced herself as Katrina from Sweden who was travelling with her 2 friends 1 Swedish, 1 Aussie. She also said I would be rudely awakened by their birthday celebrations. I said I didn’t mind as I was only here for a bit and wanted to get the most out of the day, and eventually I got into bed, my bed that is. True to her word in the morning I heard happy birthday being sung in Swedish. Time to rise and shine.

The first thing to do was witness the dolphin feeding! So we wandered over to the beach and waited for something to happen. There were a bunch of volunteers and a woman running it who announced it was something they had been doing every day for years, don’t touch the dolphins, stand ankle deep in water etc. etc. then it was time to feed. Celeste, who was the Aussie and also whose birthday it was got picked, the girls had spoken to the volunteers earlier and arranged it. Naturally she was uber excited at getting to hand feed a dolphin some slimy fish. We all watched in wonder as the dolphins crowded around and swam around the volunteer’s legs like cats waiting to be petted. They would swim right up some of them messing about in the deeper water and some right in the shallows in about a foot of water somehow still able to swim. There was even a pregnant dolphin that swam up and rolled onto her side to show us her belly!

I realised that this day was the first of December. Yes I am aware of how delayed that makes this blog, however writing and travelling at the same time is tougher than one would think. So anyways, if it was December, it was no longer November, or more importantly the end of Movember and finally I could stop looking like a 70’s porn star and start looking like me again, oh joy of joys! I took my time shaving, savouring every moment of it, and emerged looking clean and just like a modern man.

Later we went for a walk, the girls didn’t object to me hanging about with them for the day so I did. We walked the nearby track, which took in some nice views and a few birds, we saw a goanna and then continued onto the beach where I encountered some camels. Annoying when I tried to take some pictures of the camels the man running the camel ride told me to stop and pointed out that there were children riding therefore I couldn’t take photos. My god has the world sunk so far, that I cannot take a photo of a camel without someone thinking I’m a paedophile!

After lunch we hired some Kayaks and naturally I being the one who was tagging along also made them wait for ages whilst I was on the phone attempting to book my greyhound ticket, which was a bloody nightmare! Eventually I got to the boats and much to my surprise didn’t receive a kick for taking so long. They were 2-person sea Kayak’s and I was in with the lovely Katrina, who kept splashing me with her paddle. It took ages to get anywhere and when we did there was not a lot to see, or so we thought. Sitting there battling the wind and wondering if anything was out there we noticed a moving rock, we gave chase (slowly) and discovered it was a moving dolphin shaped rock, which then swam underneath us! I got pretty excited by this, after all it isn’t everyday a dolphin shaped rock swims underneath you when you’re kayaking!

After the excitement of dolphin rocks we spent the rest of the day and that evening chilling out and doing not very much, sitting on the beach, the girls got some champagne. I didn’t drink a lot, mainly because I don’t usually drink a lot but the girls did, it being Celeste’s birthday she obviously got bought a ton of drinks by a crowd of people that seemed to me to have appeared out of nowhere and proceeded to get very drunk. Although I didn’t drink I did stay up, my bus leaving at 3 in the morning meant there wasn’t much point in me using my bed, so I enjoyed the birthday drunkenness, and chatted to Katrina who was nowhere near as drunk as the others and therefore capable of coherent conversation, unfortunately wasted on me when I started talking about how I might be half werewolf. It was full moon though, made sense to me at the time.

Kalbarri

Wednesday, January 13, 2010

I eventually discovered the Bus Pass I possessed was in fact valid for more than I had been told about and I wanted to see the west coast a little better, so North I headed. My first stop was Kalbarri, a little town with a striking coastline and a lot of birds. On my bus ride up a guy offered me some weed, which amused me, and he also mentioned that Kalbarri was full of hot birds! It didn’t quite seem to be the case when I arrived but then maybe he meant the wildlife. However it was full of great people.

Straight away I was invited to go with the shuttle driver Anna to some cliffs the next night to view the sunset, naturally I agreed and then got treated to a view of Kalbarri from the distance. With the sun low in the sky and the sea in the distance, you could see the River and Gorge twist towards the little town and settle just before it. Beautiful little place and Anna chatted away as we drove, telling me about the town and backpackers she had met there, including 2 who would be coming with us for the sunset. Eventually she dropped me off at Kalbarri Backpackers YHA and I attempted to find some food. This search was rather fruitless ending in only a tin of chilli beef.

I woke up and went shopping; I needed some real food as the tin of chilli had made my insides a little uncomfortable. Whilst in the supermarket I experienced an odd thing with the meat, I picked up a packet of steak and then feeling something wet and slimy immediately put it down to see that my fingers were covered in blood which had been leaking out of the package, great I thought and asked for a toilet or somewhere I could wash the blood off my hands, they didn’t have one, instead they gave me some paper towel and I noticed as they did, a sink behind the counter, nowhere I can wash my hands, huh. And on the way back from the shopping mall I was attacked by a bird; it swooped down and clipped my head as it flew over me, before landing nearby and acting as if it was totally innocent, I didn’t take my revenge as I was laden with shopping and really couldn’t be bothered.

I met Helen and Clare 2 charming ladies who also came along for the sunset and off we went to the cliffs, which are by the way pretty damn awesome! As soon as I got there I realised that they weren’t just straight drops, and therefore I could run down and maybe do a little climbing, so off I went bounding over rocks and having a great time. Done with climbing I sat down and chatted with Clare about books while we waited for the sun to descend when suddenly someone shouted Whale! Out in the water the only thing we could see was blue… but after staring at it for long enough there was a slightly different splash of water, whale? We kept looking and nothing happened, so we persevered and eventually there was a similar splash elsewhere, had it moved? So we kept staring and finally it paid off, there in the water a slight black shadow transformed into a little patch of black above the water. We had seen a whale! And we were proud. Then it was time for the sunset, which naturally was gorgeous, the colour growing more intense as the sun got lower, creating this great blue sea/red cliff contrast.

Lucky me got invited along on a little day trip by Helen and Liga. Liga drove I mapread and off we went heading south, our first stop was a pink lake, we assumed it was either just named the pink lake because someone was bad at names or maybe in a certain light it could look pink. Nope, this was just plain Barbie doll pink! The whole lot of it a huge pink mass of water, or least we presumed it was water. I suggested swimming but the girls didn’t fancy it.

After our pink experience we went to the beach nearby and discovered some stairs buried under the sand, walking up them was harder than normal when your feet sunk at least a foot before reaching the actual step. The water at the beach was beautiful, pristine clear water with shoals of fish swimming about and tons of boats, all in what looked like a natural harbour, with no way out. It made you wonder how exactly they all got there, did they come in at an extraordinary high tide and get stuck, or were they built there before the builders realised they couldn’t actually go anywhere with their new boats.

Then we visited an old convict town with only 3 gravestones, odd place. Someone still lived there as well, and we found a miniature arm, that explained what happened to the rest of the inhabitants at least. We spoke to the owner of the remaining house and checked out the mill before heading back to Kalbarri, listening to ‘The Saint’ soundtrack on the way back which was a bit surreal, I also found out some of my music was Lithuanian when Liga recognised it, not quite sure how that got onto my iPod… oh we also stopped at some of the cliff lookouts on the way back, saw dolphins sleeping and some very dramatic rocks!

For the rest of my stay in Kalbarri I swam, chilled out, met lots of lovely people and chatted to Clair and Helen a lot. On my last day before heading up to Monkey Mia I visited the Pelican feeding. It was hilarious, firstly the pelicans themselves who just look so funny but then the way the seagulls would hover above us and steal fish and attack people. When I tried to feed my Pelican a gull swooped down and snatched the fish out of my hand so I had to get another and try again, and when feeding the big birds they would run forward in a sort of charge to grab the fish and then walk away happy. One of the more comical events I have witnessed during my trip so far.

Perth

Monday, January 4, 2010

Perth took a while longer to get to than I thought it would. By this I mean I had been in the middle of nothing and then suddenly there was buildings and vegetation, were here! Here unfortunately was about 2 hours away from Perth, I was so shocked to see civilization that I immediately presumed it must be the city, also this tends to be the way with a lot of places in Australia. However perth is where most of the Western Australians live, I think the stat. is 99%, so I was only on the outskirts of the city, the real city being another 2 hours away.

When I got there I was a little confused about how to get from there, which was still not the city centre, into the city centre and to my hostel, Perth City YHA. Eventually a nice couple who ran another backpackers gave me a lift because they had a free car and could see I was a little confused by the layout. They dropped me off and I ventured inside my new home, the staff made me welcome and off I went to my room to collapse, on the train I did little sleeping. I chilled out for a bit eating and sleeping and then I met Angela, the beautiful Canadian put in charge of me whilst I was in the west. She got me on to a wine tour with the Pink Bus and I was off seeing more wineries and resting less!

This tour focused more on the alcohol, starting with dessert wines at the first stop, these we drank in awesome little glasses that looked like headless cats! I want one. However I didn’t think it would last my journey so I opted to not waste my money. Then we visited more wineries and tasted cheese (which I was the designated guard of) and chocolate! When lunch came it was a very different affair to last time, instead of lots of kangaroo this time 3 large platters were brought out laden with cheese, bread, beetroot jam, olives, asparagus, salad and dukkah a spice mix that is eaten by dipping bread first into olive oil then into the spices. It was a new experience for me and rather a tasty one, I loved the bread and cheese, which went beautifully with the beetroot and the dukkah was weird but delicious. After our summer lunch we went to a brewery to taste some ales and outside they had a tree which had fallen down, yet refused to let that stop it and was continuing to grow along the ground… a very weird sight as parts of the trunk were buried, a sideways tree! The end of the tour was nigh and I merrily tottered back to my room to have a little nap before dinner.

Then I visited Rottnest, a very pretty little island where I got on a bike and along with an English couple rode around the island which was windy as hell and attempted to find a good swimming spot where it wasn’t really windy. The island is very picturesque and had a lot more people on it than I expected. We started in the little port, and then rode anticlockwise around seeing various lovely beaches and eventually we split up agreeing to meet later. They went straight to a beach they wanted to snorkel on and I having no snorkel rode all the way to the far west of the island against the wind and cursing the whole way! Coming back was heaven, actually having the wind behind me and no longer in my face was utter bliss so the ride back to the port along the north side of the island flew by. We met back at the ferry it having took me so long to reach the western tip and it turned out they didn’t go snorkeling after all.

Perth is a pretty city, I liked the architecture and the way it was split by a huge river, like London’s Thames but bigger. I visited the famous Kings Park however I took perhaps an unorthodox route, I got on a bus and said “Do you go to Kings Park?” the bus driver answering with an affirmative I got on and sat down, we drove away from the city and eventually he dropped me off on a street saying “Its just down there mate!” so I walked ‘down there’ and soon found not a lot. I asked a painter and he grumpily told me it was ‘down there’ as well. It turns out it was ‘down there’ only I had failed to specify which part of Kings Park, after walking for a few hours I found out that I was walking further in but nothing seemed that amazing and I was quite confused, having been told that it was quite amazing. Eventually when I was almost asleep and heading back to my hostel I stumbled upon the botanical gardens, which were very amazing and I had a brilliant view of Perth but I was annoyed and sleepy that I didn’t fully appreciate it at this point.

Stayed: Perth City YHA

Kalgoorlie, Gold Rush!

Friday, January 1, 2010

Kalgoorlie was just a name on a map between me and Perth and I figured I should check it out, so really I knew nothing about the place. And so I found out. It has the biggest open gold mine. Unless perhaps some aliens in another galaxy far away have gold and have figured out how to mine it efficiently, Kalgoorlies gold mine, is the biggest open pit. It spans 3 kms, which is quite large, and the tiny little trucks you can see in the distance are actually quite a bit larger than their wheels, which are taller than me. All in all the general size of the place is quite excessive. It also produces a fair bit, billions of pounds of gold come out of it, just one gold bar is worth something in the region of $800,000 and they get a lot of gold bars out of that pit each day. Obviously its slightly more complicated than just digging it out, the process involves lots of chemicals and melting and destruction and blah blah blah, as one person there put it “they are raping the planet.” But hey at least they’re rich, and lots of people have jobs because of it, not to say I agree with ripping a great big hole in the earth.

The other thing that makes Kalgoorlie famous is its prostitutes, sorry guys I don’t have any more information on that subject as it’s not really my thing, I just know there are 3 brothels on the backpacker street alone which you have to walk past just to get there, and some amusing paving slabs dedicated to madams and kindly patrons. The crowd at the backpackers was at first slightly odd, the first night I was there I could hear a man screaming from down the hall. However after this night of apprehension I realised that not only was it a backpackers filled with very friendly people, they all had a story to tell, most of them interesting. In fact it was probably the friendliest crowd I had met so far, a mix of various groups, 1 African man, lots of Europeans, a Korean and a few Aussies. In my room was a Pom and an ex Pom, the Latter being a lovely old fellow who chatted about his life and travels, being originally from England then moving to New Zealand and then travelling Australia.

The Brit was called Bret, and he was on a mission for medicine. Searching for a cure for cancer, supposedly in one of the bush flowers that grew in the region. He had tattooed arms, liked his beer and also his books about spiritual enlightenment, and he was searching for a cure for cancer in a town famous for Prostitutes and Gold. Brilliant! Naturally he was a very likeable and intelligent chap and although I have just made him sound a little silly, I didn’t actually find him to be ridiculous at all, a true adventurer and a fine fellow.

The African was from Zimbabwe, and he had only one arm, the other being lost in an accident that netted him a much better job and a fair bit of compensation. He talked a lot about god and the bible, and told me much about his life, which wasn’t the easiest from what I gather, he also made Freddie a bit uncomfortable (I believe Fred was the name of the Old Ex Pom) with all his bible talk, saying things such as it wrong for someone to be buried without a bible and so on. This being disputed by the Jewish Fred and myself simply not belonging to any religion, and it created a slightly tense atmosphere. He was a sweet guy but had seen little more than Zimbabwe and seemed to believe that none other than Christianity Prevailed all over the Globe, a point of view I thought solely confined to Redneck Americans however I was wrong. He automatically presumed that myself and Fred were Christian, and after we had both said we weren’t and Fred had had enough and gone to bed, he proceeded to proclaim me a true Christian, repeatedly.

One morning I met a Korean girl, named jenny, with enough excitement to fill a whole football stadium. Truly it was something to behold. Now I know people joke about how excited Asian people get and often I see it when there is a large crowd of Asian tourists all going nuts over something I cant see and don’t care about, however this really did take the prize for excitability. We went out for the day, driven around by an Aussie called Chris and every time we suggested something or agreed to be a part of something she would jump up and down and say “Really?! Really?!!!, So COOL!!” it was hilarious and I think a little overwhelming for Chris who seemed to want to know where the off switch was, personally I thought it was just brilliant as I know full well I don’t have the capacity to be excited like that, even if every girl I have ever fancied was naked in front of me I still could not top the excitement that an old battered piece of machinery for gold smelting created for Jenny.

And last but not least; there was a guy named Rupert Murdoch. A name, which I think is just fantastic. Rupert had a limp, was from Austria originally and had been in Australia for 8 years, and everyone called him Doc. The limp was the result of a little fall and a big break. As he was such a nice guy I offered him a bit of Reiki to help speed up the repair or maybe just ease the pain, which he declined until half an hour before I left as he had nothing to offer in return but then he found a book, the Celestine Prophesy, and I do love books, especially those of a Celestial Nature. So I sat there with my hand on his leg wondering if anything was happening… and after a while I realised I was late for the Indian Pacific, “bugger I gotta go” I said and ran to get all my things together before being presented a very worn and bent book and fleeing. I was however very surprised to hear Rupert say “**** me, it doesn’t hurt. That’s awesome.” As he walked off to get the book. It was time to leave again, and I was as usual annoyed at leaving, having met loads of funny and great people. Also I had only just heard Rupert and wanted to ask him about it, having no idea really if the Reiki had done a thing, but figured missing the train could be a bit of a bother so off I trotted, turned out I was early…

Never did find out who was screaming.

Stayed: Golddust Backpackers YHA

Travelled with: Great Southern Rail