Perth

Compose

 Well our long stay at Perth was very busy. Thank you to Joy (Sue's mum) for putting us up for so long. I'm sure Joy is now enjoying a quite house, the boys did enjoy seeing you again and looking  forward to seeing you more often when you move to Melbourne. As seen above we visited the picturesque Kings Park on a lovely Perth day. Great views and also a great bbq area which we all enjoyed.

 We also visited the Perth Zoo, for the boys nature and animal fix. We were lucky to follow one of the elephants on their daily stroll around the zoo.  We had a great day and all the boys really enjoyed the orangatangs, gibbons and the sun bears plus all the usual tigers, giraffes and lions.

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 We also visited adventure world for the day. On a lovely 30 degree day we played on the bumper boats, many rides such as the pirate ship (my least favourite), go carts, water play area and many and varied water slides. The kids and adults were all pretty tired by the days end. The boys favourite was the go carts and the bumper boats. (see above)

We were lucky enough to have the Endeavour replica return to Fremantle for the first time in 10 years from Sydney. We had a one hour tour that we all really enjoyed. It was a tiny ship considering the 100 plus crew and live animals on board during its travels. The ship lacked head room for Sue and I which I thought just accounted for the smaller statured people in those days.We were amazed to hear from the guides that Captain Cook was 6 foot 2 tall whilst Charles Darwin was 6 foot 4. This would have made their stay on the ship extremely challenging. Benjamin had a  very funny question for one of the guides it was, "Is this captain Hooks ship"?  Priceless!!!!!

 Sue joined the 40's club whilst at Perth. She requested lasagne ( Sue's dads receipe) and garlic bread and Joy chose a beautiful black forest cake. Liam was very helpful with blowing out Sue's candles. Sue had selected a few presents for herself during her travels and we served breakfast in bed for her. She also requested a cooked brunch of bacon and eggs which we had not eaten on our holidays.

 We also visited Rottnest Island a couple of days after an American tourist was taken by a shark whilst swimming near the island. Luckily it was not swimming weather when we visited. Prior to this shark attack WA had 2 other shark fatalities all in a space of three months. Rottnest was very beautiful and the ferry ride was very calm, no sea sickness. Maybe sea sickness is like the common cold once you get it you are immune for 2 years. I'll wait and see. The boys also enjoyed meeting the quokkas which are unique to the island. They spent at least 30 minutes picking berries and feeding the adults and babies.

 The boys and I went fishing in the Swan River after I spent many hours on google trying to find the best fishing spot. We caught over 30 fish but they were all puffer fish. Maybe the recent shark attacks had scarred the whiting and flathead away. Nontheless the boys had a ball catching the puffa's, Benjamin is now proficent in casting his line and reeling a fish in. Originally he wasn't too fussed about fishing but with his big brothers encouragement he is quickly catching the bug.

After a long and enjoyable stay we left Sue's mum's house and headed for Busselton.

 G'day once again, it has been a while since we have updated you with our travels. We are currently in Perth in our second week of three at Sue's mums place. We are still enjoying our holiday but it does feel like we are home and enjoying some short lived creature comforts. We are also taking the opportunity to fix all the little issues that have occurred with our car and camper trailer. The car needs a service and a replacement part for the LPG system and a new poly air bag, whilst the camper trailer canvas cover needs 20 cm added onto it and a new zip. We are sending two suitcases, (unwanted suitcases of sue's mum) back to Melbourne as we packed too many clothes. This will help as I wont have to pack the car and trailer to the max. Finally we are helping Sue's mum with odd jobs around the house which will assist her when she plans to sell up and move close to us in Melbourne. We have completed a backyard blitz and all of us have scratches from tackling those thorny boganvillea (probably not spelt right) branches. We have been kept very busy and are planning to do lots of touristy things as well.

I think we last left you all at Coral Bay. Above and below are some pics from Coral Bay, beautiful, snorkeling was almost as good as Exmouth. As you can see below the water was prestine and made viewing coral and fish perfect.

                                                                         Coral Bay 

                                                                       Coral Bay                                                                                                
Once leaving Coral Bay we headed to Monkey Mia. We had received mixed reviews about Monkey Mia so we were keen to find out for ourselves. We stayed at the resort but still tenting it, we were lucky to just beat the WA school holidays and as a result it was quiet and very relaxing. Only a few overseas tourists.  It was a very picturesque campsite including a flowering bouganvillea, which sheilded us from the wind.

 We decided to take a tour on a catamaran yacht  to see dolphins, turtles and dugongs. I was a bit scepticle of  the later as I thought dugongs were very rare. We were treated to so many dugongs the boys got bored of them, we saw a turtle and were lucky to come across a pod of dolphins fishing. Sailing on the catamaran was peaceful and relaxing and we could walk around it to get the best view of the marine life. We really enjoyed it and we  went on another sail on the same yacht the next day for a sunset cruise which was complimentary and this was also great. Oh by the way no sea sickness and as you can see the ocean was almost like a mirror. The cruise operators actually advertised that they would pay any person who got sea sick on the yacht a $100. That was music to our ears.

                                                                            See no sick bags here!!!!!!!!

                                            Benjamin couldn't work out what all the fuss was about boats and sea sickness, he thought the sailing was very relaxing.

                                              A view from the boat of the coastline

 We attended two dolphin feedings during our stay. The first was an early morning one with about 200 people and the second had about 45 people.  Both times there were lots of dolphins but only a couple that they could feed due to not over feeding the regular ones.   Liam was lucky enough to be chosen to to feed one of the dolphins during the 2nd feeding session we attended. A highlight for Liam.

                          Liam feeding a dolphin called Nicki, named due to a mark on her fin.

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                                                    The three boys on our sunset cruise.

  We loved Monkey Mia and it was a pity we couldn't stay one or two days longer as the fishing was said to be great and there were a few things that we didn't get to explore. We stayed for 3 nights but we can't see everything even when you have 6 months. We did notice that the nights were getting colder and we broke out the jumpers at various times, something that we were not used to.

We left Monkey Mia for Kalbarri. Kalbarri is famous for its wild flowers, national park, fishing and coastal cliffs. Unfortunately rain stopped us from enjoying Kalbarri for about 3 days but we planned to stay a week, so it only caused some minor problems. Below is a better shot of our home away from home. On Saturday we enjoyed a pie and sauce and watched the AFL grand final. Luckily there was a TV in the camp kitchen. We had discussed going fishing all day as we didn't want to watch Collingwood win another grand final. Luckily we made the right choice and enjoyed the cats victory.

With so much rain we decided to go to the Kalbarri outdoor cinema which does have an undercover section. There were two men and a dog and unlike Broome when we also went to an outdoor cinema this time the boys brought their sleeping bags rather than their shorts, t-shirts and thongs. We all watched Transformers 3 not a bad movie.

 As the weather began to fine up we visited the Kalbarri National Park known for its gorges and red rock. The pics speak for themselves.

                                                   Natures Window a great view.

 We went on a 3 hour walk and were treated to some great views and saw plenty of colourful wild flowers. They said that this year is a 1 in 10 for viewing the wild flowers due to high level of rainfall.


The next day we hired a boat and motored along the Murchinson River. Liam, Jake and I went fishing in the morning. Plenty of bites and Jake reeled in one small fish which made its way home. Then we picked up Sue and Benjamin and took a scenic ride up the river. The wind picked up and we had lunch in a protected bank from the wind.

 The boys loved the trip and all got a turn of driving the boat. Unfortunately the river was very low at points and Liam, Jake and I had to get out and push the boat over the sand bars, a great work out but not much else.

 Liam and Jake become great sailors and were excellent when coming ashore as they jumped out in front, making sure the boat stayed put and securing the anchor.

 The coastal cliffs were very good- much the same as in Victoria along the Great Ocean Road. Unfortunately the fishing was not great due to the weather and high tide. I did go rock fishing by myself one morning and caught a coral trout which was thrown back, it was probably just on the limit to take home but our freezer was still half full from our Coral Bay catch. I was glad that the boys did not come along, rock fishing in Kalbarri is not for the faint hearted. There are warnings and plaques scattered along the beach noting fishermen who have died whilst doing so. I spent more time watching the waves than my line.

With our Kalbarri leg finished we headed for Perth, looking forward to a hard roof over our head and an oven so we could cook pizza's and roasts and of course to see Grandma Joy. On our way we visited the Pink lake. No, it has not been photo shopped it is pink from the natural occurring beta kerrotine. It looked like something out of Charlie and the chocolate factory movie, except it did not taste like strawberries. The photo doesn't show how pink it really was.

 We also visited the Pinnacles. These are said to have occurred from sand forming shapes from dying fossilized trees millions of years ago. I was surprised how large an area they covered and they looked quite magnificent.

The first week in Perth has been a mixed bag as far as the weather goes. Some cold and hot weather, we have enjoyed a day at the beach and the beautiful Kings Park. Rottnest Island , Adventure World (water park) and the Perth Zoo are also on our list.

It's amazing to think we are over half way on our trip we have viewed our video camera footage and it seems so long ago we were swimming with the croc at Berri Springs. It's been an absolute adventure and we are ready for more. Liam informed us about a couple of days ago that we had clicked over 100 days on the road. Amazing it goes so quick lots of good memories and lots of k's. We have been very lucky with the weather out of these 100 days it has only rained on us 5 days. Only in Kalbarri did it stop us from doing what we wanted, so we can't complain.

Speak to you all soon.

Note from Sue: You might notice from the photos that Steve is looking slimmer than usual. All the physical work involved in putting the camper trailer up and down, the bush walks and the Herbalife shakes have made Steve 5 kgs lighter. He didn't realise until we got to Perth and weighed himself. He's now the lightest he's been in about 15 years and very pleased with himself! We are reminded about it whenever Steve wants to eat something unhealthy.

Exmouth and Coral Bay

 After all the fishing and snorkeling we thought we might do some bush walking at Mandu Mandu Gorge.  It was a great walk with some great views. Mountain goat country but it was a good change.

 Fishing at Cape Range National park was pretty good. Unfortunately the wind was pretty strong on a couple of days. But on one morning a neighbour at the campsite Darryl and myself went fishing. Just by luck we met Darryl, Dianne and their son Tim at Cooper Pedy and Uluru. Dianne and Sue work at the same Hospital and we kept in touch with them during our travels. They heard about the Mesa campsite with its shade and good tree coverage from the wind and we both organised to get a site next to each other. Anyway both Darryl and I caught plenty of fish but kept two. This fish I caught and it put up a good fight was a big eye Trevally. It doesn't look that big but it was somewhere between 50 and 55 cm's. We all ate it for dinner that night and it tasted great so with three hungry boys and Sue and I it was a decent size. So I thought, until we got to Coral Bay.

 Once leaving Exmouth we arrived at Coral Bay, which is about 200 km's south of Exmouth. Like Exmouth, Coral Bay is known for it's snorkeling and fishing. It has a pretty little cove which is sanctuary zoned which you can snorkle in and they also have fish feeding at 3.30 p.m. every day. Big fish called Spangled Emporers come in, in droves and you can hand feed them. They are said to be excellent eating but the boys and I knew we had to be patient as we had booked a fishing charter a couple of days later. Sue and Benjamin had booked on the same day a coral reef cruise as they are not as much into fishing and Benjamin has not been able to snorkle out in the deep as the rest of us have. So we were all excited. We also visited a part of the cove which baby reef sharks live in before they venture out into the big open sea. The reef sharks are almost harmless but none of us were going to enter the water. We saw many baby reef sharks in the shallows.

The next day Sue and Benjamin went on their cruise and they saw some fantastic colourful fish and coral. Benjamin announced that his favourite fish was the colourful parrot fish and Sue was impressed with the coral and with some areas of coral named Lavender Patch and Ayers Rock (you can guess what they looked like). Sue and the boys and I plan to snorkle over this area in the days to come. Sue used the video camera to record some of this action so unfortunately I haven't worked out how to download small parts of our video footage to the blog as yet.

Liam, Jake and I were picked up at 7 am from our caravan park by the fishing charter bus. There were about  12 people in total. As we left the pier in this big boat the last thing I thought of was sea sickness, as it was so calm and little wind was blowing. That all changed as we motored over the reef and into the ocean. Liam said he had a sore stomach and I knew what that meant, I then started getting the sweats. The boat was rocking from side to side and the trip out to the deep reef where we were to fish was to take an hour and a half. I tried to ignore sea sickness but finally was overcome with a need to vomit. As I got up to vomit over the side of the boat trying not to spray people in the process, the boat took one of its violent rocks. I landed face first on the boats deck and picked myself up with some assistance and sat in a place trying to get as much fresh sea air as possible. I probably spent 1 hour trying to focus on the horizon, but there is no place that can help you when you have sea sickness. After an hour Liam succumed to the sea sickness. Both of us sat next to each other feeling rather bloody awful. As we stopped at the fishing spot Jake joined us and said he was not feeling well. This fishing trip was beginning to be a nightmare as we were going to return to shore at about 4p.m and it was about 8.30 am. After vomiting I felt a bit better and Jake and I started fishing. We caught two fish and all the time I was trying to not vomit. Jake was past the worst of his seas sickness whilst Liam was just reaching the peak of his, vomting a couple of times. It must have been scary for the fish coming up as I dragged them up from about 100 meters in depth and they arrive out of the water with a big hook in their mouth and an 11 year old vomiting near them. It's good to laugh about it now but it was rather nasty at the time. Anyway at about 10.30 am,  I had one more vomit and started to beat the effects off, Jake was back to normal and Liam soldiered on. We fished at about another 4 or 5 spots and we  caught some great fish. Goldband snapper, Tomato cod, honeycomb cod, and a Robinsons seabream. The biggest being the Goldband snapper which we caught 4, all of them exceeding 80 cm's with the biggest being around 90 cm's. Liam hauled this in which is a testiment to his courage under much duress. Jake was reeling in a lot of catches as some of the crew gave him a turn of there rod when we were quite. As we returned to shore we all were glad it was over and happy with our catch. Even with being sick we all had a great day. In total the crew caught about 50 fish, we kept 8. The fish can bee seen below. As the charter finished we rondevoued to the fish cleaning spot with the crew to fillet and bag our catch up. With a quite beer, softdrink for the two boys, we enjoyed taking some photos of our fish. After the fish was filleted we had quite a hall. We will be eating fish for dinner for at least the next week. We had the goldband snapper last night and it matched the taste of Barramundi. The kids loved it. There's nothing better than freshly caught fish on the bbq to make you appreciate a fishing trip.

A memorable day, some of these photo's are worth their weight in gold.

                                               Jake holding a Goldband Snapper

                                                 Liam holding a Goldband Snapper

                                            Me holding a Robinsons Seaperch

                                   Liam holding a tomato cod and Jake with a honeycomb cod

                                                 Liam holding the fish he reeled in.

Me with the biggest snappers of the day, that we caught. Each fish provided us with 6 large filleted steaks of tasty meat. Good with a beer or white wine. Not a bad day at all. I think we are now half way through our trip. It's going to be hard to top the 1st half but time will tell.

We are next in Monkey Mia and then Kalbarri which will take about 10 days then 3 weeks in Perth to stay with Sue's mum. The boys are looking forward to getting back to creature comforts and my home made pizza's. I must admit as much as I have enjoyed camping Sue and I will enjoy the change. But one thing that our creature comforts at home will never beat is the great view of the stars you get when you have a wee in the middle of the night, it is spectacular. Anyway bye for now.