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2015-04-06 | Western Australia: Rottnest Island (Day 7)
Concluding our Australia trip was an excursion to Rottnest Island, about a half hour away by boat from Fremantle where we stayed for the last two nights of our trip.
On the island the major means of transportation is the bicycle, so you get a free workout while exploring it. The reason why Rottnest Island is so popular with animal loving tourists is a tiny kind of marsupial called quokka (think mini-kangaroo). They roam freely around the island and they're not the least bit shy.
Besides quokkas there are lots of nice beaches, lighthouses, salt lakes, as well as two overpriced super markets and an even more overpriced bakery. It's therefore best to just pack your own lunch. But even if you don't you can still get decent food on the island.
We had almost another full day to walk around Fremantle but not many good photos to show, so this is the last installment of this Western Australia series. I hope you enjoyed the photos as much as we did our trip!
Bathurst Lighthouse, the smaller one of two lighthouses on the island.
The first quokka that we came across on the island and the main reason why we visited to begin with.
The little animals aren't shy at all because they have no natural enemies on the island (apart from the side effects of human civilization, that is).
Lake Baghdad with Wadjemup Lighthouse in the background.
Biking is the most common form of transportation because, apart from public transport, no motor vehicles are available on the island.
I was originally worried we'd be eating too many burgers on our trip. But it turned out the food was one of the highlights of the trip. We had a lot of good food and good hamburgers like this just never get boring.
Apart from the fact that you'll have a hard time reading 8 km/h on a speedometer this is an island pretty much without cars!
2015-04-05 | Western Australia: Lake Thetis and Pinnacles (Day 6)
Day 6 was a busy day! We had over 450 kilometers and three PoIs ("points of interest" that is for the non-GPS-avid reader :-) to cover: Grigson's Lookout, Lake Thetis with its stromatolites, and the Pinnacles Desert in the Nambung National Park. The latter is among the most famous tourist destinations in Western Australia, so the expectations were high.
We had a lunch picnic at Grigson's Lookout, a small (unfortunately unshaded) viewpoint just along the highway. By merely turning your head you can see the ocean, sand dunes, and salt lakes.
When we got to Lake Thetis it was still during the hottest time of the day, so after a walk around the lake we had to stop for ice cream in the tiny town of Cervantes before hitting the road again.
People say the Pinnacles are best visited during sunrise or sunset because that allows the limestone formations to cast long shadows that make for great photos. We wanted to avoid driving at night for fear of making (or becoming) roadkill, so we couldn't leave too late with over 200 km to go to our bed & breakfast in Fremantle. But regardless of the time of day, the Pinnacles are a very impressive sight!
Lake Thetis which is famous for its stromatolites (those tower-shaped structures).
Sand dunes along the highway. It was so hot that I barely had the energy to get out of the car to take a few photos. :-)
There's really something weird about driving through the major attraction of a national park but the area covered by pinnacles is so large that it almost makes sense. Then again, I prefer having to earn my view and that's what we did after parking our car and revisiting on foot.
From this photo you can get an idea of the are covered with pinnacles. Mind you, it continues to the left ...
2015-04-04 | Western Australia: Kalbarri to Geraldton (Day 5)
Geraldton is only about 150 kilometers south of Kalbarri and we had only pinned down two stops on the way: the coastal part of Kalbarri National Park and a suspiciously colored lake.
This left us with enough time to spend an afternoon in Geraldton and visit a few local attractions. Because it was Sunday there wasn't much else to do in town anyway. Most shops were closed, but despite that getting food wasn't a problem. Delicious burgers for lunch and Asian noodle soup (whose exact origin was impossible to determine) for dinner.
The next day was going to be another long drive back down to Perth.
Hutt Lagoon, one of several pink lakes in Western Australia. The color really looks very weird and it's hard to believe that it's natural.
Of course, the sign of a large chemical company right next to the lake does make it look even more suspicious, but apparently the color is caused by the presence of a particular kind of algae.
2015-03-28 | Western Australia: Kalbarri National Park (Day 4)
Kalbarri National Park was my personal highlight of the trip. We figured going into the national park and simply driving from parking lot to parking lot would border on an insult to nature. We at least wanted to do a bit of hiking and the ten kilometer Loop trail seemed like a good choice.
We had read the entire spectrum of experience reports: from "warm" to "unbearably hot", from "easy to get lost" to "well-designated", from "hardly any flies" to "eaten alive". We had somehow hit the middle ground: It was hot in the canyon but still bearable. The path was sometimes less than obvious but you wouldn't get lost. And the flies were annoying but far fewer than we had feared. Either way, we were prepared: Plenty of water, a good lunch, GPS, and fly nets, all of which were put to good use.
Many people primarily mention Nature's Window and Z-Bend when they talk about Kalbarri National Park. While Nature's Window is nice it is not spectacular. And if you want to have it for yourself you have to choose your time carefully (the hotter the better). Z-Bend practically wanes in comparison with the Loop, although we did hear from another couple that it gets much prettier if you descend all the way to the river, something we unfortunately didn't have time for.
Be that as it may, the Loop alone was easily worth the trip into Kalbarri National Park. Canyon views, river, trees, white sand, beautiful rock formations, and all in a single 10 km hike! But see for yourself ...
The lookout at Nature's Window and entrance to The Loop, which was destined to be our hike for the day.
The Murchison river, today unfortunately in the color sand-brown because there had been some rain upstream.
This is what Nature's Window looks like in the morning when the temperatures are still at levels that tourists can generally bear. We figured we'd just go ahead with our hike and take photos later instead of getting in line!
I'm not sure if these "water falls" have a name but I've seen similarly tiny falls labeled with tourist information signs elsewhere in Australia. :-)
The sandy part of the trail where there's no wind and where for every two steps forward you make one step back.
Nature's Window in the midday heat with just enough tourists to avoid a queue and always have someone to take your picture. :-)
2015-03-28 | Western Australia: Perth to Kalbarri (Day 3)
The third day was more about operating a car than a camera. It took us most of the day to drive the 600 kilometers north to Kalbarri while trying not to make (or become!) roadkill.
It got clear pretty quickly why everybody advises you not to drive after dusk. The second time we saw wild kangaroos was soon after we left the larger Perth area and they were neither wild nor moving. Luckily the same couldn't be said of a pair of emus that were strolling on a stretch of highway in the middle of the day. I barely managed to pull out my camera before they ran away.
We made it to Kalbarri just in time for sunset.
One of the two emus that suddenly appeared on the highway. You can see that they don't just put the warning signs there for fun.