Western Australia - More Gorges, Coral Coast, Back to Civilisation, and Wineries

Time feels like it's flown as all of a sudden it's been almost three weeks since our last blog post. Well, we've continued to do a lot of driving and sightseeing so we have many photos to share with you again. We got 7 comments on our last blog post -thanks!!! We love reading them.

We haven't beaten our record of 8 fingers yet. We got so used to giving the finger/waving while driving on the highway that we had to stop ourselves from doing the same when we would reach the cities and towns.

Karijini National Park (N.P.)

Where to start...well, we got a little "gorged out." After we left Broome, we visited Karijini National Park, which was a "must see" according to fellow travellers. The gorges were beautiful but after seeing so many in the previous weeks, we started to take their beauty for granted. Anyway, you can compare the photos below to our previous photos of the gorges.

Zoom in on the last photo to see me (Melissa) doing the spider crawl through one of the gorges. It took three attempts for me to get across but I made it!

Ningaloo Reef

We got away from gorges for a little while and headed for the Coral Coast. Our first stop was the Ningaloo Reef. It was amazing. While the Great Barrier Reef is definitely something to be seen, we didn't realise that there was this fantastic reef right on the doorstep of the west coast. We literally walked a few metres out into the water from the beach and could snorkel among beautiful tropical fish and coral.

Shark Bay

We continued along the Coral Coast to Shark Bay. Unfortunately we didn't see any sharks but we saw lots of dolphins at Monkey Mia. We also drove through Francois Peron N.P., which had soft sandy roads and lots of red dirt. It was definitely the biggest test for our car so I'm happy to report that it passed the test. We almost got stuck in the sand a few times but we made it through although I had to have a drink to calm my nerves later that night.

Dolphins at Monkey Mia

Shell Beach - am I a good photographer or what?

Driving along Shark Bay

Francois Peron N.P. - the red dirt looked awesome among the blue water

Pretty wildflowers along our drive

Kalbarri N.P. and Pinnacles Desert

The last stop along the Coral Coast were Kalbarri N.P. followed by the Pinnacles Desert.

Have you ever seen pink water?

Pinnacles Desert

Perth

We headed back to civilisation for a while within the larger city of Perth. We did some sightseeing but also got to visit our rental properties there. We even stayed in one of them, which ended our 57-day tent run although we still slept on stretchers.

Margaret River

Margaret River is one of the wine regions in Australia. We were able to stay in a lovely B&B thanks to Mum and Aunty Lisa so finally we stayed in a bed. We had a fun day of wine tasting.


Pemberton
Today we drove within the Karri Forests and saw some kangaroos boxing, which was pretty cool. Klas also climbed a 68-metre tree. I just made it up to the 25-metre platform. I think he has earned the title "Klas the Climber."



Now we're finishing the southwestern part of the country before we head east.

Gorgeous Gorges in the Kimberly Ranges

During the past week we've seen gorges, gorges and more gorges. And they were gorgeous...aren't we clever with our choice of words?! Anyway, it will be easier if we write about our adventures through the Kimberly Range (northern part of Western Australia) by describing the photos below. I don't think the photos do these places justice as they were beautiful and felt so majestic. Just a few notes here: we have now received 8 fingers in a row while driving (see July 15 post if you don't know what this means) and five comments on our last blog post so we're doing well.

Kununurra

We thought you would like this photo of a car driving across Ivanhoe Crossing.

Purnululu (Bungle Bungle) National Park

We took a tour through this National Park because the roads into the area were pretty rough. It took 4 hours to reach our first destination. The road was bumpy and we had to cross a few creeks.

First we visited Echidna Chasm, which was created by a fault line. You can see how the rock split along the fault line in the first picture.

The Bungle Bungle Range is mostly known for these beehive domes, which are actually huge when you stand next to them.

Our first gorge in the Kimberly Range was Cathedral Gorge. It felt so tall.

Geikie Gorge

We took a boat tour through this gorge. Check out the crocodile sunning himself/herself in the second photo.

Tunnel Creek

We drove on a rough road to get to this site. Our car shook on the corrugated road and we had to avoid sharp rocks from puncturing our tyres. We walked through a tunnel with water up to our knees at times, hence the name Tunnel Creek. Anyway, it was a bit dark to take good photos but we saw bats along the way.

Windjana Gorge

After continuing on the rough road, we set up camp at Windjana Gorge. It's a bit hard to see in the last photo but the views in the background were so awesome.

Bell Gorge

We thought the first part of our drive was tough but the next day was tougher along Gibb River Road, which is known for tyre blowouts. However, we made it safely to Bell Gorge across some creeks and without a punctured tyre. It was definitely worth the trip as this Gorge was beautiful with lovely swimming spots next to the waterfall.

Doesn't Klas look relaxed?

Broome

We finally made it to the town that everyone seemed to be heading to or coming from. The town's camp sites were packed so we have been camping at a pistol range that acts as a camp ground for the busiest 8 weeks of the year.

Broome is on the coast so we watched the sunset over the Indian Ocean.

Check out our neighbour's camp site. I think everything he owns is outside of his little tent.

We saw Dinosaur footprints on some rocks when it was low tide. We wouldn't have known that they were there unless we were told since we were engrossed by the views of the red rock against the bright blue water.


We drove along the Dampier Peninsula and had a picnic lunch at the beach. We had it all to ourselves.

Now we are heading south, mostly along the coast of Western Australia.