The Eyre Peninsula, South Australia

What can we say? After the stunning Esperance, South Australia was hard-pressed to compete. We spent a few days outside Port Lincoln catching up on food shopping, laundry and caravan repairs. The kids spied the library in town and had a great morning lounging around reading their great collection of books.

Mikkira Station – we camped at Bett’s Farm in their “Koala Paddock” – her family have owned this station since 1923. It was amazing seeing Koalas up so close (literally a metre away!) although the flies here were horrid. It was a hot day and a cool change came through at dusk which caused a few massive gum branches (as big as trees) to fall. The sound was unbelievable and scared the English tourists who were camped near the trees! In the morning we did a quick walk to the original station cottage. A fantastic look into pioneer living as it was still furnished with some original furniture.

We then attempted to camp at the caravan-friendly campsite in Lincoln National Park. However, it was one of their first really hot days for the season and the bees started swarming really badly so that the other campers were all packing down and advised us to move somewhere else…quickly! The bees were trying to find any fresh water possible including the camp toilets, drink bottles and even attempting to get into water tanks under caravans! The flies & march flies were just as bad so we ended up moving up the north west coast to the lovely little town of Coffin Bay. We were going to try the campground at the National Park here too except they had a burn off planned (it was cancelled later due to the hot weather!) so we ended up at the lovely caravan park opposite the bay.

Coffin Bay is named after Matthew Flinder’s friend Isaac Coffin we were relieved to find out – and the town is famous for oysters. We chilled here for a couple of days – it was one of the friendliest parks we’ve been in for quite a while. The locals were great - recommending fishing spots to Ellie so we had a try at fishing in the channel & off the pier. A fellow fisherman donated a Snook Fish for our dinner as he preferred others he’d caught! We drove out to Coffin Bay National Park the next day and had a walk along Point Avoid and Almonta Beach – definitely wild and windy. A mother Emu with 6 emu chicks ducked around our car at one point which was an amazing sight!

The next day we drove through other sleepy little fishing villages such as Venus Bay and Port Kenny to Perlubie Beach – a $5 a night beach camp that the locals upkeep. There were beach shelters & swings for the kids and LOTS AND LOTS OF FLIES. So. Many. Flies. The only relief was to walk right out in the shallow water and they wouldn’t bother you….as much! The next morning we left early to meet some very special people at Streaky Bay….GRANDPARENTS!

Murphy's Haystacks

Perlubie Beach

My parents drove from Melbourne to meet us for 4 lovely days. The first day we took a picnic down to Point Labatt to see the largest mainland Sealion colony, then a tour of the Westall Loop including High Cliffs (sandstone cliffs),  various lookouts and Smooth Pools (granite swimming hole). Low & behold our adopted travelling grandies turned up on the beach here too! So we were able to introduce them to the kids’ real grandparents!

The next day, after a scrumptious pancake birthday breakfast for Kieren, we drove around the northern loop out of Streaky Bay and tried our hand fishing on the back beach. Unfortunately it was rainy, gusty and altogether a bad day for fishing! It was, however, a great day to listen to the Whistling rocks (the tide didn’t seem to be high enough for the blowholes). The whistling sound is from the force of the air pushed up through little holes in the rocks when waves pound the cliffs. That night we celebrated Kieren’s birthday with a delicious pork roast (yay!! ovens!!) and cake. It was great fun having such a lovley family dinner!

We rounded off our stay at Streaky Bay with a lazy day – a spot of fishing (only Abbey caught a little stripey), walking along the pier and a visit to the craft shop.  

My Milo Mermaid!

The Nullar-boring

The next 3 days after our EPIC Esperance Experience saw us travel 1830km in 3 days. We travelled from breakfast to dusk (we have no idea what the actual time is) and stopped only for forced pit stops (ok EVERYONE has to go - no options) and fuel. We also had the worst fuel ecomony the whole trip due to the strong winds that beat across this sparse land. We did stop to see the awesome Bunda cliffs along the Great Australian Bight but alas did not see any whales as it's just about time for them to migrate back towards Antarctica.
Crossing the SA border we realised we had to put the clock forwards 2.5 hours (due to daylight saving) and this is still causing havoc almost a week later with our wake/sleep cycles! It's really not a trip I'd like to repeat in a hurry even though the kids were awesome and extremely patient. We freecamped both nights in rest stops sometimes with fellow caravanners beside us and the last night with some REALLY NOISY roadtrains.
The rest of the time the kids did schoolwork, we listened to music, we played A-Z & numberplate games, we ate and ate and ate, we reminisced lots about the best & worst things from our trip (that will be our last post!) and we tried to work out how we will feel going back to 'normal life' after such an incredible life experience!

what time is it REALLY?

Longest straightest section of road in Australia

Esperance in pictures

Hellfire Bay

Lucky Bay! (freezing cold wind but amazing water)

Yay! We met travelling grandies here again so got a whole family photo! Thanks Pam & Pete :)

In Miss T's words: EPIC!!!

Fun for big kids too

Cold Rock to top off a sensational day!

Frenchman's Peak 

such a steep climb

some of us were a little nervous...

what a view!

on the way back down (I was a bit slow!)

Goanna!

Twilight Beach

Replica Stonehenge

Just hanging out!

Hyden & Kalgoorlie

After reading “Are we there yet?” By Alison Lester we just had to make a visit to Wave Rock. Although it was quite a distance, the route to get there was quite beautiful through the Stirling Ranges and masses of wheat farms. We arrived mid-afternoon after dropping our caravan at the recreation centre carpark. The wave itself was just as we expected from the book illustration – though nowhere near as big as other rocks we have seen on our journeys. We had a go at surfing the rock and got some other tourists to take some funny photos of us! Ingeniously Wave Rock also forms the local areas water collection from a man-made gutter on top of the rock which directs the rain into a small dam built into the side.

Mr J's big hippo yawn

Cool junk sculptures in Hyden's main street

We ventured up on the top and found a few Ornate Dragons sunning themselves. We also had a look at another rock nicknamed “Hippos Yawn” which is a tafione (basically eroded rock). After the 90 minutes we had spent here we were REALLY SICK OF FLIES. So we decided to pick up our van and keep going rather than staying the night.

We had a dilemma – the rugby final was on the next night and heading to our next stop would mean no television signal. So instead we opted to drive another 500km to meet our friends at Kalgoorlie. The quickest way there was straight up a gravel road so off we went. We realised this would mean another tap fitting wearing away under the van but for the sake of 3 hours we were happy to take it.

We stopped overnight at a roadhouse in the middle of nowhere that had only been operating for 4 days – always happy to support fellow businessmen so we bought dinner & fuel. The next morning we headed off fairly early and arrived at Kalgoorlie at 10am. Heading into town through the industrial area you can’t help but know that this is a mining town! So many businesses supply parts or services to the mines in town. 

We had a great time catching up with our friends – The Lynch Family – and playing in the pool on the 37 degree day! We all watched the Rugby grand Final in the camp kitchen that afternoon (sometimes it is handy having a 3 hour time difference from the east coast!) and had dinner together afterwards.

The next day we went to the Royal Flying Doctor Service at Kalgoorlie Airport for a tour through their facilities & plane. The set up was amazing and the tour guide the best we’ve had on our travels. I was particularly impressed with our children’s questions during the question time – really articulate and appropriate questions. Proud mumma moment J

Afterwards, we went for a drive through the town to see all the old buildings (a lot like Bendigo) then a trip through the Kalgoorlie Museum. Part of the museum was an art gallery which Miss T particularly liked and another part was the smallest pub in Kalgoorlie (there were up to 90 during its heyday.) We then raced off to the KGCM Superpit – the Gold mine that is pretty much the only reason the town exists. The size of the mine so close to the town is mind-boggling. They blasted a section of the mine just after 1pm and the sound and dust was incredible. Mr J thought it was AWESOME. So were the excavator buckets & truck tyres that the kids played on.

There were 5 in the bed, and the little one said... spoon me!

After that we chilled out back at the park and then had our last dinner with Matt, Jane, Caitlin & Jack. We waved them off the next morning on their trip over the Nullabour. We then headed down to Esperance for our last WA beach fix! I'm so glad we got to experience Kalgoorlie as it wasn't on our original itinerary & the supermine is planned to shut in only 6 years - who knows what will happen to this town after that!

Albany

Albany is beautiful but a bit like Melbourne with its weather! It is quite a big town of 30,000 people surrounded by bays, inlets, & national parks. We stayed at the cheaper big 4 out on the edge of town but the kids were still able to attend the free kids club at the other Big4. This left Kieren & I with some free time to shop, launder, visit the caravan show (we’re now grey nomads before our time :P) AND also fit in a date night to a Thai Restaurant during the Friday night disco. Bonus! This is only our 2^nd night out in 5 months without our munchkins.

We visited the ANZAC centre in Albany – the place where 101 years ago our soldiers left for WWI. The history preserved here is amazing and the interactive museum that was built for the 100^th anniversary was the best we’ve seen. On entry you are “given” a soldier to follow and as you walk around the museum you learn about which ship he left on, what happened during the war, when or if he returned and what they did after the war. It was very sobering but amazing to follow the journey of some of our soldiers. We also did a free tour with Brian – an older fellow who has preserved a lot of the buildings, memorabilia & weaponry at this base. Mr J loved being able to get up and crank the artillery and rifles (lucky there were no ammunition in there or there might have been some explosions out to sea!)

the only part Miss A liked...

The next day we visited Whaleworld – the site of the last whaling station in Australia. Miss A was not impressed with the Flensing area (where the whales were slaughtered) but the rest of the station was very interesting. We loved the 25m skeleton of a humpback whale that filled an enormous shed! And that was classed as a small whale! The holding tanks that were used to store whale products had been turned into theatrettes – with fantastic presentations on the history of whaling & also on sharks. We also got to explore the last whaling ship that is dry-docked there – the Cheynes IV. It was an amazing rabbit warren of a ship!

On the way home we visited ‘Salmon Pools’ – a beach just near the whaling station. We watched a couple of fishermen land some enormous salmon. Unfortunately we didn’t have our fishing gear with us L

The next day saw us sitting at our site in the campground with just chairs & tables. Believe me it was a funny site! Our caravan had to be towed to a repairer to find a gas leak. Yes – we’ve all been a bit sleepy waking up lately but lucky I have a good sense of smell & realised that something needed to be repaired quick smart! #1 on the shopping list is now a gas detector! 

We ventured to the beach after lunch as it was really hot out but the water was FREEZING! “Why?” asked Miss E – because this water comes straight from Antarctica! The weather was going to turn cold again so we decided to venture inland to Wave Rock near Hyden.