It had rained heavily for much of the night, but by the time we rolled into Broome at breakfast time the sun was back out and the temperatures were back up to my now customary (and expected) 30+degrees. I headed out to explore the town and landed at the "Pearl Luggers". Broome was really founded on the pearling, or to be more precise, Mother-of-Pearl industry and this fascinating little centre told the story. There were a couple of boats, from different eras, used in the peak of the pearling booms and after having a look at them we were taken into a little museum out of the worst of the heat to hear more about the history and the rise and fall of the trade in Broome. In short: a failing farmer attended an aboriginal corroboree and seeing that all the young men were wearing decorative mother-of-pearl loin guards. He asked where the shells came from and was shown to a nearby beach where there were literally tons of them strewn along the shore. Knowing the shells were needed for button making, he spotted the key to the end of his financial woes and gathered a boat load and set off for the markets in Melbourne. Unfortunately a storm blew up, his boat was lost and so was he! However, word of his haul was out and the money-men appeared in the area to harvest the shells. Initially it was free-diving and having to work at depths of up to 15 metres to gather the shells from the sea-bed it was hard and dangerous. The death rate from those involved was high because of the pressure put on the body by diving so far and surfacing so quickly in desperation for more air. Gradually hard-helmet diving was introduced, but that "technology" was in the infancy of its development and the dangers were still very real. In search of cheap labour prepared to take the risks involved, the sea-lords recruited from the Asian countries, especially Japan where there was a tradition of pride and honour to show the stregth and character of a man in undertaking such risky and dangerous work. Diving continued until the 2nd World War when the Japanese (who by that time made up 1/3 of the population of Broome) were imprisoned as part of the war sanctions which required the 'enemy' be rounded up lest they be potential sabboteurs or fighters. After the war most returned to Japan to help in the rebuilding of their country and/or in disgust at the way their adoptive country of many years had treated them. That, and the increased use of plastic buttons, hit the industry hard and it went into decline. It did continue on a smaller scale but it was still a very tough way of life. Several layers of shetland wool long johns and jumpers were worn under a rubber wet suit along with iron and leather diving boots, lead body weights and the copper helmet completed the ensemble, meaning a man could be carrying 140+ extra kilos of kit - about twice his natural body-weight. Accidental, and deliberate, deaths were common with feuding crews put together by the sea-lords as an apparent means to ensure the boats returned to port with their pearls and didn't just 'do a runner'. Hard helmet diving continued in Broome until the 1970's when line diving became more prominant, but nowadays, with sea stocks much depleted, it is mostly farmed cultivated pearls which are harvested around the area. And that, believe it or not, is the abridged version of the pearling story!! I found the talk and exhibition fascinating and captivating though, and really enjoyed my visit. To round off our visit we were given a taste of the pearl meat. It had a texture like smoked salmon, but with it having been marinated in vinegar and soy sauce it was the sweet vinegary flavour (similar to the gravy with my Shanghai buns!) which dominated. It was by no means unpleasant, but neither did I rush out to buy a stock for tea. Pasta or couscous and veggies does me quite fine! Having had a good dose of history I decided I was in need of some exercise so went on a three hour sea kayaking trip. With a little light cloud cover and a gentle breeze to prevent it getting too hot it was perfect for the trip. We set out from the far end of Cable Beach and paddled through the gentle waves. There are a set of dinosaur footprints in the seabed which are visible at low tide but that day the tide and swell was just too high to be able to make them out. (but I did see pictures of them on leaflets so it wasn't just a case of the guides laughing at the tourists looking for dinosaur tracks before anyone says anything!) We paddled on round Gantheaume Point and got a very quick glimpse of a turtle before it submerged again. Not much further on we stopped at a little beach and had a look at a couple of blow-holes in the sandstone cliffs. There was a super fossil of a fern embedded in the roof of the cave and a little bit of dinosaur bone next to it. It was amazingly distinct. We then had a little swim in the warm sea to cool off a little and enjoy the fine day before being tempted back to shore by juice and nibbles. Relaunching our boats we started to make our way back to our starting point. On the way we saw a couple more turtles and pair of brown boobies. Boys behave - that's diving sea birds, similar to gannets in that they dive and swim to catch their fish. One of a pair of ospreys which nest in the framework of the lighthouse (its got an open structure rather than the traditional brick to make it less of a solid mass for cyclones to hit) was standing guard over the nest very proudly and shouting for all it was worth for food from its mate. Seeing the ospreys here, and previously at Kununurra, was a nice link to home. Back at the beach we got the boats loaded back onto the trailer and returned to town. Walking round town later was a bit like strolling across an artists paintbox there were so many vivid colours: the sky was blue, the sea turquoise, red sand, yellowy-green playing fields, black roads, white kerbs and gum tree trunks, and green bushes and mango trees. Every garden seemed to have big heavily laden mango trees with the fruit overhanging the boundary fences. If I'd been just a few days later I'm sure the fruit would have been riper and I could have given them a gentle shake to encourage them to fall but as it was they were still too green so survived for another day. With history, nature and exercise boxes now ticked a day of rest and laziness was called for so I headed to the beach. I went back to Gantheaume Point and wandered round the rocks admiring the views and looking, again unsuccessfully, for the dinosaur prints. I did however find Anastasias Pool. One of the first lighthousekeepers there had carved out and built a bathing pool for his wife just below the high water mark. She had had arthritis type problems so couldn't clamber down to the water's edge to ease her joints. The pool was frequently refreshed by the tide and gave her a bathing pool with a view. After wandering round the rocks for a while I made my way to Cable Beach proper. Leaving the dune road the contrast between the iron rich red and silica laden white sand in such a short distance was incredible. With no cloud cover either the sea was a most beautiful aquamarine-turquiose shade and sparkled like glass in the sun's rays. Gentle waves broke dulux white on the pearly sand and I walked all the way along, admiring the odd purple wildflower at the top of the beach adding an occasional dot of contrasting colour. It was really peaceful with hardly a soul to be seen until I eventually reached the area patrolled by the life-guards. It was a mass of people, towels and umbrellas. I never understand why with such an expanse of sand so many crowd together. With most like me only interested in a liesurely dip in the shallows they could easily have spread out more. I got a fine bit of space yet still in sight of the patrols and had a fantastic swim. The water was warm and the gentle waves allowed the child in me to enjoy swimming and surfing through them. Before too long the power of the sun got too strong, and with a family starting to play cricket next to me despite the miles of available space I gathered my things and started to walk back towards the esplanade, but as I reached the finest of the dry sands it became to hot to walk on in bare feet and I had to get my sandals on double quick. Funnily enough I've never had that problem on Lossie beach. I carried on along to a rockier patch and had another dip, paddle and general plowter about in the little shallow rock pools until it was time to get the shuttle bus back to town and prepare for moving on.
Next stop down the coast for me would be Coral Bay. It is a fair distance down from Broome and involved changing in the middle of the night at a little closed roadhouse onto a shuttle bus which travels up the peninsula to the bay and Exmouth beyond. We'd been an hour or so late in leaving Broome beacause of a shortage of busses due to mechanical problems. (The coaches pretty much run non-stop up and down the coast from Darwin to Broome to Perth, which is a distance of over 5000km one way, so you can imagine the wear and tear that causes in a short period of time, and with Greyhound based in the East there is a feeling that the "chiefs" don't appreciate the difficulties on the ground). Anyway, we set off late and had hoped to make up time on the way south, however, sadly we lost another half hour at one of the stops en route: All unaccompanied minors travelling have to be signed on and off the bus by a guardian before the drivers will leave. At South Headland a girl of about 11 or 12 who'd been returning from a holiday at her auntie's was due to be picked up but no-one was there to meet her. Despite various emergency contact numbers having been given nobody answered the phone calls either. It was such a shame that a young child has to experience that lost feeling and that nobody was desperate to welcome her home. Eventually the police were contacted to come and meet her so that we could progress. I felt so sorry for her as she was obviously upset by the whole experience yet trying to put on a brave face. We finally set off again and reached our transfer point about 1 3/4 hours late. The poor passengers transferring from the north bound bus, or who came in on the departing shuttle had had to wait all that time in the middle of nowhere and dead of night for us as the two services are timetabled to connect at the same time. Anyway, we were soon on our way again and arrived safely in Coral Bay. The name of the place gives the clue to the surroundings: one dead-ended street, the backpackers, a caravan park, a hotel, a couple of shops, a couple of daytour operators, then just miles of coral fringed beach stretching out from the shallow sheltered bay. The bus to the highway only runs on certain days, and the one we took in was the last one for 4 days, but I knew instantly that it would be no hardship for me to spend that time here. Its my kind of place. Over the following days I had to endure: Swimming in the gorgeously blue sea (the tour operators bemoaning the water was cold at only 20-21 degrees!); Snorkelling from the beach admiring the abundant coral just yards from the shore and marvelling at the myriad of different fish and stingrays all around me; reading and sunning myself on the quiet beach; trailing miles along dunes and white sandy beaches; paddling in the little rock pools; trying to spot turtles approaching the stretch of beach they use every year to lay their eggs; marvelling at the shark nursery where daily at low tide some of the adult black-tipped reef sharks will take the juvenniles -like a kind of day care facility -teaching them to find food for themselves; taking a boat trip and snorkelling with manta rays and going on an escorted scuba dive. Life was indeed tough!! Lazing around happily around the beach, rocks and rockpools it kind of transported me back to all those years of beach walking around the coves at Kilchousland. I swear if I'd closed my eyes I would have heard the clatter of taxi doors as everyone arrived from town. Snorkeling with the manta rays was awesome. They are so huge (about 3 metres across)but so graceful - gliding around 'mouths' wide open scooping up and filltering out all the food they can muster. We followed 2 or 3 and just became engrossed with them totally shutting out anything else around you - until you got a maskful of flipper from the snorkeller next to you as you hadn't been paying attention to you surroundings. It was magical. The diving was another thing altogether. Having done a few resort type dives previously I hadn't expected to get nervous about it when the time came to go but I did. It felt strange with the mask and regulator on and I'd a bit of trouble equalising my ear pressure to start with, and then the seal on my mask couldn't have been tight enough so it filled right up with water causing me a moments panic. Managing to clear it myself though seemed to settle my nerves and I began to relax and realy enjoy the freedom that being underwater gives you. Just then though we were signalled that it was time to resurface -typical. I think you'd really need to do more than one dive on a trip, certainly as a novice, to really be able to enjoy it. There are two main types of coral: brightly coloured, generally fronded, soft coral and hard coral which generally has more earthy colour tones of greys, browns purples and yellows but has a bigger variety of shapes. Its that hard coral that the inner Ningaloo reef (which stretches along the peninsula on which Coral bay sits)mostly consists of. In some places its very dense and one of the operators explained to me that generally nature carries out a natural pruning and thinning process as storms and cylcones hit lifting the old and decaying coral out of the sea letting the younger areas develop. without a cyclone in the area for about 30 years now he reckons they're well overdue for anther one. He may well be right, but I was more than happy to enjoy the area as it was in fine weather! However after a few days and with so much more still to see in Oz, I left Coral Bay and headed for Denham on another peninsula further down the coast.
The curse of the transfers struck again though: first off the shuttle was an hour late in picking us up, then when we got to the Minilya roadhouse there was no sign of the south bus and no estimated time of arrival. We waited and waited and waited getting excited as every set of headlights drew closer only to be disappointed as another road train whizzed by. I tell you, never on my trip so far has hitching seemed so appealing. Finally, about 3 hours late our bus arrived, people and luggage got transferred, and we were off. Reaching Overlander we had to transfer to the next shuttle, and our driver Trevor was half asleep! It was a horrendous journey as we tried desperately to keep speaking to him to ensure he stayed awake, but he couldn't really hear us over the noise of the fan and radio. We got him to stop for a break and tried to speak to him about it but he maintained he was ok, was just always like that and knew what he was doing! He was a bit better after the break but never were we so thankful to get to our destination in one piece.
Denham is just a very small coastal town within the Shark Bay World Heritage area and in, as you can probably imagine, a wonderfully picturesque setting. I spent a lot of time at the discovery centre. The Shark bay area is one of only a few sites around the world which qualifies for world heritage status by meting all four of the key requirements and the centre tells the story. A mixture of photos from around the area, stories about some of the old ships wrecked along the coast, background information on the geology of the area, flora and fauna, and audiovisial displays with different people who live and or work(ed) in the area speaking about how they are connected to the area and the conservation and management of it. It was a wonderful little centre and each time you'd visit I'm sure you'd pick up another little interesting fact or snippet of information. Another great day was spent at Monkey Mia. One of the star attractions there are the dolphins which swim into the shallows of the bay and are fed by DEC staff(dept. of Environment & Conservation) and a few people picked from the onlookers. They assure us they closely monitor how much is given to each dolphin to prevent overfeeding and to ensure they don't become reliant on that foodsource. It was lovely to see the dolphins so close to shore but I watched from further back as I waited to go on a guided aboriginal bushwalk. It turned out to be a fantastic walk. The guide, called Capes, tok us from the coastal white sands to the arid red desert and talked about plants, animals and a bit of traditional culture. He emphasised the belief that the natural environment is all important and as people we have just a small part to play in it - we should show respect and introduce ourselves when entering a different area. We were shown shells which would serve as cups and pots. Animal tracks were pointed out to us: kangaroo, lizards, emu and echidna. He pointed out how the feet of the echidnas "face backwards" fooling many who've tried to track them! We smelled the leaves of Myrtles used traditionally as medicinal soothers (they have a minty menthol smell a bit like Vicks)ang with slightly antiseptic properties, Charlie's Tree with Vitamin C rich currants, trees whose sap can be mixed with the ground seeds of another to form a resin which can be used to fix broken tools or fill teeth! We ate the nuts from Sandalwood trees, and chewed the leaves of another tree which is meant to help generate saliva, but I hated it: it dried my mouth rather than anything. Think of trying to chew a fuzzyfelt or bit of paper covered in sand and you're pretty near the mark I reckon! We saw goannas and other lizards, and several birds which Capes mimicked the calls of and explained how the birds' different calls would alert people to the presence of different animals and so different hunting techniques would be used as appropriate. He spoke too about the tribal system, comparing it to our clans traditionally coming from different areas, and finally ended with drawing the symbols for home in the sand and the letters EUR which sum up the fundementals of working with the natural envioronment: Educate; Understand; Respect. It really was a fantastic walk. Back at the resort I sunbathed at the beach and admired the views over the bay and the fields of seagrass to the cliffs beyond. I spotted turtles swimming just off the jetty, but none of the dugongs which some of the others saw on a boat trip (About 10,000 thats 10% of the worlds population of Dugong live in Shark bay), and I perused the information office and displays. My final day in Denham was also my birthday and it was also a fantastic day and one that for only the second time in my life I was able to celebrate in shorts and t-shirt.(thanks everyone who sent messages it was much appreciated) The wind which had kept the temperature bearable over the last few days disappeared leaving it a scorching day. I packed myself a little picnic, borrowed a bike from the hostel, and set off with the intention of having a scenic tour around the area and my first stop being at the ocean park, which dependant on which literature I read was somewhere between 7-10km from town. A perfectly normal cycling distance. What follows however is an explanation and not an excuse!! The bike had no gears, was a bit rusty, and in need of a good oil and clean up. However, I peched on along up a series of gradual climbs for a while. Without my hat my head was soon getting toasted, but with it the beads of sweat gathered on the headband before trickling down my sunnies leaving me in need of a set of wipers! Realising I was only just over 5km from town and with potentially the same again before I reached the park I decided enough was enough and pulled into the side of the road for a rest and a drink before turning back. I'd only taken a couple of gulps before a 4x4 pulled up behind me. The people had seen me stopping as they passed, and concerned that I may have had a puncture or be in need of a lift somewhere, came back to check on me. Thanking them, I explained that I was merely in need of a drink and a change of direction. It's really lovely though when a stranger shows you an act of thoughfulness like that. We went our separate ways and I had an easier return ride to town, stopping to see a couple of local properties built from shell bricks. There is a nearby beach (shell beach!) which has particularly calcium rich shells. After periods of rain these shells fuse together and can be cut out as blocks and used in construction. In times gone by there would have been several properties built with them but nowadays only a few remain. Bike safely returned I put wine in the fridge to chill, made fruit crumble for me and my 3 travel companions to enjoy later, and spent the rest of the afternoon at the beach. I soaked up the sun, paddling and splashing my way from one end of town to the other, realising that what I'd originally taken to be seaweed was actually strands of seagrass plucked from the meadows in the bay and washed ashore in great clumps with the tide. It was noticable that while the sea at the hostel end of town was warm, it was positively hot at the far end. Whether that be due to currents or if there's a thermal stream nearby I know not, but it was lovely. I rounded off my day sitting on the shore eating fish and chips and watching the sun set over the bay into the sea. A real girlsy evening followed with us eating our pudding and custard as we sat in front of the telly watching the Australian equivalent of Strictly Come Dancing. All in all it was a great birthday and it didn't matter in the end that some cheeky B*gger had pinched our wine from the fridge! All that was left to do was to survive the early morning shuttle run out of town with sleepy Trevor. We set off pre-armed with a list of inane questions we could ask him to keep him awake, but all that served to do was take his eyes off the road altogether as he strained to hear us, so we remained quiet and alarmed. Then a kangaroo jumped out and thundered off the side of the van. Although I don't think there was anything even a fully alert Trevor could have done to avoid the roo, I do think the recovery could have been a bit more controlled. However, it did wake him up for a bit, and with us getting him to stop again for a break further on and again airing our concerns we finally reached Overlander, clammy handed and anxious, but safe, and delighted to see our bus waiting for us. Thankfully the rest of the bus journeys were fine and my next port of call was Kalbarri.
Kalbarri is a lovely little town with a range of options for visitors. Each morning the local pelicans are fed on the green. Pelicans are not particularly greedy birds as a rule and don't tend to overfeed so even though they know they are guaranteed a feed, not every bird turns up each day. Numbers can vary from zero (though thats rare) to 20, and one of a local band of volunteers feeds them while imparting a few nuggets of information to the watching crowd: pelicans are nomadic rather than migratory tending to wander from place to place across Austalia; they mature about 4years but can live up to 20 years; once hatched they live in colonies with the older birds keeping the young ones under control by giving them a slap with their bills to chastise them! and relatively intelligent creatures they have been known to come to and hang about the green until help arrives if they're injured. Other wildlife encounters in Kalbarri included a visit to a parrot breeding and conservation centre and a seahorse stable. The parrot place was fine, but really once you've seen a dozen or so different parrots the novelty wears off - especially when you bump into an eccentric divorcee fishing for a feather through the mesh of a cage but simultaneously wanting to tell you all about her travels with her spiritual mentor. I quickly made my excuses and left! The seahorse place was abit more interesting but mainly because I'd never thought about their farming before. The stable breeds horses for the pet industry to prevent wild ones being taken and thereby conserving natural stocks which had been depleting. There were horses from one day old hatchlings right up to older specimens and of a variety of breeds. There are 34 different breeds worldwide but this stable only concentrate on 16 warm water living types which are more suited to domestic aquariums. It was strangely fascinating viewing but I'll not be racing out to get some of my own when I get home. There were a few attractions out of town to which no public transport was available so Annika, Kat and I decided to hire a car and go sightseeing. The car was automatic and I was driving but had never driven an automatic before and it took a bit of getting used to. As I reversed out of the parking space I managed to bring us to a very abrupt halt as I put in the "clutch" to change into 1st and move off!! We were at least able to vouch that our seat belts worked! I've no idea how many times over the course of the next couple of days that I managed to bring us to a quick stop, but fortunately it was always while slow speed manouvering. I managed to cope ok on the open road! On our first day we headed down the coast stopping at various cliffs and lookout points on the way. There was some amazing rugged cliff faces and wonderful coastal scenery. The layers and layers of sandstone and limestone were clearly visible in varying shades of pinks and yellows. It very much reminded me of a lot of Eastern Scottish coastline. At one point we were entertained by a pod of 8 or 9 dolphins playing just offshore and it really reminded me of home and the cliffs along the coast between Buckie and Sandend. From there we carried on until we reached Hutt River Province. That is one bizarre little place if ever there was one. Its about 75km square and its own little independant principality. Established in 1970 by the now Prince Leonard and Princess Shirley Casley, it seems essentially to have originated from an objection to wheat growing quotas which were being introduced by the Australian government. A loophole in the constitution was somehow discovered that meant a substantial change in economy and land use gave grounds for a separate state to be established. Bizarrely, and somewhat eccentrically, this couple set about creating their own little principality. It now has 13000 citizens, its own church, money, passports, flag, poatal stamps, crests and coats of arms, army, honours system, and about 130 ambassadors and consulates around the globe. Quite how it came to be that the family were so disgruntled that the went as far as they did I have no comprehension. There is even a Hutt River national anthem. Apparently, though (though Princess Shirley never mentioned it to us) its existance as a state only survives for the lifetime of the prince and princess, and although Shirley showed us round and stamped our passports as we entered and left the province, there was no sign of Leonard who is, according to our hostel receptionist, ageing and not in good health. All in all it was a very strange place but worth the 30km drive on corrugated unsealed road to appreciate just what a little empire it is! The next day we set out early morning and headed inland to the river gorges in the national park. Our first top after we negotiated the long sandy road in and avoided the kangaroos by the roadside was at the "Z-bend". A short walk took us down to the lookout: fantastic layers of sandstone forming deep, sometimes sheer and sometimes sharply rugged, cliffs towering above the little river zig-zagging below. Bushes and trees clung to the cliff walls and surrounding countryside dotting the reds and pinks of the rocks like green pockmarks. Leaving there we headed back along the track to The Loop. Here the river takes a huge loop (!) through the gorges creating almost a peninsula of cliff overseeing it all. (You've got to hand it to the Ozzies there is never any doubt as to why a landmark is so named!!) Starting out on the 9km hiking trail we passed a formation known as Nature's Window - a square rocky frame providing a perfect vantage point to look through. The layers of rock are even more visible than at the Z-bends forming a horizontal pyjama stripe effect of pink yellow and black, and with such varied textures too. Some parts are polished smooth while others have a wonderful rippled appearance just like wet sands, while others again are even more rumpled looking like someone had scrunched up a bit of tinfoil then tried unsuccessfully to flatten it out again. Down on the valley floor the dark river is sporadically bordered by little beaches of golden sand. Looking down from atop there were plenty of animal tracks visible ehere they'd obviously been down to the river to drink but now they were well out of sight. It was early in the day still, and there was a fair degree of cloud cover but already it was hot walking. Temperatures are usually about 10 degrees hotter in the gorges than in the town and already in the 20's when we left Kalbarri it was certainly much warmer now. We trekked on admiring the landscape and enjoying the walk even if the terrain was quite rocky, rubbley and hard going at times. After an hour and a half we reached the first of the big swings in the river's course and the path made its way down to the waters edge through a series of red river gum trees. With the water so calm the reflections were great - making the water seem very dark as so little sky was reflected in the water thanks to the tall cliffs. We carried on a little bit further but with not enough time to complete the circuit and return the car on time we retraced our steps. Apart from the steep climb back up the cliff we decided the walk was just as good doing this as the outlook was somehow different going in the opposite direction. By the time we got back to nature's window it was almost busy with vistors and tour groups vying for the best vantage points so we were glad we'd left when we did. A final wander round town was all there was time for before we had to leave Kalbarri and I moved on for a short visit to Cervantes en route to Perth.
Just a few km out of Cervantes lie the strange desert rock formations of The Pinnacles. These are thousands of pillers of limestone of varying heights, anything up to 5 metres tall, and covering an area of over 17000 hectares. Some are quite smooth while others are textured and jagged with little holes and cut-aways through them. The layers of rock are clearly visible in most but as the sands continue to shift more are being revealed as others are reconcealed. The pillars were created by layers of calcium rich shells and sand being compacted over time. The deposits created large solidified dunes which were filled in over time by further sand blows. Vegetation grew on the surface and the slightly acidic water draining through the leaf mulches ate away at the limestone forming the pillars and towers. Its an incredible sight: they spread over such a vast distance but look so strange and alien in a way and especially eerie in the showery dusky light that we were viewing them under. Walking amongst them though it wasn't difficult to spot some resembling the shapes of turtles, hippopotamus, kangaroos, cathedrals and so on. It was a fascinating visit and a sight worth seeing, but I was also glad to get back to the hostel and out of the stange phenomena called rain which we experienced! With dryer weather and some time to spare in the morning before our bus to Perth we went for a walk along the beach and it was immediately apparent just why this area is known as the turquoise coast. With clear water, blue-ish sky and sandy beds the water was reflecting various shades. The sand was white, the shore covered in salty green grasses and flowers and a few islets of rock sat just off the coast. It was beautiful and so reminiscent of the west coast of Scotland. It made me think of Gigha. With a bit of breeze even the sea had the chop and white horses so familiar at home. Strolling along the deserted beach we became aware of lots of blue jelly fish dotting the sand with straggly tails and inflated ballon like bodies: Portugese Men-of-War. Not lethal but nonetheless capable of a poisonous sting we gave them a wider berth. Rounding the point the sand became smoother, the jellyfish fewer and bird numbers greater. We reached a jetty and left the beach for a little cafe. Sitting drinking cappocinos in the sun, admiring the view and listening to the piped easy-listening music we reflected on the tough lives we're currently living! However we soon had to leave for the city.
Arriving in Perth, it felt odd being back in a city - much bigger and more impersonal than the towns and villages I have become accustomed to, but no doubt with plenty for me to discover.
