On Saturday morning after swimming a few laps at the Emu Point sea baths, I went to help out the man where I hire cars from, to upgrade his website as his regular guy has moved to Melbourne some time ago. It turned out to be a longer day than planned with a steep learning curve using software I hadn't seen before, but in return he kindly loaned me a car for the rest of the weekend which was great. Saturday night I had dinner at Marg and Don's and met their children from Perth (Catherine, Lia and Tyrone) and Marg's sister Deb and husband Pete, holidaying from QLD.
On Sunday morning we all headed off to Two People's Bay to put the tinnie (boat) in the water to explore some of the coves along the coastline but the waves were too rough so we abandoned that plan and stopped briefly at the beautiful Little Beach, before continuing onto Nanarup. Here we drove along the beach and stopped at a stunning sheltered cove for a swim, a short walk up the rocks for great views, and morning tea with cake. So many great spots here! Late morning we headed home for a shower and straight out again to the Porongurups Wine Festival where there was live music to dance to and all the local Porongurup wineries showcased their wares. The weather was perfect and a great time was had by all.
The long weekend continued on Monday morning when I headed off in 'my' car to Mount Adelaide, where there is a military museum which I did not visit, and Mount Clarence with great views over Albany. These and Mount Melville are the three mountains (hills) right here in Albany. Then it was off to the wind farm with more beautiful vistas and where I met a small group of guys who had just finished a competition using radio-controlled gliders and who were going up to the top of the wind farm to do some more gliding, so I asked to tag along because I was writing a story. I must admit I did look authentic as I was carrying my tablet (which I use for mapping) for security reasons instead of leaving it in the car. So out we went along a little track in the scrub with views across all the wind turbines, and on the way while chatting to Paul, the competition winner and very skilled glider, I discovered that he had spent 5 years on a bicycle, touring around Australia and overseas. When we reached our destination and the gliding began, I stood exactly where I was told to, as the gliders can reach up to 400kms per hour and I didn't feel like losing my head that day. .
At about midday I headed off to the Cheynes Beach in the Waychinicup National Park and on the way I met Kim, a young Swedish guy looking for a ride to Esperance (500kms away) and as I was heading in the same direction we decided I would drop him at the Manypeaks store about 50km up the highway but unfortunately when we got there the store was closed for the public holiday. We decided to continue to Cheynes Beach which was a bit windy but I could see its potential on a still day. On the way back we took a detour on a dirt road through the Waychinicup National Park and visited the camping area at ?? which was lovely with small private designated camping areas. I will be going back there with my tent. I dropped Kim at a sports oval near the Manypeaks store where he would camp if he was unsuccessful at getting a lift. I heard a few days later that he got a lift to Ravensthorpe and somewhere to stay the night, 30 minutes after I dropped him there and a ride to Esperance the following morning.
I headed home in time for a ukulele session on the beach at Emu Point, before returning to do further website work at the car hire place and return the car but Kalvin insisted I keep it for the week and the following weekend which was great.
