Day 3 & 4: Ningaloo Reef

From Carnarvon, its another 400 km North to Exmouth and the Ningaloo Reef, with its white sandy beaches and crystal-clear lagoons. Nothing better than to end our trip right here... It was a great day and we made our first stop at Coral Bay.

In the afternoon, we checked out Turquoise Bay where we went for a snorkel. Turquoise Bay is a 'drift snorkel' wherein you enter the water at one point on the beach, and the current that is prevalent at that part of the reef carries you over the spectacular coral reef.  The current on that day was strong and Bastian needed to pull me out of the water at some point... 

After we got out of the water Bastian explained me that if we hadn't made it to the shore by a very specific point at the drift snorkel, there is a remote (but very real) possibility that we could get swept out through a gap in the reef into the open ocean. What he also did not tell me before was this video that he found on youtube showing a huge shark swimming at the exact point where we were snorkeling. Scary!!!

After all the action, we were ready to chill out... On the way we saw a family of Emus and lots of other wildlife. Its been so much fun just driving around and seeing all those wild animals.

We drove up to the Vlamingh Lighthouse where we had spectacular views of the entire cape. At certain times of the year, you are able to see Whales from here...

To increase our chances, we went to the Marina and jumped on a boat that was offering Whale watching tours. We were going for the big ones, the Humpback Whales which can get a length of up to 16m. We were lucky and saw few mothers and their calves cruising along and taking a breather... 

We had so much fun and we couldn't get enough. Before returning our lovely car and flying back to Perth, we took a few nice shots of the white dunes at the Ningaloo Reef. What a great vacation!!!

Day 2: From Geraldtown to Kalbarri


The day started early for us, we woke up at 7am - No breakfast, no coffee. But the sun was out already and we were excited to go to Kalbarri National Park. It was a stunning drive passing by diverse landscape. The roads become more and more sandy, but our Ford Focus stood up to the challenge...

After about 1 1/2 hours we reached the National Park. The Kalbarri National Park contains almost 2000 square km of wild bushland, stunning river gorges and eroded coastal cliffs. We stopped at the first lookout, the Hawks' Head: From here, we enjoyed an amazing view over the Murchison River.

We have to drive about 26km down the Gravel Corrugated Road, another sandy, concrete free road to reach the Nature's Window. Along the way, we passed by beautiful wildflowers.

After a short walk, we reach the Nature's Window, a wind-eroded opening in the layered sandstone. Bastian and I enjoyed the magnificient view and took some funny pics ;o)

From Kalbarri, we headed for another long drive: 450km north to Carnarvon. What was our lesson learned from the last day? Always have enough gas! Did we learn? Not sure about that. The road was leading straight all the way, no other cars except for us, reason for Bastian to drive the Ford Focus a bit faster, partially up to 170 km/h and the gasoline in the tank evaporated. About 20km more to drive and suddenly the fuel meter dropped to 10km... OMG!!! We turned off the aircon, the radio, everything just to save more gas... And we counted together 7km, 6km, 5km... The fuel meter dropped to 0 and we had 7km more to drive. Ahhhhhhhhh!!!! How can that happen to us AGAIN? We were in the middle of nowhere, no other cars, no people, no shops. We had no choice, but to drive until the car would stop. Finally we saw an exit sign to Carnarvon and asked people for the nearest gas station. We had luck as we made it with 300ml fuel in the tank! Puhhhhh. This is adventure pure, indeed!!!! With a full tank and a short break at our hotel, we finished the day the Carnarvon Blowholes. 

On the way we saw several animals crossing the street including a cow and an ostrich family. Unfortunately, we again saw several dead kangaroos and a huge dead lizard on the road.

Outback Adventure - Road trip from Perth to Exmouth

We took a long weekend off and made a road trip in Australia. We flew into Perth, rented a car (Ford Focus) and drove about 2,000 km up the coast to end the trip in Exmouth at the Ningaloo Reef. We had only 4 days so it was a truly action-packed adventure.

Day 1: Fremantle and Pinnacles

After a rough overnight flight, we headed to Fremantle for breakfast. A cappuccino and delicious scrambled eggs at Gino's got us off to a great start. 

What we enjoyed from the moment we arrived: Fresh air blowing and sitting outside at reasonable temperature... Fremantle is about 30 minutes from downtown Perth. It is often considered as the port city to Perth and is full of well-preserved architectural heritage. 

After filling our empty stomachs, we headed to Fremantle's market which is crowded with lots of meat, fish, fruit and vegetable sellers... It seems that everything is growing bigger in Australia. Evelyn couldn't resist these giant strawberries!

We found a lot of super-sized stuff. Even the eggs seemed much bigger... Ah, hold on. These are actually Ostrich eggs ;-)

 They also sold souvenirs like these didgeridoos...

We strolled around town towards the marina. Its a very quiet and relaxed town... the perfect start into our adventure.  

Our friends, Cuong and Mel, had recommended us a brewery restaurant by the water called 'Little Creatures' and we had fresh seafood and amazing 'chips' for lunch. 

We were ready to hit the road... We had another 500km to go with the first 250km to a small town called Cervantes near the famous Pinnacles. 

Evelyn started to count the dead kangaroos along the road... she counted 12... well, 12 and 1/2 to be exact!

The further we drove, the worst the weather got and it started raining when we got to the Nanbung National Park. Due to the bad weather and our GPS that didn't work well in the Outback, we missed the exit and drove for another 50km past the entrance to the Pinnacles. When we finally arrived, the rain suddenly stopped... 'When angels travel' ;-)

In the Pinnacles desert, thousands of huge limestone pillars arise from shifting yellow sands, resembling a landscape from a science fiction movie. We seemed to be the only ones in the park and enjoyed walking around the limestones...

We saw two Galah Cockatoos sitting on one of the limestone rocks and Evelyn managed to take some nice shots of them.

Another three hours drive to Geraldton was lying infront of us, we better keep going and especially follow Bastian's parents advice to fill up the car at the gas station in Cervantes right after the National Park. The town turned out to be a "ghost town" with only one gas station and a liquor store. It was about 6.30pm when we arrived there, standing infront of a closed gas station saying "New operating hours"... Fully optimistic, we went to the liquor store to ask for the next gas station. The old lady looked at me and said three words... "You are stuck". No other gas station around town, the next one was about 108km back to Perth. With gas for about 120km left, we were litterally stuck. The town was creepy, we definitely did not want to stay overnight. We risked to drive all the way back in the night. The drive itself was not the easiest, it was all dark and foggy, raining and randomly wild animals would pass the road. Plus, we were both afraid we would not make it to the gas station. But it turned out all to be good and we were able to fill up our car. From here it was another three hours drive to our next stop Geraldton. We finally made it to our hotel just before midnight and could only think of sleeping. Lesson learned: Always have enough gas in your tank!!! Nevertheless, Pinnacles rocked! Distance travelled today: 700km!