Long weekend at the Porongurups

The Porongurups are a small mountain range of granite formations of up to 670 metres, a 4 hours drive south-west of Perth. It’s peaks offer magnificent views of the Stirling Ranges on one side and the Southern Ocean on the other. During wildflower season, the Porongurup and Stirling Range National Parks are full of spectacular and unique wildflowers. Although only 20 km apart, both have a very different biodiversity. We rented a chalet as our base for hikes. Conveniently, there are some nice wineries dotted along the mountains. The Porongurup and Stirling Ranges were formed by 1.1 billion year old granite intrusions during the collision of the Antarctic and Australian continents forming the super continent Gondwana.

It was the first real spring weekend this year, with two consecutive days of solid sunshine. We drove past endless yellow fields of canola (“koolzaad”) plants in bloom.

Canola Fields

In the Porongurups are many Marri trees. These trees can grow up to 60 metres tall and are unique to Western Australia. They are also commonly known as Red Gum trees not because of the colour of the wood, but because of the colour of the sap or gum. When the bark of the tree is injured, it seeps a red gum and looks as if it is bleeding.

Aboriginals used the red gum, or "kino" to sprinkle onto wounds to prevent bleeding or mixed with water as a mouthwash or disinfectant. The tannin has antiseptic qualities. Large quantities of the powdered gum was also used to tan kangaroo skins.

Red Gum Tree

In the Porongurups we walked the Nancy’s Peak Circuit, a beautiful ridge walk, passing 3 peaks. The first was Hayward Peak (610m), named after Seybert Hayward who was Western Australia’s first director of tourism (1921-1942). The views to the Stirling Ranges were beautiful. Then came Nancy's Peak (670m) with views both to the Stirling Ranges and the Southern Ocean and Albany.

View to the Stirling Ranges

The last peak was Morgan’s View (585m), named after Alfred Edward Morgan, Premier of Western Australia for one month during 1901. Morgan owned land to the south of the range.

After a late lunch at Jingalla winery, we drove to the eastern side of the Porongurups. Flower colours changed from many purple and yellows, to more reds.

We walked the Castle Rock Trail to Balancing Rock. Here we saw the Southern Cross flowers. The flowers resemble the Southern Cross constellation, a symbol of Australia.

Southern Cross flower

We reached a massive rock called, quite appropriately, Balancing Rock. Constant weathering of the Porongurup Range over millions of years has left the harder granites exposed as bare domes or gigantic perched boulders. Balancing Rock is 6.4 metre high and has a 16 metre girth. Estimated to weigh around 186 tonnes, it rests perfectly balanced on a 1.21 square metre base.

Corine balancing on Balancing Rock

A little further, we climbed Castle Rock (570m). This rock was found and named Alfred’s Castle by Alfred Meadows Gillam (1846-1930), who was the first European to have climbed this monolith. The construction of a ladder, walkway and viewing platform on Castle Rock enabled us to enjoy the magnificent vista. The ladder was reached by scrambling over some 2 metre boulders. As usual we saw the appropriate warning sign: “please take care – your safety is our concern but your responsibility”.

View from Castle Rock

Another flower we saw all over the Porongurups, was a particular blue flower. We saw these along the ridge and thought that half of each flower had been blown away by the strong winds. But as we saw this flower in the dense undergrowth of the tall trees, we realised that it is a flower supposed to look like this. It never had been a round flower, but always "half"...

We drove back through the Stirling Ranges on Monday, with dramatic clouds.

Both the Porongurup and Stirling Ranges are famous for their many species of orchids. At the beginning of our journey, we made a bet who would find the most species of orchids, however, we never got further than one, a cowslip orchid.

Cowslip orchid

Wildflower festival in Kings Park

September is wildflower season in Western Australia, and the 400 ha Kings Park close to our house hosts the Wildflower Festival with guided tours through its botanical gardens and nature walks. Today started sunny so we went out to see what was flowering...

The south west of West Australia is Australia's only Global Biodiversity Hotspot and one of the twelve botanical hotspots in the world. Of the 25,000 plant species in Australia, 12,000 are in Western Australia. Nearly 80% of the plant species in the region are found nowhere else on earth.







Pink and white Everlasting flowers


We took a tour of the botanical garden. Our guide was very knowledgable not only about all the flowers, but also about the many different trees that we have here.

Our tour group under a beautiful peppermint tree

Most flowers in WA need birds rather than bees to transport pollen and germinate. There are some native bees in in Australia but they do not occur in swarms and honey was therefore not known in Australia until European bees were imported.

A bee germinating a Buttercup flower

Not surprisingly, there are also numerous birds in the park, sometimes easier to hear than to spot. We spotted many Red Wattle Birds this time around, who were feasting on the blooming flowers of the Parrot Bushes.

Blooming Parrot Bush flower

Red Wattle Bird

In Kings Park are 60 orchid species. This is more than can be found in the whole of Europe!

Pink Fairy Orchid

There are 76 Banksia species, and all but one occur naturally only in Australia. Banksias were named after Sir Joseph Banks, who, in 1770, was the first European to collect specimens of these plants. South western Australia contains the greatest diversity of banksias, with 60 species recorded.

Banksia

Many flowers have very different shapes and colours than what we are used to see in Europe.

Example of an atypical flower

Impressionist picture

Birthday girl finally becomes pilot

For her last birthday Corine's present was a trial flight with the Royal Aero Club at Jandacot Airport. Today was the day that this dream became reality. Corine was assigned an intructor, Graham and a plane, a Cessna 152 single engine two-seater. Her plane was the VH-TNO: Tango-November-Oscar.

Corine and her Tango-November-Oscar

The plane was to take off in formation with a vintage orange Tiger Moth.

The orange Tiger Moth

And Corine would control the take off of her Tango-November-Oscar!

Corine in control

They would fly in formation to the coast, just south off Fremantle. The Tiger Moth would then split from the formation and each would go their own way.

...And we have lift off

on her way to the coast

Corine would fly along the coast to Fremantle, Cottesloe, Scarborough, and Hillary's Boat Club. and meet the Tiger Moth after an hour to land in formation. Unfortunatly Tango-November-Oscar just missed the Tiger Moth for the formation landing. Corine and Graham landed the plane safely a minute later, and they taxied to the Royal Aero Club platform.

the eagle has landed

That was an unforgetable experience, and it certainly put a smile on her face!

Smiling Corine and her instructor

In Dutch we would say: "Nog een keertje!"

Easter in Sydney

We took the opportunity to make the long Easter weekend a bit longer and make the 5 hour flight to see Sydney in New South Wales. This is a longer distance than the flight from Cairo to Amsterdam we used to make regularly!

During the flight we overtook slowly another plane!

We stayed near Darling Harbour, close to the maritime museum and metro and monorail stations. The Maritime museum had an exhibition on Darwin's exploration journeys (it is after all the Darwin year) and the permanent collection had a vintage submarine, a replica of James Cook's Endeavour and a restored schooner.

James Cook's Endeavour with the Sydney skyline backdrop

We liked the area of the Rocks and Circular Quay a lot. It has nice harbour views, including the Sydney Opera House and the Sydney Harbour Bridge.

There is usually lots of traffic on the water, and often an enormous cruise ship is parked at the Overseas Passenger Terminal. There are many restaurants here with good views and atmosphere. Also the Museum of Contemporary Art is here, where we saw an interesting exhibition of Yayoi Kusama.

Sydney Harbour Bridge from the Rocks

We took the opportunity to see the Sydney Dance Theatre on our second night.

Sydney Opera House from a distance

After seeing the Opera House from a distance from the Rocks we had to visit it too. It is an impressive building with nice views on the city skyline, harbour and Sydney Harbour Bridge.

Sydney Harbour Bridge reflecting in the Sydney Opera House

We learned that the architect Jorn Utzon was not able to finish the building the way he liked. The interior is therefore not everywhere as impressive as the exterior. Only one room was in Utzon style. Currently his son is helping to restore the building in his father's style.

Corine admiring Utzon's design

Sydney is surrounded by water, and many places can be visited by ferry. We took a ferry tour from Darling Harbour sailing under the Sydney Harbour Bridge, stopping at Circular Quay, The Opera House, Fort Denison, the Zoo and some of the outer suburbs.

Fort Denison with the Sydney skyline backdrop

Sydney is an impressive city with many iconic landmarks and a more cosmopolitan feel than Perth.

Looking back from the ferry

Australia Day

January 26th was Australia day in Perth. We had just returned from a Margareth River long weekend to see the spectacular fireworks on the Swan River and from the rooftops of the CBD skyscrapers. We cycled to Kings Park with our camera to have a nice overview of the fireworks. The rest of Perth was there too, so it was a bit tricky to take pictures without people in it.

Spectacular fireworks from the CBD rooftops

Spectacular fireworks above Swan River

Perth by night

Driving North along the west coast

In November 2008 (yes we have been slow posting to our blog..) we did our first long trip in Australia. To get a feel of distances we drove to Exmouth and back in a week (3400 km driving). This is a trip that deserves more time really, so we will have to come back. But it gave us a good feel what is there to see and how easy it is to do long distance trips here. It also shows that in a week with a lot of driving, you still only cover a very small part of Australia!

Our GPS track on the Australia Satellite image

First stop: Kalbarri
The first stretch of our trip was the drive to Kalbarri, a small village facing the Indian Ocean, 589 km north of Perth.

Indian Ocean view from Kalbarri

Kalbarri itself was not our main goal, but the Kalbarri National Park offers great views on the Murchinson river canyon, even through Nature's Window (if you do not sit in it to block the view). The wildflowers were still in season and added some nice colour to the scenery.

Nature's Window with Corine and Jurriaan blocking the view on Murchinson River Canyon

Wildflowers in the Kalbarri National Park

Second stop: Shark Bay World Heritage Site
On the highway from Kalbarri to Exmouth we turned off to visit the Shark Bay world heritage site, a great wilderness area with several spectacular sites to visit. One of the attarctions was Monkey Mia, where bottlenose dolphins come to shore to catch fish they get fed. This tradition started many years ago when fishermen threw fish waste over board. Dolphins stuck around, and people kept feeding them to the point that they forgot how to catch fish themselves. Now it is strickly regulated and only a small percenatge of the daily food intake is fed. This allowed us to stand in the water a metre away from dolphins. A bit touristy, but spectacular nonetheless.

A bottlenose dolphin catches his fish

North of Denham and Monkey Mia is the François Péron National Park, a sandy peninsula with beautifull coastlines. This was a good opportunity for a first test on the off road capabilities of our car. No recovery techniques were required, so he passed the test (for now). The reddish sand provided beautifull contrast with the turquois blue ocean, dark green bushes and aquamarine sky.

The colour spectrum of the François Péron National Park

Remote
After a day in the Francois Peron National Park in West Australia we arrive in the sleepy town of Denham, low on fuel, tyre pressure, food, water and sunscreen. No shortage of red dust though.

In the local petrol station we buy fuel, water, juice and ice cream. "Are you having a party?", asks the guy behind the counter. "Maybe a very small one", I reply. "Not for our standards, it isn't", he replies, and after a short pause he continues: "Not much is happening here".

Since we were looking for more food than just our ice cream, we were looking for a supermarket. Corine points to the local map and asks the guys what Murphy's market sells. "You don't want to know", the guys replies. After a short pause he confesses: "It is a junk yard".

...Luckily Denham was not as bad as it sounds: we found our supermarket where we stocked up for the 800km journey the next day to Exmouth....

Driving on
On our way out of the area we had to stop at Hamelin Pool, where Stromatolites are still thriving in a unique habitat of hyper saline water. Stromatolites a colonies of cyano bacteria, one of the oldest lifeforms on earth. Stromatolites feed on carbon dioxide and produce oxygen. Billions of years ago this process may have provided in the oxygen we breathe now on earth. However, the stromatolites at Hamelin Pool are only 3000 years old. It is the largest population of stromatolites on the southern hemisphere.

Stromatolites at Hamelin Pool

Third stop: Ningaloo Reef and Cape Range national Park

Our journey continued to Exmouth, the gateway to Ningaloo Reef and Cape Range National Park. After a long drive, we camped just outside the entrance of Cape Range National Park. At night we wanted to spot turtles laying eggs on the beach. We drove to a beach entrance at no more than 20 km/h, because the road at night was littered with hundreds of Kangaroos. On the beach we found a quiet spot to wait for a turtle to come. Just when we were about to give up and started walking back we nearly stumbled on a turtle digging a hole. We hid ourselves behind a dune to avoid distracting her. The turtle was quite serious about her hole. After digging for a while she decided this was not "The Hole" and moved to a better spot to dig again. Very special to see, just us and this enormous animal. After an hour we gave up waiting for the right hole to see the eggs (this may take 6 hours).

The next morning we drove into the park. We stopped at Turquoise Bay to snorkel Ningaloo Reef. Beautifull pristine waters with nice coral heads to explore. We saw our first reef shark here.
Ningaloo offers many snorkel and dive spots, but on our short long-distance journey, we have only time for one. We will be back!

To avoid driving the same road back to Exmouth we liked to try an off road route along the coast to Coral Bay. And it provided another test for our car... The only hurdle was to cross Yardie Creek at low tide. A place were tourists have been known to require expensive towing assistance after a failed attempt.

The access track to the Yardie Creek crossing

We waited for the lowest tide and we walked, or actually, waded the crossing to see if ground was firm and flat. At the low tide point a Landcruiser came from the other side and crossed without a problem. We already heared from the locals how to do it, so we were confident that our car was up for it. And it was... Although it may not have liked the salt water on its chassis, but that is also part of the initiation.

The Yardie Creek crossing

The track to Coral Bay was sandy but firm so easy to continue. It offered beautifull views and many kangoroos stopped along to road to see who was passing by.

Kangaroos watching human wildlife

We also saw our first Emus. A mother with two chicks.

Emus in Cape Range National Park

On the way back: Geraldton
After a night in Coral Bay, we only had to drive back. We drove in one go to Geraldton, a medium size coastal town 424 km North of Perth. Geraldton has an interesting Maritime Museum where stories of Dutch shipwrecks of the 17th century were nicely told. Many did not make it to Indonesia. The story of the Batavia that shipwrecked on the Houtman Abrolhos islands was particulary interesting. It involved mutiny and murder. After months on the islands the remainer of the crew decided to build a small boat from the leftovers of the Batavia. In this boat they managed to sail in four weeks (!) to Batavia, some 3000 km.

The next day we reached Perth, looking back on an intense journey. We know we like to go back to many of the places we visited. We have a good feel of West-Australian distances now: they are large.