Day 78 Friday 1st July
We left at about 9.00 this morning for Kalbarri, after sleeping in. We stopped at Shell Beach on the way. This beach was made totally of little cockle shells, millions of them. Apparently they are about 5 metres deep. The water here is very salty too. The landscape has changed along the way. There were a lot more trees and even some crops growing (lucerne) and sheep. Kalbarri is a lovely town with the Murchison River flowing alongside it. Our camping area backs onto the river. Hopefully the rain will go away by the morning. It is quite cool tonight.
Distance travelled today 465 kms
Total distance travelled 12369 kms
Day 79 Saturday 2nd July
It poured rain all night but the sun is shining this morning. The view from our van is fantastic.
We drove off this morning to view the coastal cliffs. First, we went to Chinaman’s Point Lookout. It looks out over the mouth of the Murchison River and is quite dangerous with lots of surf crashing on the rocks. There were people surfing just nearby.
We continued on to Red Bluff Lookout. The cliffs here were dangerous but the story of George Grey was interesting. Many boats crashed along here in the early days, leaving very few survivors.
Next we went to Eagle Gorge. We saw a Manta Ray in the water just near the rocks here.
After this we went to Natural Bridge where we saw some interesting rock structures in the water. It certainly was not a welcoming shoreline to those early sailors.
On our return we stopped at Wittecarra Creek where an interesting plaque was placed. I would love to know what happened to these two young castaways.
There have been a few wild flowers around but not a lot. I can see that in about a month’s time the place will be covered in beautiful flowers. A common bush in this area is the Murchison Rose.
