The Great Southern Loop

I left Belgium in February 2008. Eight years ago. Since then I lived in Queensland, Victoria, New Caledonia and Western Australia. Since then, much has changed back home too. And I have a new life, we have a new life.

At last then, visit from the family ! The last one was in Melbourne, in 2009, when my sister flew in for three weeks, then in 2012 when she joined me in Asia. Now, it’s Mum’s turn. And she’s taking her first grandson along. He’s been dreaming of this trip ever since I left, saving money and talking about the things he’d do, etc.

It took some explanation on how to change terminals, how to pack bags, what to take, etc but finally, after a 23 hours flight, they landed in Perth a week before Xsmas.

Claire and I were still at work for a few days so they took that time to visit Perth and surroundings. Obviously, 40+ degrees was also a novelty but all things considered, that all went fine. After a great Christmas dinner, we left the next day for a ten days loop along the Western and Southern coasts of the state.

First stop, Yalgorup National Park, just south of Mandurah, where we could admire one of the earliest life-form on Earth, the thrombolites. Basically, we owe our lives to these rock-like things. They don’t look like much to be honest, a bunch of hard sponges or rocks left at low tide, but they were the first organism that generated oxygen, and later our atmosphere.

We camped next to Leschenault, where William helped his grandmother to set the tent up. Success ! First outback camping for the two of them (well, not quite the Rend Centre but still, drop toilets and nocturnal visits from wallabies, so that counts as outback, yeah ?). Also, this gave us the opportunity to test our next improvement: hot shower. We had bought a pop-up ensuite at the Perth 4WD Show, and converted a garden pump sprayer into a shower. Simply heat water on your stove, add cool water to reach desired temperature, start pumping, pop in your cabin and voila, instant shower. It’s almost glamping !

Further South, Cape Naturaliste and Cape Leeuwin, where the rough coasts allowed for spotting sun bathing sea lions. What a view !

Unfortunately there are no easy roads between Cape Leeuwin and Windy Harbour so we had to opt for tarmac. Pemberton has a great ride through the karri forest where you can tune in to a local FM radio, which explains the early settlers life, the timber industry, and some great Noongar stories from The Dreaming. There’s also one of the few remaining “fire lookout tower”, basically a platform atop the tallest karri trees, built in the 1940ies. Guys would spend weeks on a platform, swinging with the wing, looking out for smoke that would indicate a bush-fire. You can still climb to the top, but that required courage all four of us lacked that day. I’m sure any other day, yep no worries, just that day, I don’t know, climbing to 60 meters wasn’t that appealing.

After four days on the road so far, we felt like a break. Setting up camp every night and driving to the next in the morning is exhausting after a while. We aimed for a first spot, but being the festive season, that was full. Same story at the next campspot, Crystal Springs. Luckily though, there seemed to be a third spot (Banksia Camp, in the d’Entrecasteaux National Park), right on the beach, some 15km further out. The good news was, according to a guy who’d just been there, there was plenty of space left. The bad news (for Claire) was that it required four wheel driving.

We had decided to take the two cars, because Troopy is a two-seater only, and it would have needed too much effort to put the rooftop tent, tools, fridge, etc onto the HiLux. So, reluctantly, Claire agreed to deflate her tyres, and follow me. First time ever she’d driven on sand dunes. Well done, only one little bog (remember, momentum is the key !)

Under a light rain, we setup camp on a dune, somewhat sheltered by the trees, and enjoyed two days of rest, walks on the beach, visits to Walpole and the Valley of Giants (The obligatory TreeTop walk rewarded us with a quokka !), and mostly rest.

We went as far as Bremer Bay the next day and camped in the superb Quaalup Homestead, right in the middle of the Fitzgerald River National Park. The homestead was built in the mid-1800, and was successively a sheep shearing shed farm, an outpost, then became part of the War Service Settlement Scheme, then later part of the National Park and converted into a museum. Today, it’s a lovely homestead and camping ground in this amazing UNESCO listed biosphere. We’ll certainly try to go back for Wildflower season.

Time to head North, towards Wave Rock. Luckily the many graded dirt roads made the trip short and easy, and we got there before sunset. On the way, we purchased a few marrons for dinner, it’s New Year’s Eve after all.

We enjoyed a bright milky way to celebrate 2015, and welcomed 2016 the next day with a walk on the rock, and through the Mulka’s Cave where we gazed at the rock paintings, some estimated as old as 6000 years ago. Mulka’s Cave tells the tale of adultery, children wandering away from home, and the bogey man.

A total of just under 2000km and a ton of new experiences for Mum and William. Mum’s an avid nature buff and ranger at her spare times. She knows the name of all birds and plants around her so she was obviously lost in the Australian outback. None of it made sense, all flowers, plants, birds, mammals, … were new to her.