If they are crouching........

Out at 5.30am but beach walk/limp totally uneventful compared with Crocodile Wednesday, walk from beach to camp site, just the odd eagle or two, the limp into camp site, nothing other than the normal green parrots, the walk up to the van or should I say, Motorhome, I see a local resident crouching, what you looking at I say, as all I can see is what appears to be a branch on the ground......... His wife whispers, it's Tawny Frogmouth Owl, it's baby has fallen out of the nest and the mother is Guarding it from the Magpie Larks....... I approach in a semi crouch and the branch transforms itself into a once in a life time moment when you can see both mother and baby Tawny Frogmouth Owls without being up a tree, according to Clive, the local naturalist...... So what do I do, I burst into the van, excitedly grab my, now dry camera and whilst reassembling it, utter some form of gibberish, which from the tone makes someone who has just been rudely woken up, get out of bed, grab her camera and start clicking away outside in her night attire......... After the photo session, I stand guard, attempting to fend off the magpie larks, failed miserably on three occasions, when the MPL flew in and clouted the mother owl on the head with their feet, whilst Clive goes to contact Animal Rescue. Mother owl was the ultimate defender, she did not shrink from her protection instincts until Rescue came in the form of a bronzed Adonis, with a ladder, plastic tray and blanket......... Baby owl taken up a tree in the tray and left until mummy flew over. 
So now when ever we are out and looking for hidden wildlife, we are just going to look for the Crouching Aussie..........
The rest of the day spent site seeing, but that was quickly over and then spent around the pool which is somewhere in the region of 36 degrees........ Funny when we get into the air con van and 32 degrees feels cool.......... Off into deep outback tomorrow with no internet, just aborigine settlements, (Fitzroy Crossing, Halls Creek) so possibly no more updates until Lake Argyle.
One good bit of news though, we saw, approached and spoke with German couple who were robbed, they found all their stuff in the back pack that was stolen, hidden / thrown away in a tree on the camp site. Police say thief just wanted cash as Passports, Credit and Debit cards all found intact.  As we left them it was smiles and Thank you's all round..........

18.35hrs, Even more Good News, sunset was 20 minutes ago and Baby Frogmouth out of tray and bouncing about on a branch next to Mummy Frogmouth.

    A Osprey

Just Chillin

Is it me or does anyone else find it hard to do nothing? I am advised that today is a rest day, we will do nothing but chill, hard to do, when it 37 degrees....... So upon waking at 5am, I put my Burglar skills to use and stealthily creep out of bed, get dressed, get heart monitor and phone so as to track distance and route etc all without disturbing someone, ahh I hear you say, he is so considerate...... Then I get out of the Motorhome and slam the door........ Which whilst someone may feel the need to chastise me, I believe I did her a good turn as she then got up to use the bathroom........ 
Next stop Cable Beach, the tide is out so a huge expanse of sand awaits my footprints, I start my so called power walk and head towards Gantheaume Point, when I am waved to by two female athletic beauties, who are definitely beckoning me over to them and their two dogs, it must be me as its only 5.40am and there is now other stupid bugger on the beach...... So over I go and one of them asks if I have a phone, I say yes and produce my iPhone 6, and she runs off with it.......
Not really, only joking, she takes it and asks do I have email, I again says yes at which point she crouches down and then says where is the camera, I indicate the camera app, she crouches down again and moves here dogs out of the way to reveal a small baby Crocodile, stranded but fiercely protecting its piece of Cable Beach territory, snapping at anything that gets within 4in of it.  Having taken a picture she tries to email it to herself but alas my Spanish Phone has data roaming turned off, talk about take liberties, I mean she could have taken advantage of me, no problem, but liberties...........
Back at base after a dip in the pool and sending pictures via wifi, we head off to town to see what Broome has to offer, we step off the Bus and are greeted by Australia's version of the looki looki man, only selling carved palm tree seed pods, we unfortunately decline his offer, I say unfortunate because later as we walk around town, it becomes apparent that the majority of the indigenous people sit around doing nothing but talk and drink which later becomes shout and drink, whereas at least looki looki was trying to fend for himself.......... If we see him tomorrow we may just end up buying a palm tree seed pod with some strange markings and pattern on, now I wonder who we could give that to as a present...........?
The Sunset photo completion is drawing to a conclusion with both participants down on the beach wanting to include some wet rocks in the foreground so as to capture the setting Suns reflection.  Unfortunately today's completion came to a sudden end when one of the competitors  who was using all of his mountain goat skills to clamber over the wet rocks suddenly fell A over T, and after cleaning the algae from the offending rock with the seat of his pants, soaking his camera, attracting every shark within a radius of 20 miles with the fresh sent of blood from the cut on his ankle, ended up sitting in a rock pool....... As he walked home, dishevelled and covered in a green slimy coating, he wonder just how many of those people behind him taking sunset photos, managed to capture the action shot of his fall from grace............

    Oh so snappy

    Prior to being upended with the glistening rock pool beckoning.........

Sweeping along the Coast

So there we are at 5am, when thump thump outside the van, I'm already awake but someone else wakes up thinking someone is trying to break in, no I say, it's a bit of bark falling off a tree hitting the roof, but now your awake, I was thinking.........

And so it's decided that after a cup of tea, we make an early start and do two days driving in one......

5.30am and I'm in the camp showers all lathered up and singing 'my ding a ling' when suddenly I turn and confront this female with no clothes on, staring up at me, with her arms outstretched in my cubicle, I mutter a deep manly gruff moan that possibly sounded like 'Eeeek' before I notice the sparkle of desire and wanting in her eyes, she moves closer so as to embrace my sublime toned naked body, I notice that she is now standing up on tip toes as if to grasp me and never let go of me in this passionate moment and then I notice her other set of legs and arms waving about at me before I spray our 6inch friend with the shower head and she scurries away under the cubicle door.......

We drive, well when I say we I mean, one of us drove for 9.20hrs and one of us sat in the passenger seat looking longing at the bed in the back thinking, will he mind if I just have a little doze...... The journey is without incident, except for the bush fires we have to drive through and the 4foot lace monitor lizard we almost collide with, but we arrive in Broome and settle for Cable Beach Caravan Park.

Now after 9 odd hours of driving in temps that not once went below 35 degrees, all I want to do is check in, connect up and relax with a cup of tea under the fronds of the palm trees surrounding our site, but hey whilst talking to the receptionist, the phone rings, it's Nina, God knows where she is but she wants to cut a deal where she pays when she decides to leave and not beforehand like very one else...... 5mins later the receptionist returns to us, saying sorry admittedly but can sense I am not best pleased, possibly because I mentioned the fact, that I was thinking of phoning her so as to get checked in quicker....... I am not a happy bunny....... So whilst we are discussing what would be the best site for us with a site map in front of us, the door opens and a German couple walk in, they approach the desk where all three of us are discussing our site location and interrupt by saying, " Just a quick question" and suddenly start talking to the receptionist about changing their site and what other sites do they have available, HE then turns and points and uses our site map to discuss his problem with the receptionist.  Nuclear Explosion time, and without a diplomatic statement, suggestion, hint or reference, he gets told unequivocally to wait his turn and get off my map.......... "Of course" he replies and whilst feeling slightly embarrassed for my outburst to a fellow European, we park up and live the dream....... Out for dinner, she has had such a hard day, I feel someone else should cook for us and so go to restaurant above cable beach for the continuation of the sunset picture competition....... Even I have to admit to one to the pictures below having a certain mystical, magical and dynamic feel to it, where the colour in the sky makes the subject stand out and makes you wish you could be him!

And so we return to camp, only to see the Police driving in 4 minutes before us, but more importantly, we see a man, walking towards us away from the site putting on another top looking furtively around him as we would say in the trade...... Upon entering camp we find out someone has been broken into, we mention our suspicious man and within minutes we are talking to the local constabulary who are taking the details of what has been stolen from our 'Only a quick question' German couple........

We advise where we saw him, that he was not carrying a swag bag but suggest it could be wise to search the said area in daylight or now with serious torches, but that we will check early in the morning for them, providing they don't interrupt us that is.......

And now to sleep with the thought on my mind, do I tell her it was me banging on the side of the van........

'T' Day

Up before the sun and return to shark nursery in hope to get better/underwater photo but Stupid Steve did not think and 'Mr Know it all' did not mention, at 5.30am it's low tide and there is not a drop of water in the nursery.........
Therefore only thing to do is get someone else out of bed and hit the road, one of us was not altogether impressed with that idea........
We hit the road before 9am with a 535kms drive ahead of us, we have now mastered driving Oz style, get up to 100kph put it in cruise and keeping going straight ahead, we Travel 535kms and only do 1 x right Turn and 2 x left Turns all day, and that was in the first 13kms........
As we drive the first 200kms  awaiting the landscape to change, I say "I spy with my little eye, something beginning with T".  Possibly 20 minutes/30kms later, She actually sees one of what I had seen and shouts out "Tree" and so that game came to an end with me losing once again.........
I then get to play with or rather they get to play with me....... 
They being mini Twisters......  As we drive along you can see them forming on the flat barren landscape, picking up the red earth / dust and spinning towards us, most missed but some caught us and if they came from the front it was like hitting a giant wet sponge but if they came from the rear you felt yourself suddenly being accelerated and forced forward at a greater speed than you were doing.........
We pass hundreds of Termite mounds, all of which must be between 5-6ft tall and 3-4ft wide but do not see another living thing for the whole journey, well non human thing, now that brings me onto our final T, it stands for 'Terror'.........
Can you imagine someone aged late 20's wanting to work in a Cafe/Petrol station that is 270kms from the next living sole........ Well we break the journey up to get diesel and a coffee, so stop and enter a roadhouse as they call it, having filled up with diesel prior to entering.  As we step through the door, we immediately notice there are no other customers, in fact where are the staff........ When from under the counter up pops a guy in his late 20's who as soon as I saw him, I thought of Jack Nicholson, in 'The Shining'  after paying for my coffee we sat down, when he approached from behind and said "Here's Coffee" at which my incontinence problem was immediately cured..........

We have now made it to Karratha in the North West where hopefully someone will allow me to put my feet up whilst she makes a nice cup of T.

Coral Bay

So an early morning stroll along the deserted beach reveals nothing other than I'm on my own, so I think back to last nights conversations whilst sat around the Billabong campfire where we are told about the Reef Shark nursery/sanctuary on the other side of the bay we have been swimming in.   So naturally we take a 20 minute walk along the beach and come across 28 Reef Sharks and numerous Rays swimming in the shallows at times only 6-8 feet away from my little piggies being lapped by the gentle swish swish swoosh of the incoming tide. Photos are taken and later deleted and we walk back before the incoming tide cuts us off and forces us into the water, without my waterproof action camera to capture the result of the meeting between woman and beast..........
The afternoon is spent snorkelling and one of us exuding so much wasteful energy diving down to capture and immortalise some of the fish forever in film but failing miserably as they dart off and leave him swimming through a cloud of fish poo.........
After a quick rendezvous with 'Mr I have been everywhere, got everything (even a Land Cruiser) and know it all' we embark on a cross town walk, 5 minutes later having reached the start of the Bush, we think, 'We are coming back here for Christmas' .......... And then think, Bliss, probably, just what we will need after galloping around the Northern Territories for several weeks, as even he is not stupid enough to go swimming much further north of here, well except for New Years Day when we are staying in Shark Bay, now I wonder why they call it that?

Week 1

Well we have been on the road for a week now, covered 1512 kilometres and settled into the routine of a nomadic lifestyle reasonably easy, one of us says what she wants and the other say's "Yes! Mistress"..........
A quick pop around the corner of 265kms and not only do we enter the Tropic of Capricorn, we arrive at Coral Bay, where the only thing to do is relax, snorkel and drink beer, ours is now under lock and key after two swigs Julie's antics the other night.........
As you can see from photo, not a bad place to chill for the weekend before some serious driving next week and a self congratulatory beer is about to be consumed after successfully erecting the canopy shade on the side of the van, with a table and chairs underneath so as to enjoy the outside lifestyle I'm feeling a confident little camper man.......... and whilst I may be looked down upon by the true caravan/tent brigade because we are in a motorhome, I just don't want to turn into some of those that we have met so far, who talk nothing other than vans and the 4wd cars that pull them........... But should any of you be interested, go for a Toyota Land Cruiser, version 2 now it's been updated and modified, with turbo chargers, especially as there is always a Toyota dealer nearby, cannot remember the rest as we both turned off and started to fantasise about the possibility of checking the air pressure in the tyres......... which of course, don't forget to reduce if you go off road for extra grip. zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzZZZZZZZZZZ

Such a Busy Day

We awake and one of us ask's the other, "So, how do you clear your head the morning after" I reply, "By Snorkelling!" So it's before 10am and not only are we on the road, one of us is on the wagon.......... However by chance, we come across a group of Eagles and Crows feasting on something beside the road, having been told that Wedge Tail Eagles can kill if you hit then in a fast moving vehicle because they will easily come through the windscreen, we stop, bail out and cause huge consternation to the one and only other vehicle on the road, he had to go around us on an empty road........ 
After testing ones stalking skills again and finding they had not improved, we move onto the blow holes, which really need no explaining, unless of course you are the driver that had to drive around us............
Our ultimate destination is one kilometre further along the road and wow, not only did it clear her head and nose, a picture she refuses to let me publish, she was smiling more than me. We spent an hour and ten minutes swimming with the fishes before we found out about the reef sharks that also swim these same waters........ Don't worry Kathleen, I was perfectly safe, Julie was furthest from the beach........ Then as the tide turned we saw a flock of birds diving into the shallows snapping up the fish who had just been smiling at my camera, two of which were Albatross, so all in all we all had a great day, we'll all bar some of the fish........
Then to cap the day off we returned to the 'CLOSED' one mile pier, the longest in Western Australia apparently, to take the statutory sunset picture, of which there will be more, as someone took a better picture than me...........
Update: Someone is feeling better, as I bought her a book this morning on Birds of Australia, she has just spent 30 mins looking through it to find out that the local man who has been in these parts for 20yrs, who told me the large bird was an Albatross, was wrong, it's a Pacific Gull.......