Oooooooooo! The Aussie's don't like the latest survey........

We awake as its so bright in the van, blimey have we over slept, No in fact it's only 6.20am but the sun is shining through the back curtains, that's a good omen I say as someone else buries her head under the sheet....  Watching Breakfast TV and they give the result of some Swiss survey about the best countries to live in, UK came 3rd whilst Australia came 6th........  They do not like it but only mention the beaches and the sun versus the English rain as to being their reasons, nothing about Culture, Sophistication, Country side, Comfort, Professionalism or the ability to buy whatever with ease without travelling miles. Yes I agree that in some of the cities there are some of the things I mention but in the main, in the Towns, no chance...... I for one would not give up the UK for Australia if Spain decided they did not want me, that is.
An example of what I mean is, in the publicity brochure for a beach that has been voted as having the whitest sand in Australia it states, " make sure you have a barista coffee on the beach at Lucky Bay with Lucky Bean Cafe". Now what sort of picture does that conjure up in your mind?
In mine and you would think I should have learnt by now, I had visions of a wooden building with an outside veranda overlooking the whitest sands possible, with several Costa Coffee type Baristas rushing around preparing meals, drinks in a comfortable dining environment, no not quite, we get the Aussie version:

Anyways we set off for Cape le Grand National Park, it's Sunny, it's dry and it's all on sealed road, whilst en-route we get to pass another publicised tourist attraction, Esperance Stonehenge, a replica of how it looked nearly Four thousand years ago, it's basically in a farmers back yard and it costs 10 dollars to have said look...... 

Just a bit further down the road we see this letter box:

We also see some stunning beaches, that in our opinion certainly on the day and it did rain yesterday, has whiter sand than lucky beach, what lucky beach did have was kangaroos on it, they were wild but obviously used to humans as they approached anyone who was eating and allowed you to pet them......
So after we had managed to stop giggling like school girls at the Barista Coffee Cafe had a walk along the beach we decided on lunch being at Frenchmans Peak, a Granite peak of 262m with a 'hole' cave passing through it at the top.  Only one of us wants to do the climb and so I set off on what is described as a gentle slope...... This gentle slope has my heart beating at 168 bpm and I am certainly puffing, it's the steepest lump of rock I have ever walked up, there is no path it's just a wall of rock, much more so than Javea's Montgo....... My heart beating at that rate was all due to the exertion and had nothing to do with the well endowed young lady in a bikini I met at the top......
We get back and go Sea lion and Seal hunting on the Great Ocean drive but fail miserably so with the prospect of going somewhere grubby for a drink we decide against it and go back to watch Friends on TV with a beer from the fridge, when I'm told in the nicest possible way, " You Stink " I forget the beer and shower instead............. 

    Frenchmans Peak

    Hellfire Bay

When you wish you had stayed in bed.....

The rain continued last night and whilst we did not have a power cut we did have what sound like 10 Hippopotamus dancing on our roof several times.
Now you know those mornings you wake up and the weather forecast is still heavy rain and you think what shall we do today and you then make a decision which at the time seems a good one but 8 hours later you are deeply regretting it and wished you had stayed home in bed, today was one of those days.........
The decision was based on the fact that there are two national parks in the vicinity, the nearer one being the better and more accessible and the forecast for tomorrow being dry, it made sense to do the further one today in the damp.......
No rush, we have all day, we may not get out of the van all day because of the rain I say but it's 130 kms away anyway.  Look it up on the map and decide on the route that has the biggest solid lines indicating sealed roads and off we go, with Leona Lewis singing to keep us company.
We go through the 15,000 kilometres in total so far mark with no problem, we go through the 100 kms from Esperance mark with no problem and are happily singing along to Leona when we see the reduce speed sign, as we are approaching road works.  No problem here as we have gone through this loads of times, the road works appear to be a re sealing job as we suddenly hit dirt, only its wider than the sealed road so, maybe they have problems out here I think.......
Now in the UK you normally have workmen, machinery, vehicles and CCTV cameras at roadworks on a main road, here there is nothing, I drive 10 kms on dirt, wet dirt soggy dirt and not a soul, this must be a big roadworks and everyone and thing is at the other end......
We start to hit ruts in the now mud, the steering becomes just slightly more in control of me at times than I care for and our speed is reducing. I can hear the quiet whispers of guidance being delivered to me calmly from the seat next to me, something along the lines of " DON'T STOP, KEEP MOVING, DON'T REV IT TOO MUCH, STAY AWAY FROM THE SIDE" like I say without a hint of panic, whilst I sitting there thinking, "Oh Shit!........."
And then we stopped............
Now in normal circumstances, best thing to do is put the kettle on and have a relaxing cup of tea, unfortunately, we did not do that, we tried to move forward and then tried to move backwards and what we actually did was dig holes with the wheels........  We are stuck!  No doubt about it this is going to take some sort of divine intervention or better still a tow truck......
I reach for my phone whilst the little angel that was sat next to me is turning into a muddy Sheila until I mention we have 'No Signal' and she becomes a filthy devil, I thought she was going to try the super human strength bit and lift us out.   With no regard for our safety and snakes sheltering from the rain, we start to drag broken branches and bracken from the road side and stuff it under the wheels and flattening the mounds of mud we had created whilst trying to get out.  It looks good so I tell the little devil to push whilst I drive and then if we get moving to run and jump in the van as I can't stop.......  
We start up and try going forward, move a good two inches and that's it, that's when I found out she was not pushing, she was in the passenger seat adding to the weight of the van.......
We start rocking the van backwards and forwards and after creating an indent of about 6 inches either side of the wheel, we suddenly move forward and out of the rut, after 20 minutes of stress a huge sense of relief floods our bodies we look at what's in front of us and the anguish floods straight back......
Just then two 4x4 Utes come blazing along, see us moving and give us the thumbs up before disappearing over the horizon........
After about another kilometre we see a sealed road up ahead, we continue and make it only to find it's about 30 yards long before disappearing and the road becomes dirt again.......
Decision time again, carry on or go back, kettle on or not, clean ourselves up or not........
Wash hands, turn around (at least we know what that bit is like) and will have tea later, the sooner we start the better, never mind the blood pressure.......
We're off and it's starts raining heavier, "No not now" I scream but we are doing well but both of us are thinking where was THAT spot and will we get passed it?  There it is and it's fair to say the van started to reduce speed, it did not travel in a straight line and there was no foul smelling odours inside the van but we got past the boggy bit, continued to keep moving until we found some tar-macadam again, pulled over and had a de stress lunch......
We get back to town and head for the nearest pub but it's typical Aussie, disgusting....... I grab a table with a view and have to brush the last persons food off of the chair, and even though the table is reserved for half five by four people for dinner, it's sticky, grubby and dirty with smeared wiped drinks and glass/bottle marks, Glug Glug, let's go back to camp site......
And so I find my self back on the bed thinking, should have stayed in bed today watching the news about the rain being particularly heavy last night and a Road Train that got stuck in floods nearby but wishing and hoping it will pour down again tonight as we have just won the dirtiest camper van in Western Australia prize....

    Just before we got stuck

   One of the stickers......

    Thumbs up

    Going through the puddles just prior to getting stuck and why we now have a brown van....

Rain stops play, part 2.

Pitter patter, Pitter patter most of the night and we awake to a grey morning, take our time and by the time we are heading for the Great Ocean Drive, backwards, it's beginning to brighten up.
We get to the pink lake but it's grey, no sunlight on it, get to our first beach and it's flat, dull and damp, however by the time we get to Twilight Beach the sun is beginning to win and the sea is becoming blue.  We stop and talk to a couple and then find out they know Javea well as they have a place out in Murcia, by the time we have finished discussing campsites and places to visit, the cloud has gone and we see Twilight Bay in all its glory, no wonder it won best beach in 2006......
We carry on doing the other 6 beaches, all of which Esperance is proud of before setting off to the Kepwari Wetland Walk Trail.  It's down a gravel road overlooking a lake so we stop here for lunch and although the sun has gone it's still bright.  Now officially birdwatchers are called 'Twitchers' and some conjure up the picture of 'Anorak's'.  Well all I can say is After this afternoon, I now have half membership to the club, so just call me Twit and boy could I have done with an Anorak..........
We set off in shorts, t shirt, sports sandals and camera, I leave the camera case with its built in waterproof cover in the van and after 35 mins of walking through what can only be described as dead bushland we come across  a bird hide and take a seat inside.  After a while there is quite a lot of activity on the lake, especially when two eagles fly overhead, never seen so many ducks poo themselves so rapidly....... And then, Pitter patter on the roof of the hide, I remember that sound I say and look at the lake to see it's raining, just slightly so a decision is made to wait it out before calling it a day and rearming to the van.
It starts to Thunder, it continues to thunder only now with lightning, the rain gets heavier, the sky gets darker and the noise on the roof gets louder........  We wait ten minutes and then decide it's got to be done, so camera up t shirt and out we go, it begins to ease, oh Thank you, Mother Nature and then, well if we had stayed in the hide we would now be deaf, it buckets down and continues to do so, not only for the next 20 minutes that it took us to get back to the van but an hour or so after that.  Once back to the van at least we could strip off, dry, change and hopefully save our electronics (cameras & phone).  The van is all steamed up so after a five minute blower on the Windows we realise we cannot see much further due to the amount of rain, however we start our journey along the gravel road which is now a mini river, we manage to climb up a small hill but then when we look down the other side there are huge channels now gushing with water, they weren't there earlier my co pilot states as we quickly drive to one side with two wheels basically in the bush and the van at an angle of at least 40 degrees...... We survive and find a sealed road, it's sealed but has no drains as it runs off into the lake so we are making waves so to speak until we join a main road.  Phew you might think, that's better as we did until you realise, that at this moment in time there are now basically only three types of driver on the road, 
1. Those driving as we were at a reduced speed, with care, but driving.
2. Those that have panicked and have simply stopped at the side of the road causing an obstruction to driver no 1.
3. The 4x4 moronic dickhead who belts about, mainly to the side of the road where the water is deepest so as to make the biggest splash possible........
It's just gone 4pm but I'm heading down the center of a two lane road making it one lane to somewhere I know we can park, hopefully not many people, we can have a drink and with luck dinner, we go to the bar in the Port, park up and give a sigh of relief as we venture out to get wet all over again.  It's an early dinner for us but the deluge turns into simple raining and then drizzle, we get back to camp and surprise surprise no one is using the laundry.  We soon put the machines to good use when it's starts thunder and lightning again, now we just hope the washing/drying cycle finishes before we have a power cut..........

    Our lunch time company.

    Dead bush walk

    Blue Haven

    Twilight Beach Rocks

Running from the Tain.....

We awake to find a new weather warning, heavy rain, thunderstorms and high wind, a quick decision is made, why hang around here......... And so the day is spent driving to Esperance, 480 kms East, it's our most easterly point apart from the National Parks outside of the town and tomorrows forecast is Thunderstorms.......... It not just us that's fed up with this wet summer the aussie's are definitely not pleased as its coming up to their National Holiday long weekend basically the equivalent to the UK's August Bank Holiday only called Australia Day!  
So booked in for 4 days expecting one day at least to be a damp and a quiet day......
The only good point about the rain is that the locals are hoping it will stop the morons who have been starting bush fires near here, as we drove here we could see miles and miles of burnt bushland that we had heard about earlier when we just missed the other big fire.
Now we have just seen the news and found out that Pemberton where we stayed in the forest and climbed those trees, has been deluged with rain last night and some areas flooded.  We are just keeping in front of any grief weather at the moment, hope it continues...... It should as the forecast for the holiday weekend is Sunny and 35 degrees, we can cope with that.......
Had to laugh at the sign on the inside of the doors in the toilets....... Apparently they have an international week where they have a lot of people from other countries come, some of whom have no idea how to use the loo and more toilet seats get broken in that week than the rest of the year.......
Had a quick look around Esperance and even though it's a Holiday resort, the the best beach in West Australia, it has four restaurants to choose from and one of those is a hotel restaurant, yes it has numerous Chinese restaurants, burger joints, fish and chip cafes and no end of different chicken fast food outlets etc but somewhere nice..... No wonder the locals love their BBQ's.....

  How to use the toilet......

    Esperance

Is this Oz or the UK

It rained during the night and after awhile you get used to the old torture method of putting you in a tin can whilst it is being water bombed....... Somehow we awake refreshed, step out of van and squelch, we are parked on grass and it appears we have had a lot of rain.......
It's also a bit cool, 16 degrees, it's the first long sleeve job since we have been here..... 

What to do in Albany on a wet day?  We start off by going to the National Anzac Centre, remembering the 41,000 Australians and New Zealanders who set off from Albany to fight in the First World War, it's not really for us but keeps us dry for an hour or so.  It also makes you question the makeup of the Aussie male, they travelled thousands of miles with and fought alongside Aborigines who enlisted with them but when they returned they shunned them, even the Government treated them very differently but then I think of the way the UK treated the Gurkhas, perhaps it's something in the ancestry of Aussies that's responsible?  Right, off to the 2 lookouts, one being the most visited lookout in the region, from where families watched the 1914 convoys set sail but the cloud is so low, we are in it and can see nothing.  

Next it's off to 'The Old Farm, Strawberry Hill' in the publicity pictures it looks as if it could be in Surrey/Kent, we get there and it's still raining, do we really want to walk around the first historic homestead farm established in Western Australia?  Not if we cannot walk around the 'Beautiful' gardens.  So we drive straight back out and go for an early lunch in an out of the way secluded lookout, fine until we start getting single guys drive up, get out, walk around in the rain, looking a bit shifty according to the wannabe PSCO, (they would not make eye contact ) and then drive off after doing nothing whatsoever.  

Okay then it's the Brig Amity for us, a replica of a sailing ship that brought the first European settlers from Sydney to Western Australia.  We smiled most of the way around, thinking "We paid money for this" and then went back up on top deck, two families arrive and fluff about so as to ruin any chance of a photo.  They appeared even less impressed with the Amity than us as they left not long after arriving, that said I feel the fact you had to climb down some stairs backwards, through a two foot square opening and then walk hunched up on the middle deck, even her of the height restriction had to bend at the waist to walk...... May, due to their build, have had some bearing on their decision.........
Next stop is the Old Gaol, a building saved and restored by the local historian society, one of whose members was inside collecting the entrance fee, this rain is beginning to cost us dear!  However he takes it for granted we are 'seniors' so we get a 50% discount on the entrance fee, yes that's the equivalent to £2.50 saved........  For first ten minutes it's fine but then the family with three young children arrive, why bring three children all under the age of 7 to a place like this, they were not interested one iota.  All they did was run around, shouting, calling for attention, touching things that should not be touched and generally being a nuisance, the mum did what all Mothers do and tried to control them but in doing so also added to the noise, the dad did what it appears all Australian dads do, he ignored them...... He walked around as if he did not know them and if they approached him, he would pass them onto their mother, we have seen a lot of this type of behaviour and it's as if because he is on holiday, then he does nothing, whilst the wife/mother has to do it all.  Still we saw photos of Albany a 100 years ago, what surprised us is, that even though we had been in the town centre once a few days back, we immediately recognised it from the photos, it has hardly changed, the main buildings and a tree are the same, progress stops in Albany with new car parking bays.........
We look up what's on at the cinema but it's all children's films (still school holidays) until 20.30hrs so back to camp site pleasantly surprised as its 5pm, we notice because, as we pass the pub there are a dozen Utes parked up outside........ With that it sounds like a good idea to open the fridge and test whether it's keeping the liquids chilled........

    Lookout for low cloud

    Brig Amity

    The realistic historical interpretation of the Old Gaol Warder........

Sedately Sunday

We slept a lot better last night in our new spot away from the thumping doors and by the time I have the kettle on, most of our fellow campers are up, eating breakfast, packing up, letting toilet doors slam or walking about in their PJ's.........  Now whilst the odd one in their PJs may be okay the majority are enough to make you choke on your super smooth extra creamy porridge......
Still it's Sunday and so whilst I'm out grafting, organising an extra day's stay and generally being a nuisance to other campers, someone else is........... See picture below!
The forecast is rain but it's sunny at the mo, so quick change of plans and we are off to Little Beach in Two Peoples Bay Nature Reserve as its reportedly one of Western Australia's finest beaches.  We arrive and yes it's okay but we happen across another smaller beach over the rocks from it, WOW!  It is my all time favourite looking beach so far this holiday, not a soul on it, the sun comes out to add colour, the sea is calm,  it is easier better in my opinion than Little Beach.  I speak to a local fisherman who explains they call it Waterfall Beach as in the winter when it rains a waterfall forms and runs down on to the beach, he also explains that on New Years Eve this year, someone letting off fireworks caused a bush fire that burnt 1200 hectares around these two beaches, hence the dark bits in the photos.......
It starts to cloud over so we head in land to Porongurup National Park, get there to find it's basically several huge lumps of granite with trees growing around them, a few trail walks, sky walk bridge that connects two granite rocks after a two hour walk up hill and that's it, except for 'The Tree in a Rock' I kid you not, this is a tourist attraction and all it is, is a tree growing in/on/through a rock, we climb up onto said rock and find a family of Skink's living in the tree, so it goes some way to alleviating our disappointment re said tourist attraction........
We drive around the park and see Trees, Trees and more Trees, no point trying to do the skywalk as cloud has descended and the view may be what we would consider insufficient after a two hour walk.....  So we find Porongurup Tea Rooms, in we go and we are served by a nice lady who looked like the sort of woman you would threaten little children with if they were naughty, so as to frighten them into being good......  Coffee is fine, tea is real tea leaves in a minuscule tea pot but comes with small jug of hot water and jug of milk.  Now I'm not a betting man but I'm willing to have a small wager to say this 'Children's Scarer' needs to consider purchasing some spectacles, as along the rim of the jug of hot water you could see five strands of a cobweb all leading to the bottom of the jug, where in the Center was a small white spider, drowned if not boiled alive.........  She who likes tea, only had the one cup.......
We step outside and there is a bird she has not seen before, that's it, next half hour spent up to our ankles in Death Adder territory getting photos of a Robin that looks like he has had a bath in a painters easel.........

    Hard at it........

    Waterfall Beach

    Little Beach

    New Bird.  "Scarlet Robin"

    Kept the best till last, 'A Tree in a Rock'

Rain stops play

Yesterday when we booked into this campsite, we thought oh that's a nice spot, clean, tidy and near to the bathrooms, I can be first one in after the cleaner has been.......
Then it started at 20.30hrs and continued until 22.00hrs, our fellow campers going to do whatever before they go to bed...... There are 8 units directly behind us, all relatively new with super spring loaded door closers, so as to keep out flies, moths, spiders and Skink's......  This meant that doors were being closed automatically as people went in and also when they went out with a slam, it was incessant and together with Isaac's mum who wanted to know if he was alright and the 2.30am lovey dovey couple, we had had enough.
First thing this morning into reception and change our pitch from no 8 to no 30 we are far enough away not to hear any thing now but have to guess when the cleaner has been.  It's a brilliant bright sunny morning so we head to Torndirrup National Park and head along with a multitude of others to the Gap and Natural Bridge.  This is where the sea has eroded away the rock over millions of years to form a 'Gap' and a 'Natural Bridge'...........  The Gap is closed until March due to a new state of the art viewing platform being erected so we head to the Natural Bridge and the notice boards actually tell you they are waiting for it to collapse, so do not try and walk over it........Killjoys.....!
We do the other sights, mainly beaches, Discovery Bay, Cable Beach, Goode Beach, The Blowholes and then Stony Hill, this being the highest point in the park and it's Stony...... It's a challenge and I leave her that does not like heights and within 20 minutes, I'm the plonker getting in everyone's photographs as I stand on top taking in the view, the fresh air and my own photos.  Next stop Misery Bay for lunch and the weather looks as if it's changing, right quick let's get to Whalers Cove so I can swim in the Southern Ocean.....
Whalers Cove has a publicity paragraph that states it is excellent for snorkelling, we get there but someone is not happy with a car of three men who are obviously not out for a day at the beach.  We are parked next to a sign stating " Look, Lock, Leave" Thefts have occurred in this area...... So we look, lock and stay, we make it obvious what we are doing, even recording their car reg number, they obviously Looked and saw us, failed to lock but then Left....... One happy bunny next to me, who wants to apply to become a PCSO when she gets back, I've told her she can't, they have age restrictions.........
And so, Mr G W Shark, you failed to have the tastiest morsel known to great whites today, I got in your territory, swam about, got bored saw 3 fish, had a leak and survived the Great Whites Southern Ocean, the first time I have ever been able to swim in it, result!  As for Australian Publicity propaganda, I should have learnt by now......
We get back to the van and find a note from the Police saying we had messed up a covert undercover operation.........
Not really, we hear the 'You are out of Red Wine alarm going off' instead, this we realise is an emergency as the Bottle Shops (The only places you can buy alcohol) are closed on Sunday's, so we do 62 in a 60 speed zone, that's 60 kilometres on a dual carriageway and go shopping in still wet swimming gear........ We get a bottle and I stop hyperventilating but then someone wants to go to Woolworths food shopping, now have any of you ever been in the chiller aisles wearing wet swimming gear?  It was freezing and I can confidently state that men you are never going to impress anyone in those circumstances........
The sky is black, thunder is rumbling and some serious lightening is occurring in the distance as we park up in our new spot, next to and under a sort of weeping willow type tree, no banging of ablution doors for us tonight, however now when the rain is falling and the wind is blowing the hanging branches against the van, instead of boom, thud, clump, tonight
we have scratch, tinkle, scrape........... Oh the joys of the life in the great outdoors........

    The Natural Bridge.

   Misery Beach

   Steve'summit.  Note the regeneration after a fire.

    Cable Beach