One of the things with crowded campings is that you don’t need an alarm clock. Still we set it for 6.50 am so Marjo can get to the first dolphin feeding. We shouldn’t have bothered as at 6 am we wake up from all the kids that wake up at sunrise. I make an early breakfast and Marjo can leisurely wander to the beach. She sees the dolphins up close and swears that one of them winked his eye to her. Or did I understand that wrong?
Meanwhile I slowly wake up and feed the dogs. Marjo then walks them and I pack up, hitch up the trailer from the entrance and we’re on our way. We stop at Little Lagoon for the promised kiting and kayaking only to experience that the wind is gusty and one second the kite pulls me over while the other it drops from the sky. That the lagoon is positioned lower than the surrounding land doesn’t help either with stable winds. Marjo has some lower back pain from standing waiting for the dolphins this morning so no kayaking either and the only ones who get some water action in little lagoon are the poopers.
After getting really spooked from all the 1080 poison bait signs and two people telling us that locals lost their dogs while letting them walk around the water, we get scared and decide to forego bushcamping on the shore. A pity as it looks very enticing with perfect conditions to kite. Ah well, what’s kiting if we can be certain that no harm comes to our dogs. We read about project Eden which entails a 10 year program to bring back native animals to the Shark Bay peninsula. It involves a fence (of course; Australians love putting up fences to keep unwanted animals out (remember the rabbit proof fence and the dingo fence?)) and cull wild goats, wild sheep and – most feral – the wild cats. The best way to get rid of the cats seems to be dried meat with 1080 poison. Only dogs and cats seem to eat that, the native animals rather have fresh meat like road kill.
We stop on the way from Denham to the main road – while we still have mobile reception – to arrange for a car service in Geraldton later this week. We have found that car mechanics are busy people and need a week notice. With that arranged, as well as our campsite in Geraldton, we drive East and South.
We notice that suddenly gum trees start to appear. Apart from the odd Boab tree we haven’t seen many trees in the north, only shrubs. “tell someone who cares” I hear you say as what’s the importance of trees to you. Well for us it is, great to tie the dogs onto so they don’t wander off and eat 1080 poisoned meat but more importantly as a source of shade so we don’t get cooked in the warmer sun.
Although Kalbarri is our next stop, we don’t want to drive that far in one go and stop at the Nerren Nerren rest stop. After enduring a gazzillion flies that love any part of man and dog alike and almost swallowing a bee who drowned in my beer can, I retreat to the bus and drink water. Marjo is more fly resistant and Dotti keeps snapping her jaws and eats flies for desert.
We have an early night.
Posted from Nerren Nerren, Western Australia, Australia.
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