HEADING UP THE CORAL COAST

15th May, 2012

Our house sit has come to an end and there was a lot of tail wagging from Jake and Puddles when their owners (Martin and Kay) arrived home.  We were soon on our way – travelling north to New Norcia where we stopped for a walk around the monastic settlement.

New Norcia monastery

The monastery was founded in 1846 by Spanish Benedictine monks as an aboriginal mission.  

Courtyard inside monastery

The early years were tough ones in this unforgiving country but the founding monks persevered and today the mission is still in operation, holding prayers and retreats

Abbey church

and an on site bakery produces boutique breads and gourmet treats.  It was strange walking around the beautiful old buildings where you would expect it to be lovely and tranquil but as the Great Northern Highway runs ‘smack bang’ through the middle of the settlement the sound of road trains rumbling through sort of spoils the serenity.  We turn west towards the coast and stop for the night beside a quiet country road before continuing on to Cervantes in the morning.  At Cervantes we pay a visit to a colony of Stromatolites at Lake Thetis.

Wok checks out the Stromatolites at Lake Thetis

Stromatolites are the oldest known organisms on earth dating back 3.6 billion years.  The stromatolites here are only youngsters – 3,500 years old.  They aren’t very energetic but we guess at that age they have earned the right to just sit around and blow bubbles.  We head north along the

Indian Ocean Drive

and stop for lunch beside the beautiful aqua waters of Jurien Bay.  After lunch we walk out onto the curved jetty

Jetty at Jurien Bay

to see if the fishermen are catching anything but they don’t seem to be having much luck.  We continue north following the coastline and driving in and out of the small seaside villages.  With the opening of the new road these seaside communities are now within reach of Perth and new subdivisions and beachside homes are springing up.  Some of these sleepy seaside villages will soon be devoured by city folk looking for a seachange.  Ahhh!  The price of progress ….

We take the opportunity to free camp for a couple of nights and then continue north on the No 1 Highway

Brand Highway

passing the pioneer settlement of Greenough with its bizarre leaning trees.

Leaning tree at Greenough

The prevailing southerly winds have forced the trees to grow horizontally and have become something of an icon in the region.  We arrive in the coastal town of Geraldton at midday and check into a caravan park at Point Moore where the red and white striped lighthouse is quite an ‘easy to spot’ landmark.

Lighthouse at Point Moore

With its beam being able to be seen 26 kilometres out to sea it is also ‘easy to spot’ from that angle as well.  We have a walk along the foreshore and take in the old buildings in the city centre.  The information bureau is located in a lovely two story building that was part of the district hospital built in the late 1800’s and the old prison is located nearby.  Sitting high atop a hill behind the town and overlooking the ocean is the HMAS Sydney II Memorial.

HMAS Sydney II Memorial

The HMAS Sydney II and her 645 men disappeared after a battle with the German Raider HSK Kormoran in 1941.  The German ship was also lost but many of her crew survived the ordeal.  The silver dome is made up of 645 seagulls each representing one of the lost HMAS Sydney II crew.  When the architects and engineers were surveying the site for the memorial they were constantly harassed by seagulls and this sparked the idea of creating the memorial with the seagulls becoming a feature of the dome.  Beside the dome the bronze statue of a woman gazes out to sea as she awaits news of the ill-fated Sydney.  The mystery of where the two ships lay was solved in 2008 when the Kormoran was located 207 kms off the west coast at Steep Point and 4 days later the Sydney II was discovered not far away.  A remembrance pool was then added to the memorial with a lone seagull dipping its wing into the water at a point marked on the bottom of the pool with the longitude and latitude of the wreck.  A wall shows photographs of the ships and the names of the HMAS Sydney II crew.  It is a marvellous memorial and a thought provoking one as well.  So many men lost on both ships – the futility of war.

Next to the marina is the Geraldton Western Australian Museum.  The museum is housed in a new building and we were very impressed with the displays ranging from the lives of the local aboriginal people to the influence of European settlement.  Of course the many shipwrecks in this area are covered – the most famous being the Batavia which happened on the Abrolhos Islands 60 kms west of Geraldton.  On Monday morning we visited Fishermen’s Wharf and took a crayfish tour.  Live lobsters are processed at the Geraldton Fishermen’s Co-operative and we followed the lobster’s journey from the moment they arrived at the co-operative

Lobsters arrive at the co-operative

through the sorting process

Sorting the lobsters

into the holding tanks

My - What big beady eyes you have!

and onto the packaging in preparation for export to the overseas markets – mainly Asian buyers who pay a veritable fortune for these leggy crustacians.  It was an interesting tour and we got up close and personal with lots of very expensive future dinners.

This monster lobster will fetch $300 in the Asian market

On the road again and only 32 kms north of Geraldton we pulled off the highway for a look at Oakabella Homestead.  The farming lease was taken up in 1851 and the pioneering stone homestead “Oakabella’ is classified by the National Trust.

Oakabella Homestead

The home is filled with furniture and nik naks from the pioneering days and the barn with its unique buttresses that were added later to make the barn more stable was full of farming implements dating from the 1850’s.

Buttressed barn at Oakabella

We find it hard to imagine how anyone could farm on this rocky stark ground.  Even now we find it hard to believe that anyone could eke a living out of these arid lands.  What the sheep and cattle find to eat is beyond us.  We turn off the highway and take the scenic route closer to the Indian Ocean.  Along the way we stop at the ruins of what once was Lynton Hiring Station tucked away at the foot of rolling hills.  Built in 1853 the station’s stone buildings once housed convicts who worked on the Geraldine mine and local pastoral stations.

Lynton Hiring Station

Of course when you have convicts you also have to have a prison where you can put the ‘bad’ convicts.

Ruins of prison cells

Heaven knows where these convicts were going to escape to as there would have been nothing within hundreds of kilometres north, south and east.  And to the west, nothing but endless ocean – really it's like building a prison within a natural prison.

During our travels we have been intrigued by the continual sightings of these small round melons.  

Wok is bemused by all the melons

Not only do they grow along the sides of the roads, but also in newly ploughed fields, in grassed paddocks and now here on the rocky ground of the hiring station.  We have been told that they are called Pig Melons or Pie Melons and just grow wild.  Rumour has it that some of the early settler women used them as filling for pies with other fruits such as apples.  The melons have no real taste of their own and take on the taste of the fruit they are cooked with.  Other than that they don’t seem to have any other use whatsoever.  Maybe we will find out more about them as we travel on.  We take a side trip into Port Gregory where a couple of lobster boats were anchored.  

Lobster boats moored at Port Gregory

Port Gregory was to be the main port on this part of the coast but the encircling five kilometres of exposed coral reef proved too dangerous and the port was abandoned for a more suitable site.  Today it is a small fishing village that will probably stay just as it is, sleepy and isolated.  Just outside the town is Pink Lake.

Pink Lake is definitely pink ...

Its colour is created by the naturally occurring beta carotene and a factory processes this for import and export.  It is getting late in the day so we head north to Kalbarri and check into a caravan park for a couple of nights.  Surrounding the town of Kalbarri is national park and tomorrow we will leave the van and head out on some dirt roads to check out some of nature’s wonders, but that will be in the next blog ……