Monkey Mia to Whale Bone and on to Galena Bridge

Leaving Monkey Mia this morning after for days. The skies back to their usual blue after an overcast day with the occasional spit of rain yesterday. There are enough walking tracks around MM to keep everyone occupied when there are no Dolphines to be watched and there are several excursions with two catamerans on offer at the booking office of the caravan park.

A last hot shower for a few days, and then back on the road towards Denham. About 10km out of Denham is the turn-off on my right to Cape Peron, a dirt road currently closed to all traffic except Tour-vehicles and just beyond the turn-off, the road to Little Lagoon with beautiful white sandy beaches for sun bathing and several sun shelters with tables and barbeques. In the distant hills of Denham I can see already the four towers with their propellers, the Windfarm for Denham. There is a queue at the Service-station-come-shop, but I only need a few bits from the shop, so I stop out in the street and walk in. I then put my name down at the visitor centre to stay the night at one of the rest areas.

There are several rest areas south of Denham, the first one being "Eagle Bluff" high on a hill with fabulous views and a boardwalk.

View from Eagle Bluff Boardwalk

From there I drive on to "Fowlers Camp" where I run into four people I met at 14-mile beach. They suggest that "Whalebone Bay" may be the best and I decide to drive down a few more km to the turn-off. This is probably the best spot, but still quite windy and I need to turn my off-side of the van into wind to have a little protection. At least, its not dusty and I am looking right at the ocean in front of me.

It does keep blowing all night, the van rocking me to sleep with gusts of wind. When I step outside in the morning, its still blowing but not a cold morning, so, after breakfast I set off again towards Karbarri, further down the coast. Its about 100km back to the main highway that will take me further south. Some views of Shark Bay as I head towards the T-intersection, apart from that though, just scrub either side of the road, quite a few caravans and motor homes on the road, heading towards Denham and Monkey Mia.

Once I have turned right, heading south, I make e tentative stop at Nerren Nerren Rest Area that has a good write-up on my map. It looks quite nice and clean but its right on the highway and so I decide to drive on to Galena Bridge Rest Area, another 72km down the road. About 10km before Galena Bridge, the landscape changes, farming has shaped a new, by now rarely seen look, with crops of what looks like Barley, also ploughed fields, most important though, lots of flowers, carpets of them, the scent in the air smells of honey. This is spring time in Western Australia and there will be plenty more blossoming flowers to be seen as I head down the coast.



Some of the many flowers near Galena Bridge Rest Area

Galena Bridge is much further away from the road, the camp sites along the river, separated only by sheer endless carpets of white, bottlebrush-like flowers. I really like it and decide to stay a couple of nights.