Meelup Trail

 Tuesday 11 August – 180823

This morning I saw a rabbit near the caravan park toilets at dawn.  After breakfast and showers, we packed down. It was a cold morning, but thankfully not raining.

Today we walked some of the Meelup Trail from Dunsborough to Eagle Bay and back. Meelup Trail This was pretty coastal scenery. We saw a lot of black cockatoos, galahs, Australian Ring Neck Parrots and lots of small birds.  We could hear a lot more birds than we could see. We saw plenty of wildflowers and saw a whale from Sail Rock. 14.75km, 4h 5m

After a very late lunch we drove to Augusta, we are staying at Turner Holiday Park. Turner Holiday Park This is a lovely and well-maintained park. We finalised our gear for tomorrow and set our alarms for an early start to make our transfers.

Bibbulmun Track Food Organisation

 Monday 10 August - 180823

Began the day with a long run along the foreshore of Geographe Bay, past the Busselton Jetty and back in what turned out to be the best weather of the day – moderate wind and minimal rain. The day got progressively wetter and colder – in the middle of the day I had on long thermals top and bottom, a T-shirt, long sleeve shirt, long pants, puffer vest, winter jumper and a beanie! We spent most of the day sorting the food we had purchased yesterday into resupply bags for the Bibbulmun Track. We also sorted our food and packed our packs ready for the Cape-to-Cape Track.

 

Nannup Flower and Garden Festival and a BIG grocery shop

 Sunday 9 August - 180660

While it was a cold night, it wasn’t much colder than the day. Bluff knoll reported snow and hail yesterday, we were about 100km north of this when it was 6 degrees at 2pm yesterday. I explored the river and campground – there are rapids upstream which cause clouds of bubbles on the water surface.

Driving toward Nannup we saw rabbits crossing the dirt road, sheep country, free range chicken farming and large-scale tree farming. We crossed the Bibbulmun track on the Brockman Highway between Bridgetown and Nannup, north of Donnelly River. We arrived in Nannup just after 10am and had morning tea. We then set off to explore the Nannup Flower and Garden Festival. Despite the cold drizzly weather there were plenty of people and the tulips were beautifully mass planted. Nannup Flower and Garden Festival

We drove to Busselton and have booked into Discovery Parks Busselton for two nights. After setting up and a late lunch, we set out to purchase supplies for the Cape-to-Cape Track and Bibbulmun Track. We went to Anaconda, Woolworths, Coles and Aldi – we still need a few more things for the Bibbulmun which we will get after the Cape-to-Cape.

Dinner in the camp kitchen with a lovely travelling family from Tasmania.

Esperance Foreshore Parkrun and travel in miserable weather

Saturday 8 August - 180114

Esperance Foreshore Parkrun – lovely blue skies at the start, just starting to rain as I finished and by the time we ran back to the van we had been drenched in icy rain. Esperance Foreshore Parkrun

We packed down the van in the rain, since we were already soaked. We were both absolutely frozen by the time we finished. Hot showers and dry clothes before leaving. By the time I had finished my shower I had warmed up enough for my teeth to chatter. Drew had icy fingers, which is unheard of. We left the caravan park just before 10am, refuelled the car and headed towards Ravensthorpe.  Our original plan had been to go to Jerramungup tonight and then hike the Mamang trail over the next two days, however the bom is forecasting a lot of rain and some small hail, so we changed our plans.  We stopped for lunch in Ravensthorpe – freezing wind and 12 degrees.

Today’s drive varied from sunny stretches to gale force wind with rain and back again. Our fuel economy today will have been dreadful, due to a predominantly head wind. The temperature dropped to 6 degrees just before 2pm – the weather today can be summed up a very cold, wet and miserable. The countryside was mainly cultivated farmland, which was in bloom – bright yellow. We saw a few sheep, with lambs, and the occasional group of black cattle. We saw a lot of large groups of Australian Ring Neck Parrots, quite a few galahs and some black cockatoos.  There were several spots where we needed to drive on the wrong side of the road to go around fallen trees.

We have camped for the night at Jayes Bridge Blackwood River – all to ourselves.

Jayes Bridge Camping

 

Esperance Great Ocean Drive and Pink Lake

 Friday 7 August – 180060

This morning we worked out a shopping list for our Cape-to-Cape Track hike and a preliminary list for the Bibbulmun Track hike. It is a bit of a freaky, and daunting, list – including such itemss as 230 nut bars, 95 cup of soups etc. We did our gym programs mid-morning when the caravan park was quieter. Drew cleaned the red dust off the caravan and car, while I completed the 2026 Census online.

After lunch we went to visit Pink Lake, which is not pink but apparently was at some point in the past.  Pink Lake - Esperance

We then drove the Esperance Great Ocean Drive to see the stunning beaches the area is known for. The sea was a little rough, a marine wind warning comes into effect at midnight tonight and it was starting to pick up a little. Great Ocean Drive 

I finished the day with a haircut, to a short style suitable for hiking and not blowing in my face.