Coral Bay, WA, Australia

05/09 – With Merryn & Patrick still camped up at Osprey Bay there was just ourselves and Glen moving on today. Coral Bay, a resort town a little way down the coast is where we’ve booked in, about an hour and a half away.

Visits to the newsagent, bakery and visitors centre were in order on the way out of town and these were completed and we were underway before 9:30. It wasn’t so warm today, in fact, the forecast for Coral Bay was only 22 degrees. That’s an overnight temperature, not a daytime one! Not looking forward to this travelling South business, brrrrrr.

Down the road a ways we caught up with a couple of other caravanners, you know, those ones that feel it necessary to travel at 80kph on a 110 highway. I guess I can understand them wanting to do this, it saves fuel, but it would be nice if they pulled over periodically to let the ever-growing line of traffic past, or even travelled far enough apart so that you could fit in between them when you overtake. We’ve encountered a lot of these, some travelling as slowly as 75kph and it makes us all angry and we’ve even been involved in a little bit of radio tit for tat with a couple.

As we drove along it began to rain! We haven’t seen rain since Burra in SA over two months ago and I wasn’t quite sure what to do about it. Thankfully the wipers on the Mazda still worked and I remembered how to turn them on but neither Lyn nor I were happy about it. At the same time, the outside temperature dropped to 19 and I had visions of wearing long pants and a jumper, not what I had in mind for a coastal town.

By the time we reached Coral Bay, the rain was gone and the temperature had improved. I think yesterday was probably around 27 as it turned out. Coral Bay is a weird joint. 150 permanent residents who all work in tourism, there’s nothing else. The town consists of two caravan parks, a tavern, a backpackers and a small group of shops (bakery, supermarket, newsagent and two or three tour booking places). There appears to be not much to do here if you don’t book a tour of some sort.

We grabbed a pie from the bakery for lunch and headed back to the park just as Scott & Nicole Davies and the kids pulled in. Once everyone was settled and we’d decided on the activities for tomorrow (a sunset quad bike tour) we wandered down to the beach to watch the daily fish feeding but as you can imagine so did four hundred other people so we didn’t actually get to see any fish although I snapped a pic of one over everyone’s head.

We’d also been told about the shark nursery. Skeleton Bay, a shallow bay inside the reef is where black-tipped reef sharks and white-tipped reef sharks come to raise their young. We walked the allotted 15 minutes up the beach, which wasn’t an easy walk as much of it is over rocky coral outcrops, to reach the bay where the sign explained about the nursery and advised against entering the water as there have previously been injuries from shark bites! Well, I can tell you, despite the fact that reef sharks can’t manage to kill you, I don’t need any more encouragement to stay out of the water. I don’t need to be bitten.

Apparently not so for Hans Dopeybumhaas, the German backpacker. He decided that thigh-deep waving his GoPro under the water like a tantalising treat was the way to go. I was astounded that someone could be so stupid but as it’s been pointed out to me, I did cuddle Tigers in Thailand once. Fortunately, Hans wasn’t bitten but I still think he was an idiot.

Now it was a long way to the shark nursery and I’d thought we might have seen something but all we managed to get a view of were some shadows under the water. It was windy and the chop on the top of the water made it pretty hard to get a good look at anything but I guess we had some exercise.

06/09 – Six quad bikes are booked for 3:30 departure as the Davies are joining us. As we were first to book the sunset tour we got to choose the destination and the duration so 2.5 hours and we’ll go North, please.

With the tour all booked, it’s what to do for the morning? I’d picked the brains of the English lass in the visitor’s centre to find out that Five Finger Reef and Turtle Cliffs (both destinations on the southbound bike tours) were accessible by 4wd, hence our decision to go North on ours. With mud map in hand, we ventured off into the sand dunes to find Five Finger Reef.

Sand driving isn’t my favourite thing, I can’t work out what’s solid and what’s not and generally get stuck in the soft stuff. The first hill into the dunes was challenging and with tyres at 18psi and a bucket load of revs we bounced our way to the top. Meandering through the sand dunes, it was a pretty drive along the coast with some great views but it’s a pity that the sun wasn’t out more often. Eventually, we found the five Finger Reef, a spot where five sections of reef run straight out from the shore. We’d been told the snorkelling here was good but it was quite choppy and none of us (Davies, Glen, Lyn & I) were confident enough to give it a go.

We could see Turtle Cliffs from where we were but getting there was another matter as the tracks through the dunes were numerous and confusing. Having decided on a course we had a crack at a steep hill with a very sharp bend at the top. Whilst we managed OK and Scott’s Pajero also had no trouble, Glen’s Navara bogged down in the rear near the top and despite having a couple of attempts, wasn’t able to get up. Glen chose to head back to the park and Scott and I continued on.

We should have gone back with Glen. We’d already texted Coughlins and told them not to follow us in when they reached town. The sand is tricky and Patrick wouldn’t have liked it, especially on his own. We did find Turtle Cliffs and although we’d been told that “…it’s best at feeding times, but ahhh, you’ll always see turtles there…” the choppy water again made it difficult to make anything out. We saw 2!

The drive out of the dunes was equally as difficult with two or three wrong turns. One of these resulted in a very, very steep descent of a sand dune on a pretty rough little track. It was really just a case of pointing the ute down the hill and letting gravity do its thing as controlling anything was impossible. No problems, we’re down and away.

A quick swim in the pool park which is heated by artesian bore water to about 16,000 degrees and we were all freshened up, ready for our bike adventure.

Jaxon was our guide and after he’s decked us out with a bunch of 1970s style open-faced helmets and snorkelling gear it was time to be trained on the bikes.

“..don’t touch any switches, you don’t need them. Don’t use the parking brake, you don’t need it. Don’t run into each other as you have to pay for the damage and don’t go fanging it around all the corners, just follow my wheel tracks……”

It wasn’t sounding like as much fun as I’d thought?

Across the salt flats and then onto the beach. Our 35kph speed limit was soon broken and following Jaxon’s wheel tracks was harder than you might think. The guy can’t stay in a straight line and it was very hard keeping up. Scooting up the beach was a lot of fun and it took us a good 30 or so minutes winding around the humps and bumps on the beach and running down into the surf before we arrived at the Oyster Bridge.

At Oyster Bridge, we donned our snorkelling gear and hopped into the water. the Oyster Bridge is a rock outcrop that runs parallel to the beach creating a little bay of still water. There was an amazing array of fish life in this little bay, including some surgeonfish, a wobbegong shark, Merryn & I saw an octopus and a variety of other fish. It was a great snorkelling experience and we spent probably half an hour here until the incoming tide breaking over the bridge brought in too many bubbles to see well.

Back on the bikes and another quick ride down the beach to the top of a huge sand dune for sunset. There was a lot of cloud today and although this makes for good sunset photos, the sun managed to hide behind one until it dropped below the horizon. Don’t worry, I took a heap of photos anyway but they’re not great sunset ones.

With the sun down the last bit of the ride was a very fast sprint home. We’re not allowed on the bikes in the dark so let’s go. Up the big sand dune. The instruction was ” go flat out but 5 meters from the top there’s a bump, so back off here “. I missed that last part! flat out we did go, ignoring the bump and rocketing over that we crested the dune and just to see how quick these four stroke Can-Am quads are, held it flat out down the other side. About three-quarters of the way down, I wished I hadn’t done this but with Lyn hanging on tight behind me we managed to keep all four wheels on the ground and hit the flat at 56kph. It doesn’t sound fast but it sure felt it.

A fantastic tour. Every one of us enjoyed it and it made Coral Bay a memorable spot on our adventure.