Ningaloo Reef – Cape Range National Park (July 10 - 20)

Only a 3 hour drive from Emu Creek Station and we are in Exmouth – the gateway to Ningaloo Reef.  Still being school holidays it is very busy but we managed to get 4 nights camping at Yardie Creek Caravan Park which is the closest accommodation to Cape Range National Park.   Most of the sites in the National Park are online bookings only, the others you have to line up at the gate from 6am til 8am and it is one out one in.  Luck was once again on our side and we secured a great site, protected behind a dune at Ned’s Camp (only 9 sites) from the howling winds which are battering the coast here at the moment.  Apparently the weather is unseasonally windy and cold.  Very disappointing.  We encountered our first rain in 10 weeks and even had to endure a day of only 18 degrees – it was freezing!

However, the weather has not deterred us from getting out and snorkelling this amazing part of the world.  The most popular spots to snorkel are The Drift at Turquoise Bay, Lakeside and the Oyster Stacks.  At The Drift you enter the water at one end of the beach and you snorkel with the currents down to the other end of the beach, making sure you get out before you get washed out of the lagoon through the outer reef. 

The Drift

Oyster Stacks

All the snorkelling here is only a few metres off shore and the fish are plentiful, such vibrant colours and so many shapes and sizes.  Beautiful coral, sea cucumbers the size of your arm, stingrays, octopus and turtles.  What an experience it is to slowly swim beside a green sea turtle as he weaves in an out of the coral, seemingly oblivious to his onlookers.

Ash had to shave off his 3 month growth to ensure a better fit for his snorkel and mask.

From This

To This

To This!

Ash and the boys did have some success in catching our dinner a couple of nights with some nice flathead and spangled emperor.  Although we do believe most of the large fish know to swim within the sanctuary zones so they can’t be caught.

Coen's 48cm flathead

Each night the Camp Hosts have happy hour which is a great way to catch up with fellow travellers.  They told us about an unmarked track into Pilgramunna Gorge where we saw Black-Footed Rock Wallaby’s – they are so agile and so cute. 

Sturt Desert Pea - W.A. floral emblem

The sunsets are amazing here, but the sunrises are even better.

A slight hiccup one morning to our snorkelling plans when Ota decided not to start, after a jumpstart and a trip to the AutoElects we have new contacts in the starter motor and are running again.  Found some huge sandunes to play on.

After a week of strong winds, cloudy skies and little sunshine and no sightings of whalesharks for the past 4 days we were more than a little worried our whaleshark tour would be a disappointment.  But Saturday dawned sunny, calm and cloudless.  The day was to be one of the highlights of our trip.

WOW, WOW, WOW and WOW!!!!

You are but a tiny spec dropped into the depths of the Indian Ocean, from the back of a 17 metre boat and all of a sudden this majestic, graceful and incredibly large spotty fish (the biggest fish in the world) materialises out of the deep blue water and cruises slowly towards you.  You lose all sense of time and where you are and you just swim beside this amazing whaleshark for 100’s of metres just soaking in its ambience.  The 2 we swam with were approximately 7 metres long.

They only allow 10 swimmers in at a time and you must stay 3 metres away but you still have a sense of their enormity and serenity.  And we didn’t even notice we were being tossed around in the 1.5 metre waves.

The day also included a morning and afternoon snorkel, even more spectacular than the reefs closer to shore.  We also saw another whaleshark swim beside the boat, a dugong, dolphins, humpback whales and a cheeky turtle who just floated about watching our boat.  Surprisingly the waters outside the inner reef were a lot warmer than in the lagoon. 

Cadell and Coen were the only children on the tour and I was so proud of them.  The look of awe and amazement on their faces was priceless.  What a privilege and an unbelievable experience.