We arrived in Walpole and headed to the visitors centre with the intention of getting a chalet or similar for a few nights. We didn't end up finding anything we liked within our budget so we headed to the caravan park and got a powered site. This allowed us to catch up on much needed internet! Our site was tucked back from the beach at Coalmine Beach, out of the wind and separated from the others by banks of trees. It was very windy while we were here so we were lucky! Kitty was very happy to have electricity, phone reception and hot running water!
Our first stop on Friday was the Valley of the Giants Treetop Walk. They have a series of platforms up and through the treetops, which get a bit of a sway up when you walk! Pretty good views and a good chance to get up and close with some massive tingle trees. They also had a walk on the floor of the forest where you could take photos of the big holes in the bottom of the trees. When tingle trees get burned in a fire, they can keep growing as long as a small layer beneath the bark stays alive. It's pretty amazing seeing these massive trees growing from a very fragile looking stump.
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| Kitty at the start of the Treetop Walk |
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| View down to forest floor |
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| Cool looking tree |
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| Kitty in front of tingle with hole at the bottom |
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| Kitty in tingle with big hole |
After the treetop walk we went to Swarbrick which is an exhibition piece in the middle of the forest about the history of conservation in the area and the varying uses of the forest. It was quite interesting.
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| Another cool looking tree |
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| Tingle forest at Swarbrick |
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| Halo Kitty |
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| Floating Feather |
From there we headed to the Fernbrook Falls on the Deep River. They were pretty nice but again the river was low because of the season. The water is black because of the tannins from all the eucalypts.
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| Fernhook Falls |
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| Rowell's Pool at the bottom of the falls |
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| Cool looking fungus |
We started back to Walpole, stopping off at Mandalay Beach on the Southern Ocean. There were some amazing views from the cliffs there but the wind was howling. No wonder there's a shipwreck under the beach - every 10 years or so it gets uncovered.
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| View to Chatham Island at Mandalay Beach |
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| View towards east from cliffs - we ran out of camera battery at this point :( |
Saturday was pretty quiet. Kitty spent the day doing planning for US and S.Am part of our trip (which is only 4 weeks away) and Lawrie went fishing.
On Sunday we had a bit of a late start and went to the Nornalup Teahouse & Restaurant for lunch. The food was amazing - we would definitely recommend this place to anyone in the area. From here we headed back towards Walpole and did the scenic drive to Circular Pool on the Frankland River. We stopped at the Giant Tingle Tree (so big you can park a car in the hole at the bottom) and met a fella who was walking the Bibbulmun Track from end to end (1000km taking around 50 days). We were pretty impressed. The sections of the track that we saw were pretty amazing - it would be a great adventure.
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| Lawrie in a big tingle |
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| Burned and rotted out Giant Tingle base - the tree is still alive and is the oldest living eucalypt in the wold |
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| Giant Tingle from other side |
Back on our way to Circular Pool we saw a turn off to Sapper's Bridge. We had no idea what it was but thought we'd have a look. It turns out that it's just a wooden bridge over the Frankland River but the river below is very pretty. We finally made it to Circular Pool and explored around a little bit. Lawrie wanted to look at Deep River a bit closer (it's one of the most pristine rivers in WA) so we drove down to where the river meets the inlet and drove along its length for a bit. We ended up at the trail head at Mt Clare but it was a bit late in the day to start a hike. We did notice that there was a suspension bridge on the map that we could drive to so we went there. The river was stunning.
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| Trees at Sapper's Bridge - we liked them because they remind us of the designs on our wedding rings |
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| Frankland River at Sapper's Bridge |
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| This would be awesome rapids in the winter |
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| Kitty and the rocks |
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| Deep River at the suspension bridge |
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| Lawrie on the suspension bridge |
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| View from John Rate Lookout to the inlet |
On Monday we woke up and found a massive hole in the vestibule door. Upon further examination we found a big ugly bug had made a cocoon out of our tent - gross! Lawrie got rid of it and we actually had a good pack-up day and headed on our way to Denmark (the town, not the country).
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| Oh look - there's a hole in our tent |
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| Hang on - there's something in there |
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| Eeew gross - Lawrie get rid of it!!!! |
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