27. The one with docile dolphins and rollicking rays

Total distance travelled: 25,990 km (+980 km)

Leaving the turquoise waters of Coral Bay was always going to be hard, but the arid landscape inland didn't exactly help either. We were heading towards Carnarvon, which sits as an anomaly in this area - an agricultural powerhouse for the state, courtesy of the Gascoyne River. While its banana and mango plantations were a novelty, the wind in this part of the world is horrific. What trees survive, grow at the same 45 degree angle under the constant onslaught. A quick trip out to the Point Quobba Blow holes was sandwiched between a long but necessary list of to-dos, before we kept moving south.

Next up was Monkey Mia - a place we quickly found we'd underestimated after fellow travellers had warned us to stay in nearby Denham and not to expect much from its famed dolphin experiences. Instead, we spent 3 wonderful days at the Monkey Mia Resort, with daily temperatures consistently above 35 degrees - perfect swimming weather in our choice of either the enormous, luxury

pool or glassy ocean. While we chose the pool on our first day, once we discovered the wonders in the ocean, we never made it back to the pool!

Monkey Mia consists of an exclusive beachside resort and is known for its frequent visits by a pod of dolphins. During peak season, they average 300 people (and up to 700 people) lining the beach each morning, hoping to be one of the lucky ones chosen to feed the 2 Indo-Pacific Bottlenose Dolphins currently involved in the feeding program (Kia and Piccolo). Despite there only being 2 dolphins who have chosen to be involved in this program, many more dolphins accompany them to shore, with 16 dolphins visiting on our first morning there. The dolphins are offered 3 feedings a day, with the resort’s license only permitting them to feed the dolphins between 8:00am and 12:00pm. Each feeding can only go for 20 mins and there must be 10 mins between one feeding ending and the next

beginning. We learnt that dolphins need to eat about 10kg of fish a day!! To ensure that the dolphins still teach their calves how to hunt fish, the feeding program only provides each dolphin with 10% of its daily food requirement. Fortunately, we arrived at Monkey Mia just after the school holidays. The dolphins came 2 of the 3 mornings we were there and with only a handful of participants, everyone had at least one turn feeding them, which was incredibly special.

After feeding the dolphins on our first morning, we decided it was time the kids did some school work, so we headed to the camp kitchen for the kids to get stuck into their work. We were surprised to meet another family there (with a daughter slightly older than Acacia and son slightly older than Josh) also getting their school work done. As inevitably happens in caravan parks, we started chatting with the parents and hit it off really well with the Cooper family. They offered

us to use their stand up paddle boards, which we eagerly accepted. We were thrilled to discover turtles, rays and sharks in the glass-like water and as we paddled out further, eagle rays were doing brilliant flips and leaps out of the water. It was a real treat to watch and made us realise there was a lot more to Monkey Mia than the dolphins. Perhaps the only creatures we didn't appreciate there were the roaming families of emus with hungry chicks in tow, which would pounce on any food scraps, and happily enter buildings to scavenge food if allowed!

From the wonders of Monkey Mia, we moved on to the coastal town of Kalbarri, or "kill Barry" as we occasionally mispronounced. Despite its idyllic location at the mouth of the Murchison River, facing the Indian Ocean, and surrounded by a national park of the same name, Kalbarri is set in a hostile environment. The heat and wind can be relentless, especially in summer, driving huge waves onto the rocky cliffs along the coastline. It makes for a spectacular sight, watching cray fishing boats charting the perilous course across the swell, before finding the safety of the river. It's a small seaside holiday town, still bearing many scars of the unexpected Cyclone Seroja 9 months prior. Many houses are still missing roofing and abandoned, many more structures broken and scattered on the ground. There's still plenty of life in town though, with the foreshore playground, skatepark, jetty, bakery and IGA always busy. We naturally joined the crowds, with highlights including our coffee, cinnamon scrolls and Nutella donuts from the bakery, and Acacia winning a pack of TimTams from a promotion at IGA!

To burn off all that sugar, we rode our bikes around town and up to the lookout. We also ventured out into the national park to find Nature's Window - a natural rock formation that resembles a picture frame. From there we explored Skywalk - a viewing platform that celebrates local indigenous culture, and is cantilevered out over a 100m cliff, with sweeping views across the Murchison Gorge. Once again, our timing meant we were the only people at these attractions, which made for a spectacular and peaceful experience. We decided against the more challenging gorge walks, with Acacia having painfully stubbed her toe during our stay in Monkey Mia. Instead we enjoyed the pool at our caravan park, and found more books in the local op shop.

From Kalbarri we drove further south towards Geraldton, with quick stops at the Island Rock and Natural Bridge lookouts (think a smaller version of Victoria's Twelve Apostles, but only one apostle, and London Bridge still intact) and also at Pink Lake in Gregory, which was mostly dry but still provided Josh the opportunity to gleefully throw handfuls of salt around!