Western Australia - part 2

Last Sunday we started to head south of Perth to checkout the area and as most of the tourists appear to head south in their vans we were expecting good things.

There were a couple of things that immediately struck us.  Firstly the scenery was quite different.  After the barren looking flatness of the north, the south gave us hills, countless trees and loads of farmland.  To be honest it is all a bit reminiscent of the English countryside - maybe that's why so many Brits live here?!?!

The weather also changed, it became much cooler (no complaints there).  After the first couple of days it changed to low to mid 20's but with it came overnight storms and rain. 

To be honest we initially weren't that thrilled with this part of Oz.  There were more people to contend with, things didn't have the relaxing laid back feel of the sparse north and everything just seemed that little bit more complicated!

Anyway, what we got up to in a nutshell was:

• drove around the coast which was very much the same as up north.  Got a bit choppy and rough on the south coast though - quite different from the tranquil Indian Ocean bays of the north.

• saw lots of big trees - Karri and Tingle trees.

• went for a tree top walk - on a suspended platform which was level with the top of the trees, a bit wobbly in places but we really enjoyed it.

Monkey Adams!

• paid a visit to the Gloucester tree, which is a 60m Karri tree that was used back in the day as a fire lookout across the national park.  You can climb to the top of the tree using the series of metal poles which have been shoved into the tree.  The poles spiral to the top and there is no harness - just a net over the poles to help you bounce to the ground in a slightly more orderly fashion!  We thoroughly enjoyed climbing to the top and were commended by the locals for our speed and obvious natural ability ;-)

Rob on his climb!

• ate some shark and chips from the local fish and chip shop.  Bit sceptical about it before we bought it, but the very friendly chippy owner fried a bit so we could try it.  Turned out Jaws is very tasty after all.

To be honest apart from driving, seeing camping sites and small towns that was pretty much it for the south of Perth.  Surprisingly for us it was all a tad underwhelming and no where near as enjoyable as the north.  

Onwards .... We fly to Cairns on Saturday to drive the east coast to ultimately end up in Sydney for New Year's Eve - looking forward to seeing the new year in at the harbour bridge!  For this stretch sadly no camper van - we've decided that sleeping in a tin can in all the tropical humidity may be a bit much.  So for at least the next 2 weeks we'll have a car and accommodation.