Coral Bay and Beyond Part 2

After having such a wonderful time swimming with the whale sharks the 5 of us decided to go with the same company (Coral Bay Adventures) and swim with the manta rays the next day. The day started off the same with a morning snorkel before the spotter plane took off to spot the manta rays. That snorkel was definitely the most incredible one I have ever done. First I saw a reef shark...which was a bit scary to be honest. And then I saw a giant loggerhead turtle. It was the most peaceful, majestic creature I have ever seen and it was a privilege to have swum with it. After we got out of the water one of the guides told us that she had been doing this tour and diving in the area for 5 years and she had only swum with loggerheads three time, so we definitely got lucky.


Our turle


It was huge!


Can you tell I really liked it?

Right after we got out of the water and got under way again the captain came down to tell us the spotter plane had seen some manta rays. It didn't take us nearly as long to get to where the rays were as it did to get to the whale sharks so we didn't have too long to get nervous. Soon we were in the water, looking down this time, and searching for the rays. The manta ray that we spent the next hour or so with was about 3 meters across with a beautiful pattern across its back. Our guide told us that manta rays are often very curious and social. The rays can only see to the side and down when they are swimming upright so when they turn upside down underneath you its so they can look at you. This manta ray was very social and kept turning to look at us and came right up to us several times. After a while it settled down on the bottom and headed to a cleaning station where the little fish clean out its mouth. We watched it for nearly an hour just swimming around on the ocean floor. After a while we decided to let it be and headed back in for another lovely lunch, another snorkel, and then back to shore.


Upside down Manta



Our Manta



The day with the manta rays was another incredible experience. To be honest I think if I had the choice to only do one thing in Coral Bay it would be to swim with the mantas. The whale sharks were wonderful but it was such a hectic experience, whereas the day with the mantas was so calm and you really go to spend time with the animals.

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A day or so after we did the manta ray tour Andrea, Lauren, Rachel,Leroy and I decided to take a three day trip up to Exmouth. Exmouth itself is a pretty small dumpy town but about 20 k's out are some gorgeous beaches. Because of this we decided to rent a car for one day (cost about $30 each). Renting the car was definitely the way to go because we couldn't have found enough to do to spend a whole day in Exmouth. We spent the day driving up the coast, stopping at all the beaches and snorkel sites. It was very pretty and a good idea of something to do if you're on your way up there but not a necessity by any means.



Sandy Bay in Exmouth


All of us in Exmouth

Next on the agenda was a few days in the sunshine and then the 19 hour bus journey to Broome. The bus journey was very very long with the most interesting thing being all the kangaroos we hit during the night. It was rather difficult to get to sleep because every 20 minutes or so you would hear a loud thump and we ran over yet another kangaroo. Its so strange to think about how much we love kangaroos in the states and yet in Australia they are considered nothing more than pests and are killed in the thousands every year.

Eventually we did make it to Broome and then to our hostel in Cable Beach called Cable Beach Backpackers (about 10 minutes out of the actual town of Broome). In Cable Beach we met back up with John, who had left Coral Bay while we were in Exmouth, and had a bit of a reunion party at the local pub. Most of our time in Cable Beach/Broome was spent sunning ourselves on the beach and generally being bums.


Beautiful Cable Beach


Easyrider out on the town

Towards the end of the week it was time to say goodbye to all of our Easyrider Crew. First John left to head back to England, then Rachel up to Darwin, and finally Lauren off to Brisbane. It was hard to say goodbye to them all. Even though we had only spend a few weeks together it felt like we had been friends for ages and ages. By that time all that was left of the group was Andrea and I. We decided to treat ourselves and go to the hostel next door called Beaches of Broome. It was $2 more a night to stay there but it was definitely worth it. Since it is both a hostel and a resort you get to use all of the resort facilities but only pay hostel prices, and it was brand new so there hadn't been time for the backpackers to turn the bathrooms and bedrooms into a real hostel.

We spent another two days lounging around and exploring the town of Broome. There isn't a whole lot to see in Broome unless you like and can afford to like pearls but we had a good time window shopping. All too soon it was time for Andrea and I to go our separate ways. Andrea was heading up to Darwin by bus and I was on my way to meet my family in Brisbane. So we said our goodbyes, promised to keep in touch and were off.

Tomorrow I'll update on whats been going on since then. I am still currently with the family although we are now in Cairns having a great time and seeing all the sites including the Great Barrier Reef tomorrow!

Until then!

Coral Bay and Beyond

Ok so I've finally got the pictures from Coral Bay available to me so now I can update on the past month or so.

Coral Bay is a cute little down on the west coast that caters to holidayers who love the water. The beach is gorgeous, although at certain times during the day the tide is so high that there actually is no beach. When there is a beach though it is lovely to just lie on all day, read, drink some goon (boxed wine), and relax. I spent a few days doing that while the rest of the Easyrider group went to Karijini National Park. Once they got back we decided to go swimming with whale sharks. We chose to go with Coral Bay Adventures which cost about $360 but pictures of the trip was provided. There was another less expensive tour but the pictures weren't provided and to purchase them afterword would have ended up costing more in total.

The trip started at 8 am and we were driven to the boat that we were going to be on for the day. There were 20 of us on the tour, 5 of us from Easyrider.The companies in Coral Bay use a spotter plane to find the whale sharks. The plane takes off around 10am and can fly until 3pm, so until the the plane took off we were taken to place to go snorkeling. The snorkeling in itself was pretty amazing, lots of different fishes, some small rays, and beautiful coral.


The Gorgeous Coral

Then we got back in the boat and just started motoring around the area until the plane said they had spotted a whale shark. As we were traveling someone spotted a splash that turned out to be two Humpback whales. We followed them in the boats for about 15 minutes which was really nice. Then our captain decided we should leave them be as they were trucking pretty fast. We continued traveling up the coast and along the way we saw a turtle, a breaching Eagle Ray, lots of dolphins, and a bunch of tuna feeding. Then it was lunch time, which was a smorgasbord of fruit, meat, veggies, and pretty much everything else you could think of. After lunch we still hadn't heard anything from the spotter plane so the captain decided to take us to another snorkel area while we waited.


Food!

We were all getting a little anxious since it was coming up on 2pm and the plane could only stay up until 3pm and we still hadn't seen a whale shark. The tour does offer a second chance option which allows you to go on the tour again another day if you don't see a whale shark the first day. After the second chance though you are out of luck if you don't get to see a whale shark so we really wanted to see one the first time.

The 2nd snorkel was just as amazing, lots of fish again, and apparently a very large shark that I thankfully didn't see, but did cause several people to get out of the water very fast. As soon as we all got out of the water and stripped our wetsuits down to the waist the captain came down and very calmly said, "Just to make your day a bit better the spotter plane has just a whale shark." We all clapped and the boat took off in the direction we had came from. We were all so relieved because it was 2:45pm...so we were cutting it close. It took us over 30 minutes to make it to where the whale shark was. Then we all lined up on the end of the boat in our two separate groups and were given instructions on what we were going to do when we got in the water. All of us Easyrider were in the second group so we got to see how it worked the first time. Suddenly it was our turn and we all slid into the water. We were told to make sure we looked level with the water and not down into the depths otherwise we might miss the whale shark all together.

And then there it was, this massive 7 meter fish swimming right below us, just cruising along completely ignoring us. We all fanned out to the sides of us and started swimming with it. It was really cruising and so we were all swimming at full speed, it was quite tiring. Then they pulled us up and let the next group go in again. In total we go to go in 3 times. The third time was by far the best because the whale shark was much closer to the surface. That time when I got in the water I went all the way under, like past my snorkel. So when I came back to the surface I put my head above the water to dump out my snorkel. When I put my head under water again I looked forward and there was the whale shark heading right toward me. I screamed into my snorkel and then kicked as hard as I could to get out of its way. That night I had a nightmare about looking up and seeing that whale shark, except in the dream it actually ran into me. Aside from that minor moment of terror though it was great that third time because it was so much closer than the last few times and it was moving a bit slower.


Our Shark


Just to show you how big it was in comparison to a person

After everyone had had three times in the water with the whale shark we got back in the boat and started heading back to shore. Then there was a splash in the water and we looked down to the see that the whale shark had turned back and was swimming around the boat. It was great to see the whale shark from out of the water because it wasn't so distorted and you could really see how gigantic it was. After another hour or so, and some delicious cake, we had made it back to the shore.

Swimming with whale sharks was truly an amazing experience. It was a bit hectic with everyone jumping in and out of the water and swimming as fast as they could. The whale shark was an incredible animal and I would definitely do it again. In fact we all love it so much that we decided to go back the next day with the same company and swim with the Manta Rays. But that update will be for tomorrow.

Until then!

Tales from the West Coast

I know I know, its been ages since I've updated. I'm just having too much fun to bother with turning on the computer and writing! The good news is that I have lots of excellent things to write about so settle in for some serious reading.

When I last wrote I was about to get on the Easyrider bus on my way up the west coast and I have to say that was probably the best decision I've made so far. Easyrider made everything very simple and we had a lot of fun as well. They picked me up at my hostel in Geraldton and then we were on the road to our first destination, Kalbarri. In Kalbarri we went to a restaurant called Finlay's in the middle of no where and had the most amazing fish and chips ever. That night was mostly spent getting to know everyone and the next day we headed out bright and early to go canoeing on the Murchison River. Canoeing was pretty ridiculous as we were all really hungry for the first bit (breakfast was provided after the first section of the river was travelled) so all we could think about was food. I canoed with a lovely Canadian girl named Lauren and aside from our boat not turning right we did pretty well. Rachel and Andrea had a bit of trouble though and spent a fair amount of time doing donuts in the middle of the river. After canoeing we hit the pub and found out who the drinkers in the group were!



Andrea and Rachel giving it a go!



Rachel and I at the pub in Kalbarri.


The next morning we were up bright and early to head to Denham with a few stops on the way. The first stop was at Natures window, basically a naturally made hole in the rock that looks out on some absolutely stunning scenery.



Nature's Window

Next stop was to look at the stromatolites which look like a bunch of rocks in the ocean. They are actually living organisms that act sort of like trees in turning CO2 into oxygen. They're not much to look at but the walk was a welcome break from sitting in the van. Last stop before Denham was at shell beach. Shell Beach is exactly what it sounds like, a beach made entirely out of shells. It was very beautiful and would have been an excellent place for swimming if it hadn't been threatening rain the whole time. Then we finally made it into Denham and had a quiet night since we had a 4wd tour in the morning.

We started out the morning by going to Ocean Park with our very good looking tour guide. I would definitely recommend a stop at Ocean Park for anyone that's in the area. The guide was very knowledgeable about all of the animals they had, which included baby turtles, sea snakes, eels, lots of massive fish, and of course what they are known for, sharks!



Sharks!

Then it was time for the 4wd drive tour. It was a pretty long and very bumpy drive but we had good music and good people. We stopped at several different places and even managed to see a dugong (sea cow type thing) which is very rare. After the tour we headed to pub for one of the best nights I've had in Australia. At first we all just went to pub for a drink which turned into quite a few drinks and an invitation to go out to Monkey Mia for a "full moon party". Of course we said yes so me, Jenny (the driver and tour guide), Rachel, Lauren, and Andrea jumped in the car and we drove the 20 minutes to Monkey Mia. One of the men that was with us used to be a park ranger at Monkey Mia so he knew alot about the area and the dolphins of course. For those of you who don't know Monkey Mia is famous for its dolphins which come to the beach every morning to be fed. They apparently hang out there most of the time because they were there at night and it was absolutely incredible to see them coming right up to the dock with the moonlight reflecting off their backs and bellies. We were all up quite late that night and didn't make it back to the hostel in Denham till about 4:30 in the morning but it was definitely worth it.

The next morning, with about 3 hours of sleep under our belts, we headed out to see Monkey Mia in the daylight. Seeing the dolphins at Monkey Mia was a very strange experience. They line up about 100 people on the beach and then the dolphins come up the sand and just swim back and forth a few feet away from you waiting for fish. It was great to see the dolphins up close but it felt a little sad to see so many people fighting each other for a spot to see them and the dolphins just waiting to be fed.



Dolphins!

From Monkey Mia we headed to Coral Bay where I am now. Coral Bay will definitely require another blog entry so for now I'll leave you with my travels up the coast. As soon as I get access to a computer with a cd drive so that I can upload some more pictures I will update about the gloriousness that is Coral Bay, so until then!