The Simple Life, Western Australia
The Western Australian coastline has been a dream for too long, but once we were on the road, what we witnessed was like nothing we had ever dreamed of seeing.
We slept under the sky of a million stars, listening to the sounds of nature as we fell asleep every night, sleeping mostly far away from anyone in site, and waking up to some of Australia’s most untouched beautiful places.
Every morning we would wake, go for a morning swim in ocean clarity that I thought was only found in the Caribbean and would head back to our little home to cook up some breakfast.
The simple life, where all you need to think about is when to cook your meal and when the next town is to get more food, plastic free of course.
No phone signal, no other distractions, just completely present in our surroundings.
On the road, noting maters, there’s no sense of fashion, no sense of time, no sense of memory of what you left behind. Completely indulged in the present.
We began our adventure by stopping into The Pinnacles, which are ancient limestone pillars scattered across the desert which are some millions of years old.
It was eerie walking through here, but so beautiful and raw, somewhat mesmerising.
Our next stop was Jurien Bay where we experienced one of the highlights from the trip and headed out with Turquoise Safari’s in search of some playful Australian Sea Lions. It was only a short ride before we pulled up to an island and waited in the shallows until they wanted to play. Little tip, if you want to lure sea lions out for a party, the best way to entice them from their comfy sandy bed is by splashing, squealing and lunging about in the water. (We have tried this method over the years with sea lions and it works, despite feeling silly)
Within a few minutes we had 4 beautiful sea lions dancing and twirling with us for well over an hour, completely distracted by how cold the water was. Precious moments shared on this experience thanks to Turquoise Safari’s, a must do when in the area!
The days driving were filled with moments of inspiration fuelled by the sense of freedom and pure bliss, with windows down and hands catching the hot breeze as we passed wild kangaroo’s and cows. Good music and great chats fuelled from incredible podcasts that we listened to on repeat. It’s an incredible feeling simplifying your life down to being fully present. I don’t think there’s a word to describe the feeling. Staring at a straight road, with the same red earth on each side for hours on end can get a little too much though, so we decided to pull into the coast again in search of coast.
We tucked in behind some rolling sand dunes and cooked under the sky as the full moon rose.
The simple life. Cook ups on the beach and red wine in hand. Nothing else matters only this moment.
The further up the coast we headed, the greater our eyes were wowed. Kalbarri National Park is absolutely spectacular, covered in layers of red sandstone rock formations and gorges, it felt surreal to be standing in a place that was so old. Reaching just over 45 degrees in heat here, we inhaled the land (and a couple of flies) before heading in search of cooler turquoise waters to sleep near.
We headed out with the legends from Ningaloo Reef Dive, to do exactly just that, Scuba Dive Ningaloo Reef! We were incredibly fortunate to witness an abundance of marine life such as Tiger Sharks, dolphins and Manta Rays. Ningaloo Reef is a natural aquarium, a thriving ocean, with waters so clear and colours picture perfect.
The reef and coral formations are spectacular, this place is truly remarkable. We saw plenty of fish bustling about their days in sea life, a cleaning station which had 4 reef sharks getting a groom, a beautiful Loggerhead turtle and got to jump in for a snorkel between dives with a Manta Ray.
If your not a diver, you can do all of this snorkelling with Ningaloo Reef Dive as-well. We cannot recommend Ningaloo Reef Dive enough!
The old sheep and cattle stations were probably our favourite spots to fall asleep and wake up to – Ningaloo station and Waroora Station.
Almost complete isolation and camping on the sand in protected bays full of turtles. It was these two places that will make us return to the West Coast, purely because we just don’t think it gets better then that!
We had planned to head to Karinjini
National Park – which was an 8 hour drive inland to get there and planned on fanging it home in 16 hours across …. 16 hours before our flight. That was the plan and it was worth the risk of missing out flight from what other travellers on the road had told us. But alas nothing goes to plan on the road, we had heard there was roaring bush fires and towns were being evacuated so sadly missed out on visiting Karinjini. But a positive came from this, we decided we could fang it back to Perth in two days, sleeping on the side of the highway one night after dodging wild rabbits, kangaroos and goats and added Margaret River to the trip.
We were welcomed to Hamelin Bay by giant stingrays and dolphins which we attempted to swim out to but lost in the depths of the ocean. The Margaret River region was different from where we had come, no wilderness camping as such, only caravan parks to stay in which when we got there were all fully booked. We stressed out a little, and slept in the national park late that night in a carpark wondering what our calling was to come here, but alas the universe always has a plan. We stumbled upon Fair Harvest, a permaculture farm that accepts campers, and what a little dream this place was. Chickens and goats, geese’s, cows and horses, veggie gardens of every kind of veggie, fruits and a completely sustainably built farm. We had found our little sustainable gold mine! It was here that we were grateful to have also met the beautiful Arnhem, founder of one of our favourite dress brands Arnhem clothing as she was travelling around Australia with her beautiful family. We had wine under the sky and talked about all things life, and we left feeling so inspired by not only the place we stayed, but the souls we had met.
All of these memories were beautiful, but our time spent in the ocean was the most mprecious.
