A sauna and a sunset

I can’t decide if I like Broome or not. On the one hand it’s swelteringly humid and ridiculously spread out; but on the other (cocktail-holding) hand it does have some fabulous hotels – and I’m staying in one of them.

The grand dame of Broome accommodation is Cable Beach Club, a stunning resort within beachtowel swinging distance of the famous Cable Beach sands. The rooms and bungalows are dotted around what feels like a botanical gardens, all draping trees and exotic plants, and there are humpbacked wooden bridges over little lagoons to lead you from pool to spa, room to restaurant. It’s a wonderful place to spend the day and I’ve very much enjoyed taking in the last sunshine I’m likely to see for some weeks by the (adults only, hurrah) pool.

Unfortunately though, this isn’t exactly what I had in mind for my time here, nice as it is. I wanted to get to know the town better and maybe even get out into the surrounding bush but, as everyone keeps telling me, this is a bad time of year to be here. It comes as quite a shock after several weeks of high-season sunshine and busy resorts to suddenly find myself in low season, surrounded by closed up shops and restaurants and unable to join a tour because nothing is running. It’s like months have passed without my noticing. Numerous places are shut until next year, the hotels are quiet and the streets are near-deserted as everyone escapes indoors to avoid the unrelenting sauna-like heat.

So I’ve had to join them. I did venture into Chinatown where the touristy shops were open for business and the café terraces were full but now I don’t have a car it’s very difficult to get anywhere much else. I shared a taxi from the airport with a local guy who told me not to walk around alone at night and having been on the streets during the day it’s not hard to see why this is the local advice, so my evenings have been spent hotel-bound.

Fortunately this hotel has one of the town’s best restaurants, at least as far as setting is concerned. My dinner tonight was at the Sunset Grill, so-named because the terrace looks out towards Cable Beach and those famous ball-dropping sunsets. The food wasn’t the best I’ve had but the view certainly was and as I tucked into steak and local shiraz, I was able to watch the blazing sun disappear into the Indian Ocean. I may not have quite got to grips with Broome but could anywhere else have provided a better end to my Aussie adventure than that?

Snorkelling for beginners

I’ve always had what I consider to be a healthy respect for the sea. Others may call it a fear but I prefer to think of it as self-preservation. After all, why would you want to mess with something which can so easily kill you?

Just last week a British backpacker was swept out to sea on the south coast by a rip tide, never to be seen again. And yesterday the news featured a surfer who had lost her arm to a shark. Here the sea isn’t just a little bit scary, it’s bloody terrifying.

So it was with some trepidation that I arrived in Coral Bay on Friday. The coast from here north towards Exmouth is one of the few places in the world where the reef comes right up to the beach – and so snorkeling is practically compulsory. I had carried my trusty snorkel all the way from England pretty much for these next few days on Ningaloo Reef, and there was no way I wasn’t going to use it.

Thing is, there are signs everywhere (and I mean everywhere) telling you that snorkeling here is dangerous. There are offshore currents, rip tides, large waves, tiger sharks, sharp corals… I could go on. The advice from every corner is not to snorkel alone and never to attempt it if you’re not sure it’s safe. Of course I’m travelling solo and haven’t a clue about things like wave patterns and wind strength. I’m like a statistic just waiting to happen – last time I was here I freaked out my boyfriend by swimming too far out and of course, this time there was noone to stand on the beach scanning the horizon for me when I didn’t come back to shore.

But dammit, this is a sight worth a little risk to see. Ningaloo Reef is truly spectacular – miles and miles of multi-coloured ancient coral harbouring thousands of tropical fish, turtles, rays, and yep, sharks, all just a couple of minutes swim time from the sand. I saw more types of coral than I knew existed just on that first swim and spent many happy minutes mindlessly following shoals of shimmering fish around the reef. Of course every couple of minutes I’d have a little panic and stick my head up to check land was still ahoy but I’m writing this so you already know that I didn’t get eaten by a shark/taken to Indonesia by a freak wave/speared by a stingray – and it was fabulous.

The next day was even better. Cape Range national park reaches south from Exmouth, a string of jaw-dropping beaches with sand so white it almost looks like snow and water so turquoise you take your sunglasses off because you can’t believe it really is that colour. I swam at the aptly named Turquoise Bay, perhaps the most idyllic spot I’ve ever had the luck to visit and saw what felt like thousands of fish from tiny to half my size and even a sting ray. I won’t pretend my mind didn’t float straight to images of Steve Irwin but I didn’t panic this time and by the time I got back to the car several hours appeared to have passed.

Yesterday was my final day on the reef so I took a trip with Ningaloo Ecology Tours on a glass-bottomed boat so I could get further out and see the really impressive corals. And my god, but they were impressive. Huge lumps called bombies came so close to the boat I would have feared we’d hit them if it wasn’t for the self-assured skipper Alek, and we saw every tiny detail of these centuries-old living marvels. There were literally thousands of fish – striped ones, iridescent ones, electric blue ones, silver ones, all with names instantly forgotten because I was too wowed to get out my notebook.

It was amazing but even better was the snorkel we did here. All fear now gone I was one of the first in the water, battling the strengthening waves as the wind got up to swim within a couple of inches of every type of coral you can imagine and follow fish from one crevice to the next. The fish out here were bigger and the reef stretched for seemingly miles away from me in every direction. I swam until my flippers pinched and my skin shriveled but not once did I even think about those ever-present sharks. Until, that is, it came time to head back to the boat. Many of my fellow snorkelers were Aussies and, of course, they all had that typically laissez faire attitude to all things deadly. Floating just a few metres from the boat, one of them, Will, looked at me excitedly and said “wow, did you see that reef shark?” Despite the blazing sun and snorkel mask I, no doubt, went white and replied “No, where was it?” “Right underneath you mate”, he replied “it was huge”. He held his hands about four feet apart and grinned before he was off again. I like to think I acted cool, and I was actually sorry not to see it, but I also reckon not many people have climbed back on that boat quite as quickly.

On our way back to shore Alek told us what he wouldn’t elaborate on earlier – that there’s a resident tiger shark out here which is such a frequent visitor locals have named her. I couldn’t tell you what because Alek went on to tell us how it grabbed his flipper once last June and that it’s almost as long as the boat – a part of the story that had me gratefully packing my snorkel away.

This happy story occupied my mind for the journey back to the beach but just as we were about to lay anchor, Alek spotted a turtle and swung the boat around after it. Being mating season, the females are desperately hiding from the randy males at this time of year and so are much harder to spot – so this was lucky indeed. As we scanned the water for more turtle heads popping up, a vast loggerhead floated sedately underneath the boat. He was only there for a second or two but my mind was well and truly off that shark story. Well, at least until the next time I decide to go for a swim.

The best "job" in the world

Travel writers don’t get a lot of sympathy. People think all we do is swan around from one exotic location to another, pausing every so often to meet some fascinating local figure or other or possibly, just occasionally, bang away at a laptop for a while. Of course this isn’t really the case and so, in the interests of ever finding a kind ear to moan into again about the downsides, I am almost regretting writing this post before I even start.

Because I’ve just had the most amazing day and I know that if I tell the world about it my chances of ever making anyone understand that travel writing is not an easy profession may well be scuppered.

It started in Kalbarri, a dreamy little coastal town where nobody seemed to wear proper shoes and everybody appeared to be permanently in a good mood. My “hotel” was actually an apartment big enough to move into, the sun had popped back up again after its dazzling closing show the night before and I had an appointment to get to – with a pelican.

Every morning for the past 40 years the Kalbarri community has fed a bucket of fish to the local pelicans. Far bigger than any pelicans I’d seen before, these huge birds were much more graceful than you would imagine as they came gliding in to land on the grass. I got picked out to grasp a greasy fish by its tail and fling it into the pack of excitedly waiting birds, and the whole experience had a real theatre about it – the pelicans fighting over the fish with a bunch of seagulls who cheekily tried to muscle in.

I was sorry to leave Kalbarri but called in at the inland gorges on my way out of town and was confronted with scenery straight out of an “Outback experience” promotional video. The gorges are part of a wildly scenic area of dramatic red-rock formations which stretches all the way along this coast and they were spectacular – one of those sights you find yourself staring at mouth slightly open, camera hanging obsolete around your neck because you know you’ll never capture it.

From here it was – yet another – long drive. My destination for the day was Monkey Mia, about 150km off the highway in the Shark Bay world heritage area, and a five-hour drive from Kalbarri. Fortunately there’s plenty to see along the way, including a beach made up entirely of tiny compacted shells, several bays with sand so white and sea so aqua you start drifting across the road for staring at them, and the lifeform credited with putting enough oxygen into the earth’s atmosphere for us to start evolving. The stromatolites at Hamelin Bay may look just like any other collection of rocks but looking out to sea here is like looking at the earth millions of years before we were even a twinkle in its eye and it’s hard not to be a little bit moved by that.

I arrived into Monkey Mia feeling hot and tired but it’s the kind of place that makes you instantly forget about all that. Stuck out on its own on the sheltered side of the eastern Peron peninsula it’s basically just a sweeping sandy beach with a simple resort ranged along it. My room was literally beach-towel-throwing distance from the sand, with nothing to impede my view of the turquoise, almost-waveless water and the marine life within it. Before I’d even brought my suitcase in from the car I’d seen two dolphins bobbing along the shoreline – more than enough reason to see me immediately bikini-clad and heading for the water.

After a few minutes I heard a commotion just along the beach and looked up to see people with cameras pointing at the water. Despite seeing some dolphins already, I couldn’t believe that it could be anything more exciting than a fish or a seabird but I started to float towards them nonetheless. Convinced it was nothing too exciting I took my time moving along the beach until I glimpsed a telltale flash of grey – it was a dolphin they were looking at and I couldn’t believe they weren’t all in the water themselves.
Before I knew it the dolphins were just three or four metres away from me and as I stood there in the shallows two of them broke off and swam past me, one on either side. I was literally speechless (a rare thing) and just stood there gawping as a nearby family screeched with delight. Over the next few minutes we all bobbed about in the water, watching the dolphins swimming around us and chatting like old friends over our shared experience. Then we saw a turtle, a pelican landed on the water in front of us and an emu wandered along the beach behind. It was absolutely, completely amazing. And yes, it was technically part of my job.

So go ahead, tell me travel writing is more like being on holiday than having a job. Just for today, I’ll agree with you

The never-ending journey

Sometimes luxury is simply staying in one place. These past few days I’ve gone to sleep in a different bed every evening, woken to different sounds, struggled to find a differently located toilet in the middle of the night…it’s been exhausting frankly. Every day I get up, round up all my hastily flung around belongings, shove them back in my suitcase and hit the road again, off towards yet another different mattress.

But if I sound like I’m complaining, I’m not. Moving on every day means you see something different every day – and this weekend has been an extremely varied one because of it.

I left Kalgoorlie on Friday and spent hours driving past waving golden fields which held more wheat than the entire Ashes cricket team could hope to eat in a lifetime, and through the down-at-heel and downright depressing communities that have sprung up to tend to it. The fact that one was called Grass Patch might give you some idea as to the dubious highlights that pass for being attractions in these parts, and I was relieved to reach New Norcia after seven hours horizon-chasing.

Sadly this relief was short-lived. The architecture of this somewhat random monastic community is truly stunning when you compare it to the surrounding flat fields but unfortunately, though my hotel for the night looked grand from the outside, inside it was more akin to that hostel Leo stays in in The Beach. Paint was peeling off the walls, the rowdiness of the bar downstairs could be heard through the paper-thin walls and the ceiling fan whirred annoyingly and managed to be ineffective at the same time. Having been used to air con, flatscreen TVs and, well, having my own bathroom, I became instantly sulky at having to share facilities and cope without so much as a tap to call my own. The service didn’t help – it was by far the worst I’ve had here – and I went to bed with a storm cloud over my head to match those building outside.

Fortunately the next day I was heading back to the coast and, after a look around the outside of the beautiful monastic buildings accompanied by a flock of galahs, I sped off westwards towards the coast and Cervantes. This tiny crayfishing town would be nowhere near the tourist trail were it not for one, rather magical, thing: the Pinnacles, and there is an air to the town that seems to suggest they would rather not bother, thanks all the same. They may not have to for much longer in fact, thanks to the brand-new bitumen of the Indian Ocean Drive which has cut the journey time from Perth and ended the need to get anywhere near the town unless you specifically want to, but for now it’s the only place to stay if you want to view the Pinnacles at sunset – which I did.

The Pinnacles are bizarre rock formations which poke through the sand, forming a sea of columns across a vast area of sand dune. I joined Mike Newton’s Turquoise Coast Enviro Tour for a three-hour trip out to see them in the hope that this time I would understand a bit more about the natural phenomenon that caused these geological marvels. Thanks to Mike I now do, although I wouldn’t like to try and explain it without the help of numerous diagrams and possibly the internet. Suffice to say they’re amazing, and utterly unique. I was spellbound by them again and watching the sun set between them was an unforgettable experience.

From Cervantes I was heading further north up the coast but it turned out, as it so often does here, that the road was in fact miles inland and offered only more agricultural land as a backdrop to my day. Fortunately it wasn’t far to Geraldton, a suburban-feeling town which had nothing besides fine weather to offer on a Sunday afternoon. I lapped it up of course and wasn’t the least bit upset at my enforced relaxation time due to a lack of internet and open attractions to visit.

The town’s museum was open this morning so I learned all about the dangers of boarding a boat anywhere near this coast in the Shipwreck Galleries and discovered that it is here that some of the earliest evidence of life on earth leaving the water for land can be seen. It was fascinating and left me with a greater respect for Geraldton – a great museum is a rare thing after all.

My destination today was Kalbarri and this time the drive really did take in some coastal scenery – and spectacular scenery at that. The sandstone coast along here has been gradually eroded by the water and there are gorges and striated cliffs stretching for several kilometres south of the town. I popped happily on and off the highway, diving down access roads to viewpoints and short walking trails, and snapping away to try and capture the rich red, brown and ochre colours of the rock. Hopefully I succeeded enough to help me remember it.

My day ended with roast duck on the terrace of the Grass Tree restaurant while the setting sun turned the sky blazing red and gave the water a beautiful rosy glow. I may have had to drive several thousands of kilometres to get here but every last one was worth it for that and although I’m not looking forward to packing up the car – again – tomorrow morning, I am looking forward to where it will take me next.

Boom and busts

I rarely go to the same place twice. Always wanting to see more, do more, experience more, I don’t like to return to a holiday destination year on year, take a second city break in the same place or even revisit London attractions I’ve already been to. But today, I made an exception for something truly jaw-dropping and went back to somewhere I’d only just been a few hours before.

The Super Pit in Kalgoorlie (or Boulder, depending on how you look at it) is genuinely one of the most impressive things I’ve ever seen. Its name, granted, does not inspire thoughts of excitement but once you are standing there on the cusp of a bloody great hole, this vast gold mine seems every bit as awe-inspiring as the Grand Canyon. Alright, so I might be getting a little bit carried away but, trust me, this is an impressive hole in the ground. It’s forever expanding and deepening (the lookout has just been moved so it can be incorporated into the mine) and once finished in 2013 it will be a staggering 3.8km long, 1.35km wide and more than 500m deep. From the lookout the yellow haul trucks which bring out the dirt look like meandering insects but they are in fact the size of a modest house and each tyre on them is worth $26,000 (about £16,000). What makes it even more startling is the fact that all this is man-made. If the Grand Canyon is testament to the power of a river, then this mine is testament to the greed of man.

Because, of course, we don’t really need gold; it’s main function is to look pretty. The town of Kalgoorlie, surrounded by some of the harshest, most unforgiving landscape known to man, exists purely because we like to ornament ourselves and our things. It’s crazy that it’s here at all, let alone that it’s by far the most lively place for hundreds of kilometres around.

In the same way as Las Vegas is a law unto itself, so is Kalgoorlie. The ever-warm and sunny weather combined with the vast sums of cash to be made here make this a place to fly in and fly out of, making a quick buck in half the time it could take elsewhere and having a damn good time while you do it. Back when the mines were smaller and more numerous and the average wage in Australia was around seven shillings a week a man working underground here could earn 14 shillings a day. The ladies working in the brothels could earn enough to pay for a house every single month and could spend more than two thirds of the year travelling first-class around the world on the money they made here in the rest of it.

Things have changed now, of course, but wages are still high here and there’s still an I’ve-been-down-the-mine-all-day vibe to the nightlife. As darkness descends people flood the streets and fill the pubs, sitting on the balconies of these grand old buildings downing pints and swapping tall tales, their work boots still on.

I’ve spent most of the day listening to some of the most entertaining stories I’ve heard on this trip. At the Mining Hall of Fame I went down the mine shaft and listened to ex-miner Jim talk of near-misses with 100-tonne boulders, clouds of lung-clogging dust and dangerous machinery while at Questa Casa brothel (the oldest in Australia) madam Carmel told us about scantily clad prostitutes turning cartwheels in the street, a man who died then revived during his allotted hour and a woman who drove through the building in silent rage, reversing up to try again as she hit every mound of rubble.

I feel I’ve only scratched the surface of this barmy but loveable town today and wish I could spend longer hearing its stories. Because, in a place like this, I’d bet my bottom gold nugget that there are always more.

Cruise control

It may be an obvious comparison but driving an automatic really is like driving a toy car. Not having to change gear takes much of the skill and challenge out of getting from A to B and leaves you, literally, with stop and go. At first my left leg didn’t know what to do with itself. It jiggled up and down in time with the iPod, shifted around making me bang my knee painfully against the steering wheel (I’m so short I sit practically on top of the wheel) and kept trying to get involved with the mechanics of the journey. My left hand kept resting on the non-gear stick (what is that called in an auto?) and excitedly jumping up as I came up to hills or junctions. But as the days – and kilometres – rolled past my appendages settled into their positions and presumably went to sleep while my brain tried to follow.

Because the trouble with driving an automatic is that there is so much less to think about. It tricks your brain into thinking it’s not actually in control of several tonnes of metal and once you throw cruise control into the mix (which I did yesterday as I drove the long, straight road from Albany to Esperance) your right foot doesn’t even need to do anything and you find yourself thinking you’re in some kind of simulator.

I spent much of yesterday gazing unthinkingly at the ribbon of bitumen and endlessly chasing a horizon that never seemed to come any closer. Every half an hour or so I would have to adjust the steering wheel all of an inch to the right or left and then would return to staring robotically ahead or, as the madness really set in, crooning loudly to Lily Allen.

So today came as something of a relief. I’m in Esperance for two nights, in the same hotel no less (the same bed for two nights in a row really is the travel writer’s holy grail), and spent today exploring the Great Ocean Drive scenic loop and the Cape le Grand national park. Fortunately for my numbed brain this involved lots of bends and twisty roads so, although my left leg still didn’t see any action, my right leg and both arms had plenty to occupy them.

The Great Ocean Drive is half amazing, half dull. The first half (if you go clockwise) takes you over rolling coastal hills and to a string of tourism-brochure-worthy white-sand beaches. There are lookouts and beachside strolls along the way and just when you think you can’t possibly find a more beautiful beach – ever, even if you live to a hundred and cash in those airmiles – you round the next corner and, yep, there it is, even more sweeping, more white and more photographable than the last. The second half however is inland, with the purpose of returning you to town via the pink lake. Sadly today it was cloudy so the temperature wasn’t high enough to bring out the beta carotene from the algae which makes it appear pink so it was, if we’re honest, just another lake and I was driving on just another long, straight bitumen strip.

Visiting Cape le Grand national park was a similar mix of the sublime and the yawn-worthy. Getting there took well over half an hour on one straight cruise-controllable road after another and I started to grow glass-eyed with fatigue once more. That is until I reached the park itself and found, unbelievably, beaches even better than those I’d seen nearer town. Hellfire Bay was the sort of place you want to roll up and pack in your suitcase, while Thistle Cove was backed by beautiful wildflowers and home to whistling rock, a stone bizarrely shaped like a howling dog which echoed the noise of the waves through its crevices.

I guess today really sums up the trip as a whole. Half the time I’m marveling at sights you’d swear had been computer generated or at least airbrushed and thinking how unbelievably lucky I am that this is, in fact, work; the other half I’m bored to tears by the endless highway and wishing I could be at home with a Chinese and a cup of tea (that Lily Allen song really did get to me today!).  

Still, if you want to see Australia you have to drive. Far. And so in that spirit I’ve already programmed my sat nav for tomorrow. It says “in 103 miles turn left”. Oh dear.

What lies beneath

Sometimes it feels like everything in Australia is out to get you. Poisonous snakes, jumping spiders, hungry crocs…all these are obviously dangerous but it is not these that are most likely to prematurely end your visit Down Under – drowning, evidently, is what you really want to worry about.

Today as I gazed out at yet another sweeping sea view (this time in the Torndirrup National Park near Albany) I fell into conversation with a local who casually started telling me all about rip tides and king waves. Australia can’t just have waves and currents you see, it has to have those added-value adjectives, the ones which hint at the possibility of death in the blink of an eye. More people die from drowning in WA each year than from all the poisonous species you could name put together. People have been happily standing on the coast here one minute, and washed away by a king wave the next. The sea is a terrifying place.

I spent my day finding out how the sea has impacted Albany and exploring the maritime history of this area and have discovered that it is really is littered with wince-worthy stories of death, dismemberment and disaster. At Whale World I heard not only tales of flensing the blubber from a sperm whale (which was disturbing, naturally) but also of legs being cut off by stray harpoons and deckhands being grabbed by a tentacled squid arm and drawn into the icy depths never to be seen again. At the Brig Amity, a replica of the ship which brought the first European settlers ashore here, there were stories of scurvy, disease and the dispossession of the indigenous people; while the Residency Museum told tales of difficult beginnings and environmental blunders.

But despite its difficult beginnings Albany is far from a negative place. When whaling ended here in 1978 the community sank into economic depression but there is no evidence of this today. Everyone I’ve met here has been very proud to be from this small city marooned on the south coast 400km from Perth and indeed, why shouldn’t they?

The city is set on a beautiful bay within easy striking distance of not only the coastal Torndirrip national park but also the mountainous Stirling Ranges and the rolling Porongurups. The attractions in town have been top-notch too. The Residency Museum is the only place I’ve seen so far to place Aboriginal history directly alongside European, showing how the two mirror each other and helping people understand the issues all the better; the nighttime tour of the Old Gaol with its amateur theatrics and spooky cell visits was the most fun I’ve had sans alcohol on any evening in recent history; and Whale World presented a difficult subject in not only an enlightening way but also a fascinating one, allowing visitors to independently explore an old whaling ship and make up their own minds about the whaling industry.

All in all I’ll be sad to leave Albany tomorrow - and not just because this is by far the largest place I’ll see for some time. The people here have been so welcoming and so keen that I should go away with a positive view of their home that I can't help but promise them I'll be back. I'll be sure to keep that promise.