CORONATION BEACH TO DONGARA
MONDAY 4TH NOVEMBER -
We left Coronation Beach at 9am for
our next destination 100 kilometres south to Dongara
– 355 kilometres north from
Perth and a 2 hour drive from
Coronation Beach. We arrived at Dongara Tourist Park about 11.30. It was on the point at the end of town by
South Beach. It was a roomy park with a
new shade cloth bbq area filled with big colourful ceramic pots and plants and
ferns that looked very cool and attractive.
They had also recently put in new cabins, painted bright yellows and
blues on the ocean front and were making lots of improvements around the
park. When we checked into reception the
lady at the desk told us “There’s a little bit of weed on the beach, but further
down it’s ok to walk on”. We soon found
that to be somewhat of an understatement as you couldn’t see any sand
underneath the solid mass of weed right along the entire beach. There was a tiny track just about wide enough
to walk along, but try as we did,
further along the beach was just the same and impossible to walk on. We gave up and came back to the van. We were parked on the corner of the upper
level which was well maintained and grassed.
It was $35 per night to stay there and wasn’t very busy. It was a short walk to the harbour and local
supermarket, bakery and pub. There was a
little beach along the harbour that wasn’t cluttered with sand and we took
Sally there for a few walks. We could
also walk along the boardwalk and around the obelisk at the top of the hill - a memorial to those lost at sea. The main street had a grassy strip with huge
Moreton Bay and Port Jackson Figs, planted in 1906. They were spectacular to see, so big and tall
and majestic.
The population of Dongara is about 4,500 and was named The
Irwin Valley in 1839 by Lieutenant George Grey after his friend Major
Irwin. In 1852 the town was surveyed and
named Dhungarra, which was later anglicised to Dongara. In 1864, the tiny town settlement had its
first mail service by horse from Perth via the stock route.
The annual festival The Blessing of the Fleet is held each
November to mark the beginning of rock lobster season and to wish the fleet a
good season. It was being held on 9th November this year.
TUESDAY 5TH NOVEMBER -
We went for a drive to Ellendale Pools a 1 ½ hour
drive from Dongara, located in the Geraldton area of Greenough , a popular
cheap camp area where you can stay for $6 per night for a maximum of 3
nights. It was a lovely scenic natural
watering hole with giant gums and a rocky gorge. There was a long dirt track into the camping
area. It was a hot day and the place was
full of flies. We were pleasantly
surprised to see Wil and Terri there, a
couple we’d met at Cleaverville Beach near Karratha in September. We had a picnic lunch with them and caught up
on all their news.
On the way back, we stopped at Altina
Wind Farm with 54 turbines towering 80 metres high with a rotor diameter of 82
metres and a blade length of 40 metres.
Each blade weighed 7.5 tonnes.
From farther away, it was hard to imagine they were so huge. Up close, they’re enormous.
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| RICHARD UNDERNEATH PART OF THE ROTOR BLADE |
We stopped off at the Caltex Service Station for one of the
famous Rosie’s home-made pies. Several
people had recommended us to try them for ourselves. Richard had the steak and kidney pie with a
thick fluted high crust, full of chunky meat and kidney. I had a cheese and spinach roll. They were both delicious and so fresh with
fresh flaky pastry.
WEDNESDAY 6TH NOVEMBER -
We left Dongara for our next destination Sandy
Cape, 100 kilometres south from Dongara. We were looking forward to
revisiting Sandy Cape as we’d enjoyed two lovely nights there at the beginning
of our trip north from Perth. An hour
after we set off, we were driving up the long dusty dirt road (which seemed
longer and more corrugated than we remembered it). The camping area was quite busy and we
quickly found a suitable spot to set up for our overnight stay. We went for a walk along the beautiful white
soft sand beach and up over the dunes on the left hand side to the viewing
platform with a complete 360 degree panoramic view of the whole turquoise
bay. We were rewarded with a lone
dolphin coming to the surface and swimming up and down briefly. There was a new caretaker on site and the
fees were $15 per night. It was a
beautiful spot and certainly worth the shaky drive up to the camping area. We had a few more strolls along the beach in
the afternoon and chatted to some other people camping there. It would have been great to stay another few
nights.
THURSDAY 7TH NOVEMBER -
We left Sandy Cape to visit
our friends Denise and Ben an hour south in Seabird. They had a lovely house overlooking the
ocean. We had lunch with them and went
for a walk around the area which is very quiet, but very pretty, with miles and
miles of pristine beach up and down the coastline. Denise
is a very good amateur photographer, so Richard and her had lots to talk about
and look through her collection of photos, many of which she’s won awards for. We had happy hour on the grass overlooking the
ocean and a lovely chicken pasta dinner that Denise had made for us. We had parked our van on the roadside outside
their caravan park and slept there overnight.
FRIDAY 8TH NOVEMER -
We said goodbye to Denise and Ben and hoped to catch up with them soon
again. An hour and a half later, we
arrived at Bonneys Water Ski Park in Perth
in the suburb of Baldivis, 15 minutes from Rockingham. It was a water ski park for jet skis,
wakeboards and water skiers set on 150 acres, owned and run by the Bonney
family since 1985. There were 5 man-made
lakes, taking up 110 of the 150 acres for water sports and a paintball facility
at the back of the park. There was also
a caravan park behind the lakes. The
owners were only allowed to have 15 caravans at any one time and don’t take
bookings. We had to ring up 2 days
before we wanted to arrive to see if a spot was available. The owners were very helpful and friendly and
made sure we were happy with our spot, which was very spacious. We quickly settled in and went for a walk
around one of the tranquil lakes with bbqs , picnic tables, ducks and moor hens
splashing around in the water. It was
very peaceful there. Four of the
caravans were there long-term, our neighbour had been there for over 6
months. It was $30 per night for a
powered site and good value for Perth and was pet friendly (most parks in Perth
are more expensive and definitely not pet friendly).
We decided to take a drive into Rockingham for fish and chips
for tea and were surprised to see how busy the place was with families sitting
on the grass by the ocean having take-away dinner and the kids running around
and chasing the flocks of squawking seagulls.
There were lots of people having Friday night drinks and others were
walking, cycling and jogging past on the esplanade. There were lots of cafes, restaurants,
ice-cream parlours and take-away food shops and no shortage of customers. We really enjoyed the big serving of cod,
garlic calamari, chips and mushy peas and couldn’t finish all the chips, the
seagulls got our left-overs. We went for
a stroll up the esplanade and had my favourite rum and raisin ice-cream before
we headed home totally full up.
SUNDAY 10TH NOVEMBER -
It took us 15 minutes to drive from the ski park to Success to have
lunch with Daniel, Min, Bob and Shelley and to see their house which was a
lovely spacious 4 bedroom place in a nice area.
It was great to see them again and we had a leisurely bbq lunch and left
very full up.
NEXT WEEK:
We’re meeting up with our friends Alan and Sandra and the Busselton
Caravan Club at Collie River for 3 nights, then going further south to a farm
stay at Big Valley in Margaret River.
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