Stats Overview
Kms Travelled: 984
Kms Hiked: 18
No. of Camps: 3
The Adventures
We have endured another week of miserable weather along the south-coast. This part of the Australia is incredibly beautiful, however, you have to make sure your visit aligns with the two good days it seems to have a month! We have enjoyed one warm day this week (still overcast) and then a number of days where the maximums didn't reach 20 and all it did was rain, blow a gale or both simultaneously! However, we have still made ourselves get out and about to explore doing several hikes and even enduring some cold beach swims.
The plan for this week was all focussed on visiting the Stirling Range NP which is like "the" mountain range of WA. We had grand plans of hiking a few of the mountains, however, these plans quickly unravelled after we tackled our first climb - the Bluff Knoll. It is no where near the tallest mountain we have conquered this trip, however, the steepness of the hike is definitely the most we have endured. It was only 3kms to the summit, however, over those 3kms we climbed an elevation of 665m...which is a lot! It was literally like climbing 3kms of stairs and there was more than one point where I told Will "lets stop here and get a photo and tell everyone we made it to the top!". Unfortunately for me he said no, so we had to keep persevering to the summit, which I have to admit was worth it when we got to enjoy the views. However, our muscles were definitely done with the Stirling Ranges after the Bluff Knoll, so we didn't end up hiking any more mountains there. Although we did discover there was a Granite Skywalk at the nearby Porongurup NP, so we tried to break down the lactic acid in our muscles a couple of days later by completing that hike. Fortunately, during this period we were staying near Mount Barker which has lots of wineries and an amazing bakery, so we were still able to find plenty of things to occupy our time during our "recovery" days.
We then made our way down to Cape Le Grand NP which is situated just outside of Esperance. This is one of the places we were most excited to visit during our time on the south coast, as so many people rave about the beaches down this way. The beaches around Esperance are by far the most beautiful we have seen in our trip around Australia with crystal clear waters, which are still somehow a vibrant blue colour, and white sand beaches. Our absolute favourite beach is Wharton Beach, which is so incredibly beautiful, although I don't think there is such a thing as an "ugly beach" down this way! We are going to spend a couple more days around Esperance, where we hopefully get some warm temperatures to explore some more beaches, before we make our way up to Kalgoorlie.
Kodak Moments
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| We were feeling pretty cocky, posing with the summit in the background, when we started the hike! - Bluff Knoll |
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| After a thousand stops, and even more complaining (mostly from me) we eventually made it to the summit! - Bluff Knoll |
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| Not a bad view over the Stirling Ranges - Bluff Knoll |
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| Did you even see a "balancing rock" if you didn't get a photo trying to push it over? - Porongurup NP |
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| We had a few fun obstacles to get through before we reached the skywalk. - Porongurup NP |
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| Enjoying the view from the granite skywalk. - Porongurup NP |
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| We have seen a lot of road signs to look out for these endangered birds in WA, so it was awesome to actually see a malleefowl up close! - Ongerup |
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| There is nothing better than white sand and crystal clear water! - Lucky Bay |
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| Nothing like a steep climb up a granite rock to wake you up in the morning! - Frenchman Peak |
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| We made it to the summit...and as you can see from Will's hair it was a bit windy! - Frenchman Peak |
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| How are these colours even possible?? - Wharton Beach |
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