We are on holiday!

Sunday 28th August

It rained on and off through the night, and we woke to a wet tent, inside and out. 🫤 We need to work out the best way to avoid the moisture build up inside the tent on damp nights. This time I was under the drip line, though I just got out of the way by scooting in next to Bonnie under the window, and went back to sleep!

After breakfast Richie took the kids to the river for a Pelican feeding session – run by volunteers in town. Bonnie and Otis both got to throw a fish to one very well fed Pelican, which they loved!

We left our wet tent behind and headed off to the inland section of Kalbarri National Park for the day. I was interested in doing the Z-bend river trail, which is a described as a 2.6km class 4 – challenging – walk, with lots of rock climbing, which sounded perfect for the rock obsessed kids! 😂

The walk is absolutely stunning! First stop is a lookout over the river gorge, which is incredible! Then you climb down to the river itself, passing between giant walls of rock, with ladders installed in some of the trickier spots. Wildflowers all along the way of course! The Murchison River is beautiful – had the day been warmer we would have had a swim but we were walking through occasional showers and not really feeling like jumping in! Some heavier rain started when we reached the river, and we initially scrambled about trying to find a cave we could all fit in, but it passed soon enough. We had a long lazy lunch sitting on the rocks, interrupted for a little while by a drone (which has become a familiar site). Whilst I can appreciate they have many uses professionally, as a recreational device they are incredibly irritating and feel invasive! I rate them with jet skis for annoyance!

We eventually made the climb back out of the gorge. Both kids did fantastically and managed on their own. Otis even gained a bit of a fan club as he powered on up! This has definitely been an amazing place to stop! We feel like we missed a lot, particularly in the Kimberleys, by not having a 4WD to access the gorges and rivers – we feel like Kalbarri somehow makes up for it, what a stunning place!

From here we headed onto the skywalk – very luckily dodging a speeding fine on the way and receiving a caution from a friendly officer! 😬 The skywalk is a viewing structure jutting out over a part of the river. The structure is very impressive in itself and must have cost millions! There’s also a great collection of animal sculptures around representing the local wildlife past and present, including long extinct giant scorpion-like arthropods!

Next we checked out nature’s window – by this stage the kids were feeling pretty exhausted but at 1km it was a short walk. Though with stairs and some scrambling on rocks it did take a bit of effort and concentration! The ‘window’ – a hole in the rock that looks onto the river, is beautiful. A young english couple kindly took our photo, and we spent a while chatting with them, hearing about their travels, getting jobs here and there to boost finances!

A couple that we saw and chatted to at each of the walks had explained that Kalbarri was hit badly by the cyclone last year. Coming back into town that explained the trees about the place – which all appear to be severely pruned, and the number of properties fenced off. Apparently a lot of accommodation venues were badly damaged and it is difficult to find somewhere to stay now. Quite a few other businesses are also closed.

Back at the campground, Richie and Bonnie grabbed a bag of cockles and went fishing. I waited for Otis to wake up from a car nap, and we played at the playground until dark. The fishing unfortunately yielded no results at all – which surprised me, it looked promising for some reason! So we had a late dinner in the camp kitchen watching a Harry Potter movie, then off to bed for a drier nights sleep!