After staying another day in the car (we really underestimated the distances) we arrived at Coral Bay. After visiting the city (2 campgrounds and 1 hotel) we went to the beach: a beach with white sand and amazing crystal-clear turquoise water and corals. Unfortunately the corals reachable by swimming were dead and only a few colorful fishes were seen. In order to see nice colorful corals, we would have to take a boat to go further offshore. But we didn’t have time to do so, because around noon we had to continue our journey towards our next stop: Exmouth

Coral Bay in the evening

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Finally we arrived at our very first national park. Kalbarri is a little fishing village, mainly consisting of hotels, hostels and camping grounds and of course a supermarket. But of course this concept exists everywhere where tourists appear so it was neither the first we saw nor the last one we’ll see. There is another funny characteristic of the villages along the coral coast. Most of them seem to have their own tradition in feeding one specific animal. Usually it began in the 40’s or 50’s when fishermen fed marine animals with the remaining of their caught and by the time research centers and a touristic attraction developed. The chosen animal in Kalbarri are the pelicans, which come every morning at 8:45 to be fed and seen by almost all guests staying in town. However we skipped this “event” and were obfuscating the pelicans in the evening without interruption.

To cut a long story short we arrived at the camping ground at Kalbarri in order to start exploring the national park. By the way, camping grounds in Australia are usually well equipped. All of them where we stayed had a Camper’s Kitchen with Barbecue, stove, microwave, water boiler, toaster and fridge, which is very comfortable if you stay there with a tent like we did.

Ok so now the national park (I know, finally 😛 ): We already heard from people that some national parks have unsealed roads or can only be explored with a 4WD. That’s why we asked the park ranger if our vehicle would survive in the conditions of the park. She told us “it’s fine, just a bit bumpy”. Maybe the biggest understatement EVER!!! It’s hard to describe how we felt driving on a rolled sandy road with potholes everywhere. We nearly stopped and often thought about giving it a miss, but we crawled over the road with 10-20 kph always hoping the car will not simply break into pieces. Finally we arrived at the “Loop Walk” (a sealed car parking area :-/ ) and were inspecting our car for damages. Luckily we couldn’t find any of them (Hopefully the car rental company won’t find any as well, since unsealed roads are not included in the insurance). However, it was definitely worth going there and the return was much easier with the knowledge that other similar cars also did the road without damages.

The national park itself can be summarized shortly and hopefully the pictures will do the remaining. Ages ago a river cut a gorge in the sand stone which curls through the park. It built some extraordinary formations such as the “Loop” (a loop like part of the river) or the “Z-Band” (a nearly perfect formed Z with nearly vertical edges). Another one is the “Natural Window” a formation in the stone – like the name implies – forming a window to the “Loop”. The Kalbarri NP is an impressive huge bush land. You can’t even imagine the end even if you are staying on a high lookout.

The next day, there was another drive on the schedule, going to Coral Bay (appr. 700km), let’s see how the story continues…

Oops, I nearly forgot something: By the time of arriving in Kalbarri we saw the first viable kangaroo!!!! In fact there were three of them, eating from the waste….

The "Pink Lake" right on the way to Kalbarri

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One has to know that Perth is the most isolated city in the world. You recognize it just by driving further out of Perth. Then you easily find villages being over 600km away from each other and in-between no civilization beside so called “Roadhouses” providing a fuel station and service area. A comparison illustrates the distances pretty nice: the next metropolis Adelaide is around 2700km away from Perth. Melbourne and Sidney are 3900km and. 4000km away from Perth, respectively (this equals the distance between Madrid and Moscow).
Using our small rented Mitsubishi, we were going up the West coast to the North. Driving on the left hand side and the automatic engine produced some difficulties, but driving a lot they were quickly overcome…
We were hoping to finally see some kangaroos on the street, but everything you see during the day is just dead kangaroos, cows (partially also dead), sheep and goats. So the first rendezvous with a kangaroo was still outstanding.
Another curiosity on Australian highways are so called “Road Trains”, tremendous trucks with 3 or more trailers (on the highways we used, they were allowed to have a maximum of 36.5m length). So overtaking or passing one of these Road Trains was really windy in our small car. 🙂
The farer we were moving away from Perth, the emptier the highways became. Sometimes 10 minutes passed before seeing the next car. Of course, everyone then greets each other 😉 However, it’s not too surprising, because due to its mines Perth is a very rich city and therefore all citizens have enough money for just taking the plane, since every “city” (meaning 3000 citizens or more) has a small airport.
Of course also the landscape changes from time to time during such an Odyssey. There are bushes and dunes next to the coast, steps more likely in the inner country and shiny red sand stone while going to Karijini National Park. All of them are cut through by the straight streets whose endings is sometimes only imaginable at the horizon.
One gets the feeling staying in a second America, one which is like you’ve always imagined. On the one hand side the endless roads and on the other hand side country music in the radio and inside the Roadhouses including cowboy look and Wild Western flair. We are going to explore if America will be able to beet this 😉

Street everywhere, as far as you can see...

Nun also (endlich) in Australien gelandet… Anschließend 2 Stunden warten am Zoll, Drogenkontrolle (mit Drogenspürhund), eine 1-stündige Busfahrt Richtung Stadt und schon waren wir bei unserem 2. Couchsurfing Host angekommen: Brodie, in unserem Alter, ein unglaublich netter und witziger Australier, mit einem ähnlichen Sinn für sarkastischen Humor wie ich (und dafür muss man nun extra nach Australien…). Von seinem Penthouse-Apartment (anders kann man es wirklich kaum beschreiben) mitten in der Stadt haben wir dann auch versucht all das nervige organisatorische Zeug wie Bank-Konto, Steuer-, Sozialversicherungs- und Handynummer zu erledigen, was dann am zweiten Tag auch ganz gut geklappt hat. (Übrigens kann ich jedem nur empfehlen mit einem Nachtflug über Dubai nach Australien zu fliegen, Jetlag war quasi nicht vorhanden).

Nach einem Nachmittag am Strand (Cottlesloe Beach, Brodies Geheimtip 🙂 ) und einem Ausflug in den Kings Park von Perth waren unsere 5 Tage bei Brodie auch schon wieder vorbei und wir zogen um nach South Perth in die Suburbs. Und dann auch gleich die dritte super Erfahrung mit Couchsurfing: Mike & Michelle. Das Wochenende war leider ziemlich verregnet, aber die beiden haben sich trotzdem zwei tolle Ausflüge überlegt. Sie fuhren mit uns gleich nach der Ankunft nach Fremantle, um uns die kleine Fischerstadt mit einer wirklich schönen Brauerei zu zeigen. Abends gings dann gleich weiter mit den beiden und ihrem Mitbewohner Robby zu einer Hausparty einer ihrer Freunde. Schon wieder zeigte sich wie unglaublich freundlich die Australier eingestellt sind, wir wurden sofort ohne jegliches Zögern in die Gruppe aufgenommen (wir können jetzt auch mit Fug und Recht behaupten betrunkene Australier verstehen zu können 😉 ) und haben viele gute Tipps bekommen.

Am noch verregneteren Sonntag haben sich Mike und Michelle einen Ausflug ins Swan Valley, einem Anbau- und Verkaufsgebiet für quasi alles zwischen Whiskey und Schokolade, überlegt. Und dann ging es los mit der Probiererei: verschieden Kaffeesorten, Schokoladen, Marmeladen, Essig- und Ölsorten, Käse, Wein, Nougat, Nüsse und Rum… ein absolut gelungener Nachmittag, der nur noch damit gekrönt wurde, dass die beiden für uns gekocht haben. Unglaublich nett diese Australier!!

Danach ging es dann an die Planung für die nächste Woche. Nachdem wir leider auf die Schnelle keinen weiteren Couchsurfer organisieren konnten, sollte es in den Norden Australiens weitergehen, am Besten mit Camping. Unsere drei Hosts boten uns dann auch noch eine weitere Nacht in ihrem Haus an, um gemütlich unsere nächste Woche planen zu können.

Nach ein wenig hin und her entschieden wir uns für einen Mietwagen für zwei Wochen mit dem Ziel Exmouth und Karijini National Park, sowie alle schönen Punkte unterwegs wie Shark Bay und Monkey Mia. Mike und Michelle boten uns an ihre Camping-Ausrüstung (Zelt, Iso-Matten, Küchenutensilien und Schnorchelausrüstung) mitzunehmen und so ausgerüstet geht es dann morgen los in das Abenteuer Outback.

View of our first host's balcony