Travelling Round: Australia Trip 2012_Part 2 Red Bluff to Hervey Bay

We decided after much thought to resume our trip from our last destination before my father was taken to hospital and later passed away. After a couple of days in Perth and Mandurah with friends and family we travelled back up to Carnarvon via the inland route from Perth, stayed one night on the banks of the Merchison River before heading up to New beach just south of Carnarvon where we decided to head up to Red Bluff which is located on Quobba Station.

First things first, pick Rascal from the kennels in Perth, he was happy to see us but did play the silent game for a few hours to show his disgust at being left behind.

New Beach south of Carnarvon, the start of the wind.

Found this turtle head and skeleton washed up on the beach next morning before we left.

The tide came in a little close over night.

Helen at the Quobba blow holes.

Our camp site at Red Bluff on Quobba Station.

On the way up to Gnaraloo Bay and Station via the coast track.

Gnaraloo Bay

The track out off Red Bluff

This is a Road Train, on the Haul Road.

HMAS Sydney memorial on Quobba Station

While in this area we went to Monkey Mia (disappointed with the commercialisation) stayed at Denham, than moved on to Hamelin Pools where we headed out to Steep Point.

One of the sharks at Shark World near Denham.

Near Eagle Bluff

Shell Beach

The turn off to Steep Point

Airing down at the Steep Point and False Entrance intersection. The road to this point is very good and is about 130 km from the last photo.

First sandhill in and a Nissan and boat had bogged, luckily another family had worked around him lower down and was in the process of snatching him again, this took about another 3 snatches and than the next sandhill was the same.

Well we finally got over the hill after assisting the other car help the guy with the boat, we found out that his "mates" had gone on ahead thinking he could get through.

The beach run on the way to Steep Point.

We finally made it, one more off the bucket list and now to explore the coast and blowholes.

Standing on the western edge of Australia looking north towards Dirk Hartog Island.

Looking south from the first blowholes near Steep Point

One of the many side tracks looking towards Sandy Point

The turn off to the Zuytdorp cliffs coast track at Sandy Point, we had to come back to here so we could get down to Thunder Bay along the inland route.

Helen looking down the coast, the ranger had advised us the coast track to Thunder Bay would be suspect due to the high winds that had and were still being experienced and we should take the sign posted turn off above. The sand on the track she advised was most likely going to be blown out exposing the sharp limestone or worse.

Some of the many blow holes in the area.

The track along the coast, no sand just exposed limestone along this section

We came across this memorial cairn recording the site where a trawler sank when it hit the coast back in the 60's. The cairn is marked below where the plane is on our maps. The blue line is our track

heading further south along the coast track starting to get into the coastal end of the sand ridges.

The track, photo's don't do this justice. The sand had blown out of the left wheel track which the car kept wanting to slide into and also the bank. We kept going for another few ridges which is well past where the track disappears in this photo before we turned around as the track disappeared into a large hole that had the sand blown out. Had we been with another vehicle we would have continued but with no winch points or something to recover off we backed out to find another way round to Thunder Bay. The next shot shows how far down we travelled on the coast track before backtracking.

The blue line is our track from Steep Point along the coast heading down to Thunder Bay, the cliff track and the alternate route to the Thunder Bay track are in this shot. The brown track to the right of the marker is the main track we came in on and head back along to get to False Entrance later in the day.

The track did not appear to have been used lately but we went up to the blow holes from Thunder Bay.

Thunder Bay

Good day for the blow holes as the wind and was coming in from the coast and the swell was up. We got in but getting out was going to be a different story, the track was one of those that once you started you had no choice but keep going as we were decending and going around a bend.

3 of the big blow holes in the area.

A closer look at one of the smaller blow holes.

nothing like a good show, even the big one near Helen at the top of the hill went off a little.

A view down the coast from the blow holes.

Now to find a way out.

Heading back out to the main track to go down to False Entrance.

The beach at False Entrance, the blowholes are over the headland and further down the coast.

Parked above one set of blow holes which we saw on the rock shelf below.

We thought that these were pretty impressive

until we could see spray coming up over the hill

so we went and investigated further, give you an idea of the wind the car is stationary.

How much fun is this, sitting between two blowholes and the whole rock shelf shakes each time they go off, which was pretty regular not to mention the sound that was being generated.