Kalbarri

I thought we would never get out of Geraldton today.  The car was having a service, while we passed time doing school at the local library (luckily it was a great one) for a few hours.  Following this, we chose to do groceries over lunch hour (bad choice) and then, just as we thought we were on our way, we realised we had forgotten to get petrol, so back into town we went.  Funnily enough, as we drove out of the town, who should we run into?  The Bucknell’s – who appear to run on the same clock as us!  It certainly makes for easy travel companions, and Ben and Dunc enjoyed chatting on the two-way all the way to Kalbarri.  A beautiful friendship has indeed formed.

The next day, a well-intended early departure saw us arrive at “the loop” in Kalbarri National Park, where we were going to very courageously take on an 8km walk around a gorge… Lunch packed, and more water than we cared to carry, we set off – 700m to the start point across the top of a ridge and we were ready for a rest to take in the incredible view.  Yep it was one of those days.  After some photos, we climbed down the cliff and trudged through the sand to the water – where we again stopped for a rest and to cool down – the temp was high and we were all feeling it.  I have to admit – the kids were doing Ok, but even I was feeling the heat and struggled to talk as we walked.  Doubts began to creep in as to how far we push it.  Nat’s “doomby doomby “song helped us on our way, and soon we arrived at our lunch spot, exhausted and ready to stop.  Out came Dunc’s gps – to discover that perhaps we had made it only 2kms down the track.  Wow.  11:30 and the heat was high.  Enough said – we were turning back.  We finally collapsed back at the car park at around 1:30pm.  Ben ran to the car to source more water from the fridge – as we had all run out.  We sat around and munched on some of Bens’ muesli bar slice in disbelief at the heat, and marvelled at Nick’s efforts -walking back with kilos of sand in his shoes, as he took them off and created his own sand pit.  Oh well – we didn’t make the 8 km loop, but we did make memories.

lunch break

the window.  we were still quite fresh here.
(notice Larina in the backpack, Thanks Francesca!)

Sam is just a natural

On the drive home, we stopped in to check out the “Z bend” (another gorge) – and Nat, Dunc and Ben and I took it in turns to run down the 500m to the viewing platform – so the kids could remain in the air conditioned cars. (we would have had a serious mutiny if we had suggested they get out and come with us!)

The following day, we packed up the vehicles to move on, stopping on the way at another look out.  Nick was devastated when he dropped his thong through the barrier, so Ben bravely climbed around the fence to rescue it. (despite his fear of heights – what a Dad.  Our hero.)

Ben - rescuing Nicks' thong