Driving through the Stirling Ranges National Park reminded me of my first trip to New Zealand with the alpine setting of low scrub and beautiful vistas through mountain passes. We spent a luxurious day driving the range and taking photos while quickly jumping back in the truck as it was cold and windy!
Camp that night was on the other side of the range at Moingup
Springs with a view of the Toolbrunup peak. We arrived unusually early for an end to our travel days and I wondered how Matt would occupy himself. But alas, he found a golf club at the campsite - even left handed! He went about finding enough karri tree nuts to use as balls and whittled one down as a tee and away he went knocking them straight out to the mountain top!
A beautiful sunset on the peak and we were off to sleep to prep for our morning hike. It was meant to be Bluff Knoll as the largest peak in the south of WA but the peak was covered in clouds so we opted for Mt Trio closer by and gleaming in the sun. It was perfect hiking weather in the brisk wind with sun and clouds mixing perfectly enough to keep us warm and not sunburnt. A Skype video call with the folks from the summit and back down the way we came (via a very steep descent).
After the hike, we were destined for Wave Rock - a granite
mound formed in the shape of one giant wave. The journey there was through the Australian wheatfields on every dirt track we could find. Our only other vehicle sightings in 3 hours were farmers or silos on the move at harvest time - it was a good day!
The last 10km to Hyden was a locust swarm with one lodging itself straight in the bulls skeleton nostril on the front of Albert. We had the same swarm heading back out of town the next day - something about harvest and the weather timing.
The drive back to the coast from Wave Rock had a mirror goal of dirt, but this time slightly further east we had Dragon Rocks Nature Reserve and Frank Han National Park as our journey.
As for Wave Rock itself, a giant rock in the shape of a wave. We surfed it
and left. The town has implemented an interesting way to collect drinking water with a cement wall at the top of the rock's edge which feeds into a dam on the other side of the rock - inventive indeed for this rustic town.
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